The last time I posted about this window, I had just started switching out much of the yellow glass to blue at my customer’s request. That was 3 weeks ago and, here I am, still chiseling away- almost literally! But instead of a chisel I use a dental tool, like the ones they use to scrape the plaque off your teeth at the dentist. This part of the process of creating a stained glass window is super slow and a bit tedious but it’s really important for the structure of the window. To create a leaded window, glass pieces slot into lead came which looks like a sideways capital letter H. In between the lead and the glass, there’s a bit of a gap. So for every seam, black putty has to be pushed under the came; it hardens to keeps the glass firmly in place. In order to help with the hardening process, an appropriately named dusty substance called whiting is sprinkled all over the window. Left over putty remains on the glass and that’s where the dental tool comes in. After it has dried for a few days, the putty has to be cleaned off and I’ve found this dental tool to be the best way to get at it. Every piece has to be scraped, front and back. I vacuum the whole thing repeatedly as I scrape and, ultimately, it will be ready for polishing. At the end of the day, sometimes all I have done is scrape putty. I try to be zen about it. And when that fails, I put on a podcast. So if any of you have suggestions about your favorite podcast, I’d love to hear them and I’ll share my favorites with you. Until next time, I’ll just be here, scraping away…