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!