This was a great beginners class to stained glass! I used smaller pieces of scrap glass that I bought from a local glass shop.

Gluing the pattern piece to the glass didn't work well for me. When I took the piece to the grinder to smooth the edges, the water soaked through the paper making it soggy/disintegrate, and then started washing away the glue and made the piece really slippery. I used printer paper, so maybe that wasn't the right material - but it's what I had available.

Here is the butterfly all cut out and foiled, ready for soldering. I really love the iridescent sheen on the body!

When soldering, I tried to get a thick smooth bead. Getting a nice bead along the outside edges was difficult. Overall, I think it turned out pretty good for my first try at soldering!

Here is the butterfly with the light shining through it. I love how the subtle texture/pattern in the glass really shows through.

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I took everything I learned from this course and basic butterfly project, and went on to create a second project - a custom pet portrait.

I designed this custom pet portrait based on a photo of my family's dog. It ended up being ~35 pieces total.

I used Pebeo Vitrea 160 glass paint to add some extra details to the eyes and paint the name on the bone. This project used 8 types of glass:

1. Clear water glass with a rainbow iridescent sheen
2. Red glass with little bubbles in it for the heart
3. Solid Black for the cheeks/face/nostrils
4. Dark gray streaky glass for the nose
5. Tan glass glass for the outer cheeks and body
6. Dark streaky brown for the ears and top of the head
7. Rich brown glass for the eyes
8. Streaky white glass for the bone

Here is the inspiration for this project: Trooper, an English Mastiff

Using this photo, I created this design in Adobe Illustrator. I added in some color to help determine what colors/styles of glass I wanted to use. I also wanted the piece to have some dimension, so the bone will actually be soldered on top of everything else.

Here is the cutting/grinding in progress and trying to make all of the pieces fit together. In the butterfly project, I struggled when grinding because the glued pieces disintegrated in water. For this project, I instead traced all of the pattern pieces onto the glass with Sharpie markers.

One BIG lesson I learned is that if I trace them onto glass, I need to cut on the INSIDE of the traced lines. I cut on the outside of the traced lines and spent hours at the grinder trying to make all of the pieces fit together. Some fit really nicely, some I accidentally over-grinded and caused some gaps. I outlined where some of the larger gaps are from over-grinding:

Despite the gaps, the piece looks pretty good and is ready for soldering!

All soldered up and ready to be hung! Or maybe I will add black patina and polish it.