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Saturday, October 9, 2010

ORNAMENTS FOR NATION'S CHRISTMAS TREE!


This week, a small group of Laramie artists gathered at the Martin's Glass House studio to
make ornaments for the Nation's Christmas tree in Washington, DC.

Yesterday I dropped off the ornaments at the Forest Service office in Laramie.

We thought that yesterday was going to be the deadline - but the newspaper yesterday had an announcement from the Forest Service in Casper that there is a one-week extension on getting all the ornaments turned in to the Forest Service. So, today - Saturday - we will be creating more!

This first ornament (above) is one that I created.

It is a 9" clear circle with glass scraps on both sides. Can you see the star on it? I am hoping it's easy enough to see!

The 9" and larger ornaments are supposed to be displayed on the 67-foot tree that will be the main tree in Washington - I think at the White House (?). There are several other smaller trees that will be in offices around Washington, DC, so smaller ornaments are supposed to be used on those trees.

Here are the rest of the ornaments we made. After everyone left, Phil and I created a few more ornaments to fill up both kilns.

These are the rest of the 9" ornaments...


Lisa's Ornament.

Can you see the star? Look for it!

Lisa said her sister lives close to Washington DC, so she's hoping her sister can get there to make sure that huge tree has her ornament on it!

I hope her sister will take photos of ALL our ornaments on the huge tree!





This is Patty's large (9") ornament.

The theme for ornaments this year is "Forever West".

This one looks, to me, like a mountain with clouds in the sky and a lot of rivers or lakes...

What do you see in it?






Here is Patty's smaller ornament.

The size is about 5-6".

Dots and Frit...

Red, White and Blue...

Cool!






This is Julie's large ornament.

Sort of an abstract Christmas tree. White frit for snow on the green boughs.

Julie had never done anything like glass fusing before.

Great job for her first time, don't you think?






This is Julie's smaller ornament. The small ornaments are made out of 4" circles.

Another great job! Very colorful!

(So much excitement for Julie at our house lately... She was here last week when our epiphyllum bloomed - again. The epiphyllum bloomed in early August, and again last week. So cool! I'll post some photos of that later.)







Julie brought her friend Jenny with her...

This is one of Jenny's large ornaments. I don't know when she found time to do two of them - and a smaller one - but, she did!

Isn't this great? Using scraps of glass, Jenny found a piece that had had a tree cut out of it! So, there is is right in the middle - a Christmas tree on an ornament!

Good job, Jenny!



This is Jenny's other large ornament.

I see mountains, clouds, lakes... a golf course, too... in it.

What do you see?









This is Jenny's small ornament.

A tree on one side - with frit snow on the tree.
The other side is red and blue - sort of a starburst effect. With the snow, it looks Red, White and Blue.

How creative!







And speaking of creative... Look what Phil made!

He found a piece lying on the table that was a rejected shawl pin. Clarifying with me that I wasn't going to be using it, he used it on this small ornament. Cute, huh?

I really like it when he gets involved in these projects. He really has some creative ideas for a comical (I mean chemical) engineer, don't you think? :-)

Trying to make up for destroying a 24"x24" piece of amber glass for one project by using a scrap laying around on the table....


This is a small ornament that I made.

Supposed to be the sun and sunset, over mountains, amber waves of dry grasses, a lake, a river, a few green trees ...

This is Wyoming. This is the West.






This is another small ornament I made.

A tree with a star... and the sun... and some splashes of sunsets.

The West.








This is one of the snowmen ornaments (small) that I usually make.

The traditional image with the corn cob pipe and a stove pipe hat. Later for Christmas this year, though, I think I'll work on making some with western hats.

This particular snowman has brown eyes instead of eyes made out of "coal".

I will never forget the year that I made a snowman with blue eyes. It looked just like Bing Crosby.

I wonder who has that snowman now...

And this is another ornament I made - just to fill up the kiln quickly. Just pieces of scrap glass. No particular "meaning" to it.

Maybe you see something I don't see?