Stained-glass Crosses 2011

Back by popular demand - our stained-glass cross class.

Many people have taken our stained-glass cross class over the years. It is a lot of fun and not as hard as you might think. I'm not saying it's easy, but with some good instruction (if I say so myself, hahaha) you can make a cross just like one of these!

We will meet for three Tuesday nights - Feb. 8, 15 and 22. We'll meet each night from 6:00-8:00 (and probably stay a little after that each night).

The cost is only $40 - which is a great deal! I have all of the tools you will need.

Let me know (call Donna in the church office) if you are interested. I need to order glass soon!

Stained Glass Class - Day 1

Here are a few pics from the first night of our stained-glass class.

Choosing glass is harder than it looks. So many choices! Does this glass look good with that color and texture?

You have to look at glass with light behind it. Sunlight is better but at 6:45 the sun had been down for a long time.

After tracing the pattern on the glass you have to cut it. The first cut is scary.

More cutting and putting the cut pieces on the pattern to make sure it will fit.

Congratulations Brenda!

Many years ago I lived in the rolling hills of Northeast Oklahoma in the great city of Tulsa. My dad was the Minister of Music at Eastwood Baptist Church. It was back in the day of huge youth groups and even bigger youth choirs. There were hundreds - and I mean that literally - in our youth choir. We made lots of friends and went on singing/mission tours and had small ensembles that traveled around singing at revivals... It was great.

When you are active in your youth group you make life-long friends. It has been so much fun being on Facebook and reconnecting with people I haven't seen in twenty years. But somehow - I don't remember right now - before Facebook took off, I had already found some old friends. One of them is Brenda. Cheryl and I moved away from Tulsa when our children were little, but before that I have pictures of Brenda and Richard and Mary and David and Tom and Debbie and so many others at ensemble rehearsals and concerts and holding our babies. It was a really great time in our lives.

Then, when we lived in Denver one of our friends from Tulsa ended up marrying the brother of one of our Denver choir members. (I'm not going with the old cliche "It's a small world" but you can hum it in the background if you want.)

Well... all of that to introduce our winner. If you have been reading along, you know that the person to get to hit 40,000 on the counter down there at the bottom of the page would be our winner. I got a message on Facebook and here on the blog from Brenda H. One of our old friends from Tulsa who later was my dad's secretary and a great choir/ensemble member and friend and she's the one that married the guy who's brother was in Denver. I'm glad she won. She's been a faithful reader of our worship blog for a year or so.

I hope all of this is making sense because I still have a lot of drugs trying to kill off the acute bronchitis and I'm trying real hard to not fall asleep while I type this.

I have an early Christmas present for our 40,000th hit. A little Christmas stained-glass panel. It has pretty swirled green glass and an etched bevel in the middle. (Brenda, I'll get your address on Facebook.)

Stained-glass Class Update

We needed a third night to finish our stained-glass panels. If you've been following along, you know that we are making lovely little windows of a cross. Our students picked some beautiful color combinations and have learned so far how to cut glass, cut lead and put the window together. Last Monday I was headed to the FLC for our last class when I remembered that my camera was on my desk. So I headed over to the office building.

(For our readers around the country - and the world - our office and main campus buildings are about 5 miles or so from our new Family Life Center.)

So I rushed into my office. (Cheryl will have to tell you the story of the manager she was dealing with at work that made us late.) "Oh, look! There are some of my tools. I'll need them. Oh, look! There's the bag with the masks. I'm glad I saw them. Oh good! There are those extension cords." and I hurried out to the car so I could get to the FLC and get things set up for class.

Did you notice in that little paragraph above me saying, "Ah! There's my camera. I'll get some great pictures tonight of our finished projects."?

So the pictures in this post are crosses I have made. I'll have my students send me pictures of their pieces. But we had a few that couldn't make it last Monday, so when we get together to finish their work I'll get pictures.... I hope.

Stained-glass Part 2

All of our stained-glass students are doing very well with their projects!

Look how busy they all look.

We have to get together one more time to finish them up.

Summer Arts - Stained-glass Class

Our stained-glass class started last night. We had 12 new stained-glass artists. Well, "artist" might be a stretch at this point, but they all did real well cutting glass.



Tonight we'll put our windows together with lead.



Everyone had a great time. I remembered my camera right at the end. I'll try to remember to take more pictures tonight.

Summer Arts Sign Up Continues

Summer Arts begin verrrry soon. The water color class is our first class and it is June 16th.

We've had a good start on our sign up for Summer Arts http://hilldaleworship.blogspot.com/2008/05/summer-arts.html Click the link for more info. Call the church office to sign up. Classes are $40 each or $140 for all four (save a little and learn a lot more). What a deal!

Here's a little more of an explanation of what will happen in each class.

Water color - June 16 - We'll learn how water color paints work, try some cool techniques and end up with a lovely painting that is simple enough that anyone can do it, yet interesting enough that more experienced painters will enjoy the project.

Stained-glass - June 23&24 - We'll learn how to make a leaded stained-glass panel. There are several steps which makes this is a two day class. We'll cut glass and lead and learn to solder and more. You must bring your own eye protection. There's nothing worse than getting a sliver of glass in your eye or having some hot solder pop and burn your eye.

Wire Art - June 30 - Fun and easy and you end up with a lovely wire cross to hang in your home.

Clay Creations - July 7 - We'll make a bird feeder shaped like a cat. How fun is that? Each one is different because the sculptor decides the shapes and colors of paint.

Summer Arts

Awaken your creativity! Try something new! Click poster to enlarge

Learn how to paint with watercolors, make a leaded stained-glass panel, do beautiful wire art and create something fun with clay.

You may register for individual classes, or save some money and do all four.

Classes will be held at our new Family Life Center.

Do you have an artistic friend? He/she might be interested too. Tell them about our Summer Arts classes.

Call the church office for more information or send me an e-mail.

Sign up ASAP so we can order supplies.