This is the first in a series of simple pattern blogs for you to enjoy. Wheat Bundle is a graphic representation of a handful of wheat gathered together in the center. The corn ends are both top and bottom. Great for the home symbolizing strength and prosperity.

This pattern is a great project for the beginner or the weekend hobbyist. With only 45 pieces and all straight cuts this on is quick to put together. I recommend using your Morton Cutting system if you have one. If not - it may be time to get one.

Here are a couple versions of what this piece looks like finished. Of course you will want to choose you own glass. In Agent Orange I used 1″ square bevels and center 3 bars were substituted for a 2″ square bevel.

Posting stained glass patterns are a courtesy to my fans and customers so please respect that the Wheat Bundle pattern is intellectual property of White Raven Studio, is protected by copywrite and is intended to be used for personal or educational use only. Please send me a photo if you make one and I will post it in this blog. Be sure to subscribe to the White Raven blog RSS feed so you can receive future releases of patterns, tips, show notes, etc.

If you haven’t seen it yet, please view “The Making Of A Piece” where I constructed Agent Orange in about 4 hours start to finish (the video is less than 4 minutes).

Please leave a comment below or sign my guest book, I’d love to hear from you.

Wow! What a fun weekend. This was our first one-day show. And most successful show to date. Typically we have overlooked one day venues in the past because of the amount of work necessary to set up and tare down. But this show has changed our thinking and we know now that it is well worth the effort.

First of all Chardon Square does not seem like much of a town. Perhaps smaller than Mount Vernon. Chardon is the county seat for Geauga County which generates the most activity today besides agriculture from what I understand. But this town has a charming downtown square area (park) the spans several blocks with business flanking the sides and the proud courthouse prominently seated at one end. Paved paths, an impressive center pavilion, elaborate lamp stands, and mature shade trees make for an ideal setting for an art show.

Welcome to our new baby! This is Raven, our new (used) cargo van. It’s a 2001 Chevy Astro. What a blessing. How nice it is to comfortably pack everything in to the cargo area with just a few poles on the roof rack. It drives nice and is fun to sit in cause you are up high. Not to mention the price was dropped $1000 right before we purchased it. She’s an old retired fleet vehicle and was quite dirty inside - but a weekend of cleaning and she’s good as new.

We didn’t change much with our canopy - pretty much the same layout as the Westerville show. I think the location helped though. At the Westerville show we had a pond directly opposite us. This time we were in sort of a cultisack where you could get a nice view from the opposite side. Perhaps this setting and the dramatic focus of the decorative swag caused people to notice the Victorian Cheval piece hanging in the rear. We sold that same piece twice that day. Now we have to make one for the second sale.

Another treat was my sister-in-law Sandy and her husband Mark came to visit. They are the center two in the photo. They live a few miles up the road in Painesville. Sandy said this was her first time at an art festival and had a wonderful time.

Thanks to Sandy we sold Blue Danube. We had that one still packed in the case but Lorry wanted to show her because Sandy likes blue. Sandy insisted that we hang it, so we put away Solomon’s Carpet. A little later Ken - A local Math teacher came by and said he had to have it and even though it wasn’t the exact dimensions of his window he would make it work. Thank you Sandy and thank you Ken - you are a blessing. I recently got into Sudoku puzzels and this piece makes me think of Soduko because of the grid layout based on nine. Perhaps this is why Ken likes it - however Sodoku is more of a logic game then math.

This is the only new piece we rolled out since Westerville. Northern Pointe is a remake of Fandango in different colors. We sold Fandango the week it was made at the Delaware Art Festival and only got one poor quality photograph of it. I been wanting to make another ever since. This one has a square bevel in the center - the original round. I didn’t have any more round bevels the right size. I think the square works very well as an alternative. It nice to be able to make adjustments on the fly.

Here are a few more shots of our work.

Oh, and props to Avalon Gardens, a beautiful Bed & Breakfast just a few miles west of Chardon. We stayed Saturday night there. We regret that we didn’t have more time to enjoy the garden center and we had to miss breakfast for setup. Thanks Carol for a wonderful time.

Westerville, a Sweet and Sour experience. This Olympic event tested our endurance from several angles but in the end we had fun and did well. My first endurance test - the mile hike from the exhibitor parking lot - where are the golf cart shuttles? By the time one passed me I was halfway back to my tent and the cart was full. I think they were just driving around telling people they would come back for them. These kinds of services they either need to do right or not bother.

This time of year, early/mid July seems to be the season of unpredictability. First it started off very humid and I was soaked after my hike and setting up. I’ve learned to bring an extra shirt to change into right before the show starts. Then in the afternoon several short storms popped up that had us scrambling for the tarps. One of my framed bird series tried to take flight but only toppled over the edge of the table. Thankfully it wasn’t damaged. That evening we packed all of our glass up, secured the canopy, and said a prayer knowing that more storms were coming through durning the evening.

Sunday morning we arrived and all was still standing - but very wet. Yeah, I love wet feet - especially my socks, which quickly came off after I was done setting up. But what a surprise! Dragonflies in our canopy. Apparently several dragonflies decided to use our canopy as shelter to hatch. I don’t know if they come up from the pond or the ground. Apparently they like to crawl several inches or feet up onto a vertical surface then shed their old shell. They hung around for several hours while their wings dried out.

This show I introduced several new low cost items and Lorry prepared some very impressive “typical Lorry large” panels. These “Basket Weave” panels sold for $50 and were available in several colors. Saturday, I sold two of them.

Featured Panels

Solomon’s Carpet

Dragon’s Lair

Age of Antiquity

Ginger Snap

Centerburg resident, college student and friend Amy Scarbrough recently gave me this video and I just figured out how to upload it to the internet. She had chosen White Raven Studio as a business to develop graphics and media content for her portfolio project. One Saturday a couple weeks ago she came over to our studio and brought her video camera and lighting equipment and in several hours we had footage. I planned a small stained glass panel project from start to finish. I call it Agent Orange based on its color and a current Sierra Mist promotion for the new “Get Smart” movie.

This 3 minute video demonstrates a steps involved in making a copper foil (tiffany style) stained glass panel including: the process I use to make patterns, cutting glass with a Morton System, grinding glass on a Gryphon grinder, soldering, washing, patina, and polishing.

This video is posted on Yahoo Video:
http://video.yahoo.com/watch/2809209/8157048

as well as YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82lUPupZr5o

If you view it, please drop a comment on the video site or this blog - I’d love to hear from you!

Wow, what a fun weekend we had at Spring Show at Sunbear Studio in Center Village, Ohio this last weekend. It started off looking like it was going to be another one of those “trying” weekends concerning the weather. Friday night there was a big storm coming in so we decided to set up our canopy frame only. The next morning we arrived early to put the top on and to hang our stained glass. We put our new pieces inside the studio and used our canopy to display our older work that we’ve had on display at Sunbear Gallery from time to time. It was a very muggy morning and I was a bucket of sweat in no time. Thankfully we had the airconditioned studio gallery to seek refuge in from time to time. Lorry and I didn’t need to stick around so we went home to run some errands and for me put something dry on.

This show featured the Westerville Art League (WAL) and from what I understand this will be Ruth Smilan’s last event as President of this organization. One side of this small cozy gallery was devoted to displaying original works of art by the WAL members.

The topic was “An Unusual Approach to Still Life” or something like that. Knowing me I probably got it wrong.

Renon Hulet had the showstopper work of art in acrylics that hung centered on the wall featured backlit sheer garments on a clothes rack as if you were looking out from within a mom’s closet on a bright sunny day. Renon with her painting behind her - the large one.

WAL artists who participated included: Lorene Andrews, Sandy Bloom, Carolee Brown, Dianne Capoccia, Jann Carr, Angela Hard, Renon Hulet, Lee Padula, Gail Paulus, Sue Sarber and Ruth Smilan.

Other points of interest…

Heston’s Greenhouse and Florist provided hanging basket which they were selling. They really livened up the place - amazing what a few flowers will do.

Many shoppers found some great bargains in the sale tent like scarves, prints, cards, jewelry, etc. I had several “Turtle Boxes” not “box turtles” that I had made some years back and never brought out in public because of a change in direction and the decision that doing 3 dimensional items like these took too long to make. They depicted a turtle on the lid in a Native American fashion with the colors of the four directions (red, yellow, black & white) circling the turtle. The turtle lid was hinged with and the bottom compartment had a mirror bottom. I used horse shoe nails for legs which I rolled over the pointed end as a decorative element. Normally I would sell these for $40 and had them marked down to $20 to move them. Realistically they would have to sell for $80+ for it to be worth my while making them. I am glad they found good homes - it’s the kind of item that takes the right person to appreciate and value.

We made some new friend this weekend and got reacquainted with some other artists we see from time to time but have a hard time remembering their names - my fault, not theirs. Cynthia Bryden was there most of the weekend and had on display several of her paintings and greeting cards.

Deirdre Pifer displayed many new works in fused glass. Lorry purchased her pierced moon windchime which is now hanging in our bedroom. I had my eye on this golden yellow and black plate which shouted for attention as you came in the front door (shown bottom shelf, center). Unfortunately it sold before I had a chance to buy it. Hopefully she can make another one.

Bonnie Moseley had several new and stunning works of jewelry - this is about the best photo I got. Lesson learned: when photographing though a glass case use manual focus. The auto focus often will focus on the glass and not the product inside the case.

Potter Josh Shremshock had manny new vases and bowls. I was intreagued by the “stretch” technique and the horsehair detail in the finish. Meredith explained the Josh actually used horse hair in the Raku firing process to create the black squiggly lines on the surface finish.

Laurie Simpson had on display sterling silver chainmaille bracelets and necklaces. Some of these adornments looked like they contained hundreds of links and were quite detailed. Note to self: buy one for Lorry some day.

I got to meet Deirdre’s husband Chris who played acoustic guitar for several hours on Saturday. Sorry Chris that this photo isn’t better focused. Another note to self: use a flash or faster film speed (ISO) when photographing action indoors.

Not to toot my own horn but just a little plug. I was able to help Meredith out by designing this years post card which everyone liked quite well except for Deirdre because I spelled her name wrong - sorry . This card was created on a Mac with with Adobe InDesign CS3. If you or anyone you know ever need graphic design support please let me know - I’d be glad to assist. My online portfolio and graphic design profile is being developed but will be at http://www.whiteravenstudio.com when ready. For now just send me an email and I’ll see what I can do for you.

Wow, nothing like being in a glass house on a windy weekend!

This show ranks #1 for the windiest show we’ve done to date. We were on edge all weekend and was ready to call it quits Saturday night. Saturday evening the show shut down an hour early due to a storm coming in. We hurried to pack up our glass in our padded carrying cases and we decided to lower the canopy top to reduce the chance it would blow away over the evening. Just after we removed the display window frames a strong wind kicked up and lifted the canopy top up and off of the legs. Thankfully Lorry was holding on and gave us enough time to remove the legs and lower the top to the ground. Thanks also to strangers who ran up to help us get our canopy under control. That night I realized the weights were strapped to the legs but the top was not securely fastened to the legs. The next day I brought rope and tied the weights to the canopy top. Lorry is shown doing the Delaware Festival Pose as she clings to the canopy frame.

For many vendors this was a typical pose all weekend - here is our neighbor’s son holding down their canopy. Notice the tarp even blew off at one point.

Thank all who stopped by. We really appreciate our patrons. We met several people who bought work from us last year and came by to let us know how much they enjoy our work in their home. That is a much need encouragement when you are discouraged from the weather.

Being the first major show of the year we had several months to be busy in the studio. We debut several new pieces this weekend - 15 new pieces in total. Above are a few of our new works. Sorry, Turtle Sunday sold that weekend but we can always make another one like it.

Notice our canopy is brand new too - first time out. We love it! It is nice and strong made out of 17 guage - 1 5/8″ galvanized steel poles. It’s by North East Canopy from my home town of Binghamton, NY.

Lorry had about 10 or so friends show up that she works with at Robin Enterprises. That meant a lot to her and she was very pleasantly surprised. Thanks also to Meredith Martin, owner of Sunbear Gallery in Center Village, OH who is a big support and encouragement. Also it was good to see Walter Shockley - Mount Vernon’s premier photographer who came by and gave me a hard time for not working hard enough.

Things to do or consider for future shows:
• Move visitor registry book up front by main traffic area.
• Collect information from other vendors to post on blog.
• Distribute site / blog information.
• Display on custom ordering windows and insulated units.
• Project photo book.