Glow-in-the-Dark

One of my new favorite glasses is borosilicate glow glass. I can't afford the soft glass that is glow in the dark so I had to go with the boro. It is a very nice flowing glass unlike some boro that is so hard to melt. If you like boro sticks texture then you will love this glass. If you put it out in the sun, the beads will glow for hours.

Silver coring pandora beads and boro heart

I have finally decided to put my expensive Jim Moore coring machine to good use. I have been coring my beads. I screwed up a few because of using the tubing cutter instead of the mini saw I bought at harbor freight. I also cored some unevenly. I don't know why, but when I use a tubing cutter to cut the tubing, it puts dents into the tubing and looks really bad. Even though I have to deburr and pull off some leftover silver when using the harbor freight saw, the tubing ends up looking perfect with no flaws. I deburred and even sanded when using the tubing cutter but I still get flaws so I am going to discontinue even bothering with it.

I also decided to hook my phantom back up to play with boro. I have been trying to make hearts like Mr. Smiley does from his tutorial. Also, I absolutely love encasing with boro, it is so much more pleasant than encasing with soft glass. If I wouldn't miss the colors of soft glass, I probably would stick with boro from now on. You can stick boro right in the flame and it won't crack and fly everywhere. A bead will not crack if you leave it out of the flame too long and then put it back in. It is just a wonderful glass to work with. You will be seeing a lot more boro stuff from me now on. :)

Some beads I did that I like....

I made some beads the other night that I really like. I wish I could torch all day today. When Sebastian goes to preschool I will have so much more time to torch. :)

The sun is actually out today, I almost forgot what the sun looks like. This morning Sebastian said, look the sun is out and the sky is finally blue.

Discouraging Torching....

The last few days have been discouraging as far as beadmaking for me. I have went down to torch 3 days in a row and have only made 1 nice bead. I tried to make a snowman twice from a tutorial on lampwork etc and they both cracked. Soft glass is hard for me, especially white. It gets very soupy really fast and then the bead gets lopsided. Then when I finally get something going, one part of the snowman gets too cold and cracks when I heat it back up. I wish I had more white in boro because boro lets you leave it out of the flame for a long time without cracking. I think people that can make big beads and sculpture with soft glass are really good at what they do. I am just not there yet. It is like the more complicated beads I make the more problems with cracking I have. :( I don't think I am going to torch tonight, it is 19 degrees right now, brrr. I am so tired of the cold already and winter hasn't even started. :( Only a little over 3 more months to go till spring.