Angels (revisited)

I have finished my second stained glass project (a beautiful dolphin for my son's room - he loves sea life and his namesake was on Monday, so he got this dolphin frame as a gift) and the lady at the stained glass store / class asked me what do I want to do next.

An older angel - painted on glass
Made with love, in Santa's Shop for my son :)

Well - it's Christmas time so... an Angel seemed a good idea. It took me about half an hour to go through all the books with angels and other Christmas ideas. Of course I got derailed a few times - I almost changed my mind twice; I found this gorgeous landscape with Christmas trees in the snow... decided it'll be too much for just my 3rd project. Back to angels - a cute little one 'jumped' at me from a book. I told myself: it's small, I can do it in no time. It took another 10-15 minutes to pick the glass! Seriously, if someone has a good idea on how to pick the colours... you think it should be simple - but it's not, currently it's my biggest challenge. Try to decide on the colour of the cheruby face of the little cute angel :)

Anyhow, almost one full hour into my session (which runs for 3 hours a day) I had 3 pieces of new glass (I was supposed to use some extras from the dolphin on some areas) and the pattern. Off you go to cut, grind... repeat. The face went OK. The left side of the gold hair - perfect. The right side of the gold hair - had a sharp convex curve. Concave is fine, we can deal with concave. Convex (inside curve) - a completely different story. First cut - broke the tip of the hair. Into the trash it went. Second cut - completely broke the piece in 2... Down into garbage again. Asked Beth (the teacher) for help - she smiles, makes the cut and... oops - third piece down into the trash. By now I feel a little bit better (it wasn't only me!) and Beth is annoyed (how dare you broke on me... in front of my students?!). Forth try is a charm - with a lot of griding :) After this little hiccup - all pieces go just fine... until the last 2 pieces - imagine 2 small triangles, about 1/2" in height, and maybe 1/4" in width... you have to cut & grind those 2 pieces to get into very tight little spots... and foil them on top of that all!

Anyhow - my little angel is almost ready, it's waiting for me to put him/her/it (?!) wings and a base (it's going to be one of those tea-candle holder).

Until I can show you a picture of it - enjoy another angel's voice:

In the arms of an Angel