May 2, 2012

Corning Glass Museum, Corning NY.....wow we woke up this morning and it was so warm....we are having climate shock.  We came from 43 degrees to 72 degrees.....Yowzah!  It was so warm up in the top bunk!  When we arrived at the museum, I was impressed with how large it was.  The building is all glass, of course.  We toured through the museum and watched the glass blowing demonstration first.....very impressive!  In about 20 minutes the gentleman took a glob of hot molten glass and shaped by blowing and rolling a beautiful squiggly shaped vase...The kids were WOWed by this, us adults were, too.

Fiber Optics..........we learned about how light/information travels through glass tubing  much more effectively than copper and it was all discovered and developed here by Corning.   It was also fun to check out the display on Frexnell lenses, especially, since we had just visited the Portland Head lighthouse and seen them there.   

The flame shaping demonstration was intriguing.  The lady sat in a booth with only safety goggles on, no gloves and made out of a stick of clear glass an adorable little mouse figurine.  It took her a total of about 15 minutes!  The flame that she worked with changed colors as she adjusted the heat for her varied processes. 

 

During the glass breaking demonstration, the lady asked for a volunteer.  Gracie's hand shot up like a rocket and the lady could hardly ignore her enthusiasm.  She picked her to come up and help her with the demonstration.  Gracie got to break each of the 4 types of glass that were in a case on the stage.  She was thrilled to put on the safety glasses and smash the glass in the case.  The neatest one was the egg shape object.  Gracie hit it really hard on the tip with a steel rod and, amazingly, it would not break!  Not until she hit it on the bottom did it shatter.  this demonstration was to show the strong and weak points in the object.  For her hard work, she won a small glass fish that was made here at Corning, of course.  It was quite exciting. 

Gracie had a "smashing" time at the breaking glass demo...

The best part was yet to come, the kids each got to make a glass object.  Christian used fusing to make me a set of Windchimes, Gracie used fusing to make a suncatcher, when the kids were done making their designs, the items were put into an high degree oven that melts them together and cooled in an anealor oven as the final step. 



Gracie cutting and adhesing glass in her classs....

making her own pendant

sorting glass colors to make his design\

Madison was able to create a pendant, choosing the colors and design and then forming it.  She actually sat at a 4000 degree propane and  natural gas flame to  make her pendant (hot hot hot).  She took a stick of Moretti glass (soft italian glass) and heated it up into a blob of hot glass....it looked  like a hot melty lollipop.....then she added the blue glass to it and then the purple, swirling them all together to mix the colors.  The instructor, Jackie, helped her to spin into an oval egg shape and Madison flattened it with a tweezer type of flatening tool.  All of this was done with no gloves and in front of the 4000 degree flame.  Glass is a slow conductor of heat, making it cool to hold onto on the other end of what you are forming.  The pendant was then put into a continer of vermiculite (looked like sand) to set and cool.  From there, it will be put into a 930 degree annealer oven for 8-10 hours to complete the cooling process.   All of our projects will be shipped to us at home.   



Jackie the glass instructor

After the class, we hurried over to the glass store and shopped for special somethings for us and others....we closed down the place....nothing new, I realize.  The most convenient thing about this:  they ship for a small fee right to your door!!!  Yeah!!\

this is all blown glass...

I definitely recommend this museum to everyone visiting the Corning area....great for all ages!!

toe nail polish redo

When we got back to the KOA, the little guys jumped into the awesome indoor pool for a relaxing swim and wow did they have fun~~beautiful pool.....very nice gym facility, also.  I headed off to the laundromat to do some wash....tons of fun for me....the girls had a spa day in the confines of the RV......