A Secret Christmas Surprise!

So You Want to Make a Space Monkee??

***I've password protected this post because at some point I might get my act together and write a real tutorial with photos, so for now this information is for my trial batch of guinea pigs ;o) ***

Happy Holidays, newbies and not so newbies!



I haven't been able to do much torching because of the weather, and don't have monkee beads to send out at the minute, so I thought I'd do the next best thing and write a Christmas tut for you ;o)

Sorry it isn't done with photos - same problem!  No torching :o(

I've done a Monkee, use your imagination - it could be a dog, cat, pig, - anything!  And it doesn't have to be a space suit - think about how different colours and shapes will turn your bead from a space suit into other things like - a bear in a frog suit, or a baby wearing a bonnet!

What You Need

Choose your GLASS!  Depending on what you are making.

For the monkey I use -
White
Brown
CIM Ginger - you could use any pinkish colour, opal yellow or even ivory
Stringer in the face mask colour (thicker stringer for this), white, black,  and an accent colour for tube, which could also be a twistie.

Choose your TOOLS!

Use what you are comfortable with!
You'll need a blade of some kind, something to squash dots down with, a rake and some mashers.

Skill Level
Anyone can do it!  The better you can control the heat when working with the small dots the better your end result will be.

Ok, are you ready??  Off we go!

First of all make yourself a bead with white.  Think about the size and shape of the bead when it will be squashed.  You need something big enough to fit all the features into.
3/4" is probably a good length from hole to hole.
Squash the bead, keeping the glass as thick or thicker than the mandrel throughout the length of the hole area.  Remember the higher you build the glass up on your base bead the wider you squashed bead will be.  You don't want your squashed bead to be wider than it is tall ;o)





Now you are going to use your brown - melt a small gather on the end of the rod while you keep your base bead warm, but not to hot in the flame.  The gather should be large enough to make a nice big fat dot on the centre of the bead -


Once you have added this dot to the bead, use your favourite tool to flatten it down.  It doesn't have to be perfect but this will be the shape of your monkees face.

When you are happy with the way it looks, pick up your face mask colour - the pinky one.  I find it easier to use thick stringer to make the two dots for the eye area.  Place two dots where the eyes will go.


They don't need to touch as we'll do that in the next step.

Squash these dots so that they meet in the middle and using your white stringer add two more dots, one on each side.  Flatten these as well



At this point, if you want to be really brave you can outline the brown circle with stringer or twistie - I've left it off for this tut, I didn't want to complicate things too much.

Next melt a good sized gather of your face mask colour for the muzzle of the monkey.  I usually apply this in a downward oval-type shape.



Round it up a little bit in the flame if it looks blobby. The thickest part should be towards the bottom, because you are now going to make a cut into it with your blade.

The cut will go across the muzzle towards the bottom.  You might find you have to reheat the glass a bit to do this if your glass has stiffened up.  This is the start of you Monkees mouth.

Now take your trusty rake - I use a dental pick, I find that a fine point is much nicer for raking.  Yes, that's what we'll do next!

Heat up one side of the monkees mouth (this is where understanding just how much heat you need comes into play), place the rake inside the cut you just made, close to one side of it and pull in an outward and upward motion -



Next you will repeat the process with the other side of the mouth - or not, if you want a lopsided grin.  Your grin should be a bit more exaggerated than the one in my picture.


Here's an example -



Starting to look like a monkee??

Lets give him some eyes to bring him to life!  Two small dots of black placed into the white and flattened.  Where they go and how big they are really affects the expression of your monkee - or other animal/person!



What's he missing? He needs a nose! Using stringer again I add a small dot for a nose -

While the area is still hot I use my rake, or a poking tool, to make two nostrils and then with my blade I'll cut his upper lip line (this line is optional)


Voila! There we have the monkee's face. The rest is all decoration!

Of course most animals have ears!  You can have some fun with this depending on what animal you are doing.


For space monkees I usually add a breathing tube with stringer or a twistie.  Start at the front near the mouth area and wind it around to the back of the bead in a curling pattern.

It's fun to make a bubble on the back for his air supply. To do this you'll need to make a dot, poke a hole in it while it's hot and then add a dot of clear over the hole. This will trap some air in the glass and as you gently heat it up and round it off the bubble will round out too.

He needs to be able to communicate of course...

A black dot takes care of that!
And he should also have some supersonic, space-age lights on his uniform - you can have fun with this as well!


That's pretty much all there is to making a space monkee head.
If you are making any animal for the first time I suggest research!! Look online at clipart of the animal you want to copy and sketch out some basic ideas for how you will assemble it. I've come up with some pretty strange looking creatures when I don't check to see how they actually look before I start! Simple things like ear placement can really affect the type of animal you end up with ;o)

If you make a monkee or anything else, I'd LOVE to see pictures of it!! You can send them to me, or post them where I can see them :oD