Thanks!

Wishing all my friends a day with friends and family, laughter, happiness and of course, someone else doing the dishes!

Happy Thanksgiving....and rest up, because tomorrow starts the shopping season.

Beads For Food - Lampwork Etc. Street Team Promotion

One of my other Etsy Street Teams, "LEST" is having a month long promotion. It's called, "Beads For Food".

Each participant has committed to donating a certain amount of food or money to their local food bank for each bead sale made during the month of November.

Our LEST blog, has a list of members who are involved and what they are each donating. And I have a photo of one of the current treasuries from Etsy, which shows beads by some of the members. (Recognize my turkey dinner in the upper left corner?- Thanks Vedasbeads for creating the treasury.)

I'm really proud to be a member of a group that thinks of others this way. I know times are tighter for a lot of us this year, and yet this type of action is typical for a lot of beadmakers. It's a sharing group of artisans who support and care about each other and those around them. Thanks everyone...for being who you are.

And if you'd like a bunch of eye candy, stop by LEST's Flickr pages for glass that will make you drool. Members are always adding more photos.

An Early Turkey Dinner

I baked my turkey dinner early.  Because my local glass group, Southern Flames had a Thanksgiving glass challenge.

You can see more views of it in my shop, like the stuffing that is overflowing from the cavity.  And of course it has some garnish- lettuce and cranberries to make it look more festive.

I built "the bird" first, and then decided to add the platter.  That was "interesting".  Not sure that I'd do it that way again, but it was fun.  I had the bird made on the mandrel, and then took an ivory rod and made a very large maria, and heated it up as well as the turkey connection and gently mashed them together.  (don't confuse that with the potatoes)

I then burned off the rest of the ivory rod and flattened the bottom, so the platter would sit flat.

And then garnished the plate to add a little color and interest.  Voila!  Now I don't need to cook one.