Monday, November 28, 2011

Colored Glass

So, my friend Meganne mentioned the idea of making colored glass with mod podge and food coloring several weeks ago.  Last night I finally looked on the internet to find out how to do it right and save myself the trouble of making a huge mess of it.  (As you will see/read later, I still ended up with some messes.)
Below are most of the sites I visited.  Forgive me, I have yet to learn how to put links on here (or anywhere else for that matter). I will give you the names of the blogs I visited though. I think all of them have a tutorial on how to make the colored glass, but each one is a little bit different.
gingerbreadsnowflakes.com
creativelittledaisy.typepad.com
sippycupmom.com
SaltTree.blogspot.com

                           As you can see there are various shades here.  I'll explain that a bit....

This was my first attempt.  Come to think of it, I did this one before I looked at any tutorials.  I used the mod podge and food coloring mix together and put it on the outside of the bottle with a paint brush.  It looks good from a distance, but not close up.





 This was my attempt at putting the mixture inside of the bottle.  It takes patience to swirl the color all around the bottle evenly & then to get all the excess color out.  It also takes quite a while in the oven at a low temp to get it to dry.  I was not patient on steps 2 and 3 that I just mentioned and as a result we got some gloppiness going on here.  I ended up having to spend time soaking the bottle in hot water and getting it all out after it had dried.  I ended up using a wire hanger to do that job! My daughter was grossed out by the glop but I was a bit fascinated.

My next attempts at coloring the inside and drying it in the oven.  I still ended up with excess on the bottom of the jar but I can live with that.

And I just had to give one more method a try.  This was painted on the outside with a foam brush.  This is by far the fasted way to go, but as you can see you don't get much color.




And here they all are on my mantel.  (Please don't judge my mantel....I don't have very strong decorator genes, but I'm working on improving what I do have.)

So, there you have it.  My first attempts at colored glass.  I'm pretty sure I will do it again in the future!  I've already had my eye on several clear glass objects in my house...such as a vase on top of my bookcase and a votive candle holder in my cupboard.

4 comments:

  1. I like it Katie!! Sounds like a neat project. oh and I was actually thinking your mantel looked good. Want to know what is on mine right now? ... picture frame ferris wheel left with house that i never have printed pics to put in, two boxes of ornaments given to us with tree ( keeping from Gabe),framed pic of Dan and i on a camel in Thailand while pregnant with Zi, snap shot of family when Lia newborn, and wire cutters using to get lights off "prelit" tree cause they won't work. (again keeping from G) So there you have a look into MY mantel, be proud of yours. LOL

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  2. I think they're great! What a fun project. And your mantel looks pretty...give yourself some credit! :)

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  3. Oh that is cool! I think I'll have to try that.

    My mantel looks sad right now. I've never had one before and I don't know what to do with it!

    Also... to link just highlight the text and click the picture of the paperclip looking things. :) That sounded kinda confusing but it really is quite easy. :)

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  4. Hey, Sounds fun...and I, too, think your mantel looks great:) Those Norman Rockwell pictures remind me of a time when things got a little rowdy in grandma and grandpa Kuesters basement. One of her Norman Rockwell pictures on the wall got bumped. It was the most, actually the only, 'fiest' I ever saw her exhibit. She pulled a few ears...I wonder if Shane remembers, my memory tells me he was involved!

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