Spring Lanterns

One of my favorite places to hang out is Smartbuygal Forum.  Those ladies are incredibly talented, very friendly, and generous sharing their ideas and files.  I got this idea from Amy R who posted pictures of these a few weeks ago.  You can see Amy's work here.


I also want to walk through glass etching for those of you who have never seen it before. These are both 100% Cricut projects.  I used my gypsy to design these and the list of cartridges is a bit long, but here it is: Celebrate with Flourish, Gypsy Wanderings, Plantin Schoolbook, Songbird, Walk in My Garden, ZooBalloo, Cindy Lou, Cupcake Wrappers, Home Accents, Lacy Labels, Sentimentals, and finally, Picturesque.

These are the designs after I cut them out.  

The next step is to apply the vinyl to the glass.  It's much easier when I am working with a negative image because all you have to do is place the cut out exactly where you want it.  It's a bit trickier the other way around because instead of a cut out image you are working with a stencil of that image.   But with a little practice and patience it can be done.

One important thing is to make sure there are no air bubbles between the vinyl and the glass. You can see that I put the glass pieces onto plastic.  I did this because I knew I would be taking the etching creme to the edges of the glass and I wanted to make sure I protected the table, and most importantly - me!  This is the etching creme I use:

This etching creme is a strong chemical and it is not something you want to get on your skin so I always, always, always wear gloves when I am applying or rinsing it off.  The application process is pretty simple - just brush on a generous coating of creme wherever the glass is exposed.

For the negative images I put the creme over the entire glass from end to end.

I let my creme sit on for a minimum of thirty minutes.  I like to rinse these off in our laundry room sink, I really don't want this chemical anywhere else.  Right after being rinsed off (and removing the vinyl) it looks like this.  

After they dried I cleaned them and put them into the lanterns.  Walla!

 I added a candle and turned out the lights so you can see what it will look like at night.

I adore these lanterns.  They aren't perfect though.  The etching on the large one looks a bit streaky to me so I will make sure to put a thicker layer of creme on the next one I do.  Also, "Spring Showers" isn't quite centered on the small one.  Yea - it's those tricky stencils.   But, overall, I am happy with how they turned out.  One of the great things about etching is that once the design is on there, it's there.  The chemical permanently changes the glass so you don't have to worry about washing it off.  You can clean it like you normally would and the design will not be affected.  I have a few more of these to complete before I run out of my stash, but I need to come up with some new themes first.  And I will need find homes for all of these because I am quickly running out of it in my craft room.

Thanks for stopping by!