As we are back in Korea and the Jet lag is apparently hitting harder this year than in previous years, I thought I would take advantage of the extra hours and blog about our summer.

While in Seattle we took a short glass blowing class with my Dad. It was something that we had all been interested in doing at some point or another and figured why not go for it.

We were given a brief intro with some basic info, then jumped right into making out first piece. We each made a ‘sucky’ bowl. The first step was to put the glass into the glory hole to warm it up so that we could stick colored glass. This was repeated multiple times based on the crossness of the colored glass as well as the number of colors we wanted. We then heated it up again and started blowing, all the while rotating it to prevent it from becoming lopsided. Once we had achieved the desired size we heated it once more, but cooled the half closer to the post, after this we inhaled through the pipe to pull the hotter glass inward, creating a double layered bowl. After making this we made a wobbly looking bowl as well as a drinking glass.

While we succeeded making the desired pieces, it was with a ton of assistance and we only did the simple parts and with lots of direction. It made for a fun night of art making.

Dad shaping the glass to make it round before blowing into it.

Dad smoothing out the part that you snap the pole off of.

Caitlin holding the glass in the glory hole.

After placing it in the glory hole she put it into different pans of colored glass.

Caitlin blowing into the glass. It had to be constantly rotating.

Caitlin inhaling to suck the glass back in and make a bowl.

Caitlin rolling.

Dad inhaling to create the bowl.

Shaping the glass with a piece of leather.

Dad rolling.

Blowing a beer glass.

Rolling the glass.

Caitlin making a beer mug.