Crafty Man

I had to teach/ lead a workshop at an activity for the women in our LDS congregation today.  I was asked to help those that were interested learn to etch glass.  Sounds complicated, messy and time consuming I know, but in reality it is the simplest thing.  Bonus is that it looks so impressive when you are finished.

I learned to do this a couple of years ago but since I hadn't done any since, I decided I needed to practice a little if I was going to help others.  My always supportive husband offered to help me.  He is so crafty...

He had to make sure everything was lined up just right.

Seriously, how cute is he?

Anyway, as you can see from my table to do this project, you need some glassware, a Cricut or some other way of cutting the vinyl stencil, vinyl or we just used clear contact paper, and Armour Etch Cream.  (Warning, we did have two Pyrex dishes that would not etch, although I have never had a problem before.

I took my camera to the activity, but forgot to take pictures until we were cleaning up and I want to keep what Rick and I worked on at home under wraps literally till December 25, but you can check out the Armour webpage for some examples.

The directions on the cream say to leave it on for only a minute, but it seems to work better on the heavier glassware if it is left on for five minutes.  I followed all the other directions.  Depending on the complexity of your stencil, you can complete a project in 15 to 20 minutes and there is very little mess involved.

If you look in the right-hand side of the lower picture above, you can see my other project - polishing my silver that we found in the rubble from the fire.  It is beyond tarnished with the crusted soot, ect.  More on this project later, but I am open to suggestions for improving cleaning/ removing the hard, black crusty stuff.