Finally, the tea/coffee set!

Well, it’s been a few days since I last posted and promised “before” and “after” pictures of the tea/coffee set! The set has been complete for almost a week now, but in my defense I now get home late in the afternoon when the lighting is bad and I didn’t want to post pictures where you couldn’t really tell the difference. That, and I’ve been dropping like dead as soon as I get home…

Here’s the “before” pictures:

 

As you can see this was a pretty boring and bland little milk glass set that we bought 10 years ago. In fact, I was tempted to throw it out a few weeks ago when I was going through the cupboard. Needless to say, I am glad I didn’t! Even though the set didn’t quite turn out like I would have liked it to, it gave me a nice base of experience.

Here’s the “after”:

Overall I think it turned out nice, but I need to work on the edges and a technique of folding the napkins so that they turn out even. However, the most important thing I learned – the motifs brown slightly after being baked in the oven. Believe it or not, I actually didn’t account for that. Here’s what a cup looked like before baking, and after.

It is difficult to see from the pictures, but the “after” product has a slight brownish tint to it. When I took them out of the oven the pieces looks so brown I was terrified, but once they cooled completely off and after three coats of varnish, things looked better.

This, if nothing else, was a lovely little learning experience! In fact, I’m really looking forward to “upgrading” something else that has been forgotten about for the past 10 years – and there’s plenty of that in my house!

Hope you have all had a great week so far!