I was lucky enough to travel back home to Boston for the festivities (and snow!). We had lots of laughs, great food and sacred family time. I do love my new life in California, but Christmas on the East Coast just can't be beat.
Jaylalas has now been open a full month and I'm thrilled to say I've had lots of orders! I'd like to say a very sincere thank you to all those who offered their support, liked, shared and ordered so far! Especially to my main man, Carlo, who always has my back.
SO! The most fun thing for me to do are custom orders. There's one in particular I LOVED doing. I wanted to share the process of how it became this finished product:
 |
This was a gift for a friend (hi Ginny!) to give to her boyfriend (hi Ty!) for Christmas. She was wanting a beer glass and we decided on a stein like this one.
The character is the best ninja in the village from a show called Naruto (can you tell I'm a fellow nerd?).
I sent Ginny a few photos, told her what I planned on combing/changing and with her blessing, the project began!
The first thing I do is mask off the area with tape, most importantly the lip of the glass so everyone is not eating paint (imagine that!). Then I outline the character with very faint paint on the glass. I typically wipe off the first few trys trying to get it centered and proportionate. It's just like how you would draw and erase pencil.
The most challenging thing about painting on glass is building up layers. It also takes a lot of patience to wait for each new layer to dry. But if you you rush, the layers underneath will move around and get chunky.
Eventually, it will look something like this:
Once the color blocks are down, I like to add some shading within them so it's more interesting. Then it's time for the most fun and scary part- outlining. I swear I don't breathe the entire time. To make it easier, I usually draw out the general spacing of things with pencil because it's important to get it right the first time. It's also when the character really takes shape and becomes recognizable. See why I don't breathe? Seeing this one come to life was really exciting!
Painting complete, it gets baked and then sprayed with a sealant so this bad boy lasts the test of time.
After covering everything but the painting, it takes about 3-4 coats and it's good to go.
So that's the mystery of how it becomes a super fabulous and unique beer stein! To date, I've had the honor of doing a set of custom coffee mugs with my friend's golden retriever, custom salad spoons and a really great beaded light switch cover.
 |
| Hundreds of tiny beads! |
Happy New Year everyone!
Jen
JaylalasShop@gmail.com
