May Project for the Garden

Is it the last day of May already? I'm beginning to wonder how time keeps slipping away from me, the older I get. Time has had a way of eluding me lately, and I'm not sure how it slips out of my grasp so easily. Well, one last day to get the monthly Blog in. I'll make it short and sweet. 

Our garden sign from a couple years ago looked new, but needed a face lift this year.

This month has been so busy around the yard, sprucing up the trees, bushes and lawns, and planting the seasonal flowers and garden. After Old Man Winter has had his way with our landscape, it takes a lot of determination and effort to stay on top of such a large piece of property and the work that comes with it. Russ was busy with his own projects this month, so I managed to create a glass project of my own to spruce up the garden blocks. I was tired of repainting the garden sign every year, because of sun damage, so I decided to go with glass this year to see if it would last a little longer. 

Sanding old paint off the wood block.

First I had to sand down the old paint on the wood blocks. Then I re-stained the wood blocks. Next, I used our glass cutters and cut letters out of pieces of glass scrap left over from previous projects. I fused the lettering in the kiln overnight.

Cutting lettering from glass scraps.

Then I coated the glass molds with MR 97, a mold release spray used to help the glass frit come out of the molds, once they are fused and slumped in the kiln.

Glass molds need to be sprayed before use.

Next, I used a variety of crushed glass frit to fill the molds. I used butterflies, dragonflies, ladybug and flower molds for this project. 

A selection of crushed glass frit was used to fill the molds.

 And the picture below is the final project. Kind of whimsical by design, and hopefully will stand up to the harsh high desert climate for more than a year this time. 

Completed whimsical Garden blocks made with glass.

Well, that's about it for this month's blog. Now I'm headed out the door to ship more orders we processed off the website this busy month of  May. Until next time, happy gardening!