April 18-21, 2026 Las Vegas, Nevada

 High of 78 and sunny. Not that I went outside, inside in classes from 9-5. 

I took an advanced glass clay class. The instructor made the one on the left. I made the one on the right. It still needs to be fired. We spent most of the class with the instruction and I didn't get as much time as I would have liked working on the piece so it has some ragged edges, but maybe they will smooth out when it is fired. Lots of fun and I will be working some more with this at home. My second class was the Calligraphy of vitrograph. We learned how to make things like petals and leaves from the hot glass as it came out of the kiln. This piece was made by the Kory the instructor. Some of the flowery things on the bottom are what we learned. This is three kilns full of hot glass on top of a huge rack. There are holes in the bottoms of the kilns and we pull the hot glass out of the bottom.

Kory our instructor making a fiddle head. It was  really fun class and I will be making many components for my pieces when I get home. This is the 30th anniversary of the glass expo, so the Sat night meet and greet was extravagant. Dinner and drinks out by the pool. 

Anita, Lois, Shirley and I with a couple Las Vegas dancers.  Fire dancers and lighted hula hoopers. 

And Elvis! Shirley, Anita and Lois with Elvis.

Anita with Jack Storms , we  took classes from him and Dan who owns Covington engineering that makes the machines we use for cold working glass. Me, Lois, Elvis, Anita and Shirley.

Shirley, Lois, Anita and I at the official photo booth for the event. I loved this display. It is a field of lavender blooms. They are sold individually, but look great together. You can kind of see in the background the photo of the field of lavender. The artist is from France and he says these represent fields of lavender in France. The expo is over. I am exhausted. It was a great time, but I am ready to go home tomorrow and sleep for a week.

My computer is overheating and not charging while I use it, only when is is asleep. And it is not holding a charge very long. The battery is on it's last legs. So today I purchased a new one. It is an updated version of my old Microsoft surface. Way updated. It is sapphire, and this is what it looked like in the box. And setup. Of course the color is on the back, the other side is just a screen. My new phone that I just got is the same color. I am so wiped our from running 9 am to 10 pm for 4 days, I went to the pool. It was 85 degrees. I laid on the lounge chair and instantly fell asleep. 

John took me out to dinner in the Italian restaurant at the casino. This is our waiter Fausto tossing our caesar salad. I picked up my fired mandala I made in the glass clay class. It came out pretty well considering I made it so fast, all the pieces were ragged. Looking forward to playing with the clay in my studio. 

Back home to the RV in Shoshone, Dinner on the patio. Sunset. 

Sunset the following night. 

April 14-17, 2026 Las Vegas, Nevada

 76 and sunny.

Vegas on the horizon. We are here for my glass expo. So excited. The glass expo is at South Point Casino. I read by the pool this afternoon. I will be in class from 9 am to 10 pm for 4 days. Won't get any other pool time. Our room is overlooking the pool, looking west toward the mountains. 

The first class I took was was a 2 day intensive cold glass workshop creating the Storms Cube, taught by Jack Storms. Jack in the green apron working with us. Anita polishing glass. 

At the evening meet and greet. Dustin, Anita, Lois, Me and Meggie. Dustin and Meggie are the new owners of  D and L glass, one of the largest wholesale glass stores in the US, that just happens to be in Denver.  Lucky us. Sue, Jamison, Anita and Lois. The opening evening meet and greet was hosted  by Jamison, a famous U-tube glass artist. 

The Blue Rita was the signature cocktail created for the meet and greet. It was yummy. Jamison interviewed some of the well know business owners  in the glass world. Really interesting evening. They also raffled off about 100 real cool prizes. 

Three of the pendants I made on the first day of the Jack Storms class. They have multiple layers of dichroic glass in intricate designs and pictures don't do them justice. They change colors when you move them. The second day of the class Jack has a 3 x 3 x 12 inch block of 24 layers of dichroic glass. He cut it into quarters and we each cut a cube off it, which we squared up and polished. 

Dan from Covington engineering, the company that manufactures all the cold working equipment we were using helping us with the cold working. Jack helping us laminate more dichroic glass  to our cubes. They will be beveled and polished tomorrow. 

In the evening Tabitha, with the blue hair, taught a wonderful class called Layer by layer: designing intricate vitrograph murrine.  She is a famous U-tube glass artist too. She is the vitrograph queen, she owns a company that makes the best murrine. Excellent lecture. The pendant I finished today. Again pictures don't do justice to it, it changes colors as it moves. I won this necklace made by Tabitha at the lecture. The lecture was about how to make these murrine. 

The exhibit  hall opened today. Tons of venders, stages with demos, the gallery of excellence and more. I didn't spend too much money. . . The new Wazer water jet cutter. It is the size of a refrigerator. It is on sale for 15 % off, probably brings it down to about $15,000. Cool machine, but I think I can live without if for now.  And a few other interesting glassy things at the exhibit hall. 

My entries to the Gallery of Excellence. Part of the Gallery of Excellence. Really good show this year. 

Anita and I entered the glass cutting contest. Anita won 2nd and I won third in the intermediate category. Fun contest. I picked up my 'Jack Storms' cube today, it still needs to be cold worked when I get home to finish it. After it is beveled and polished all that dichro should really shine. 

The keynote speaker tonight for the expo was Narcissus Quagliata. He is a very famous glass artist that has been in the field for 55 years. It was an excellent talk. This year is the 30 year anniversary for the expo, and 30 years ago he was the keynote speaker!

April 4 - 13 2026 Shoshone, California

 84 and sunny.

We hiked into the badlands behind China Ranch. Coming back into China ranch. It is a true oasis. 

Some of the date palms at China Ranch. Saguaro blossom, prickly pear, salt heliotrope, sacred datura, side blotch lizard and western whiptail lizard.

Driving out the slot canyon that goes into China Ranch. Chocolate covered peanut butter stuffed dates I made with some dates I bought at China Ranch.

Beginning of sunset. John enjoying dinner with sunset.

End of sunset. We went back to China Ranch to get some more pollen for our date trees and to have date shakes for dinner. 

View over China Ranch's parking lot.  Sunset.

Weird looking cloud. Sunset

I finished this beauty. It got bigger than I planed. It  is made from dyed pine needles, polyester thread, glass beads and the center is a piece of glass I fused from murrine I made. Very colorful. 12 x 3 inches. Close up of the center. 

One little cloud peeping over the horizon for sunset tonight. The desert golds are still blooming, but they are really short and the blooms are about the size of a dime. Not enough water for them.

Sunset looked like a bunch of pink toes on the horizon.  Woo hoo it rained! not very  much, ( 0.06 on our weather station), but enough for a nice rainbow.

We had dinner with Susan at the Crowbar on our last night in Shoshone. Fun to see her and great food. This is all of sunset there was after the rain.