A few weeks ago we headed down to Corning to watch my friend Becky run a marathon. After the race, a tired Becky went home, but a few friends and I headed to the Corning Museum of Glass for a field trip. I’ve been there a few times before, but this trip my friend Tracy and I did a glass blowing class and made glass pumpkins. That sounds super exciting, right? Well, truth is we actually just picked the colors out and blew air into a tube, filling up the glass at the other end. The CMOG workers actually did the “real” work of making the pumpkin. It was a neat experience though and I think it turned out great.

This is the part where I disclose I didn’t follow directions and actually ruined my first pumpkin attempt. I blew too hard and didn’t stop when the lady told me to, so my first pumpkin came out too big and thin and she said it wouldn’t survive (too brittle) so we tried for number two. Mind you, 5 year olds were able to follow these directions…

After the class we just wandered around the gift shop for a bit and were fascinated by the huge pumpkins that “real” glass artists made!

The staff member got some molten glass from the kiln. (Totally butchering terminology)







I picked my colors (white and yellow for the body, green for the stem) and she rolled the glass goober in the flecks of coloring. Then she dropped it in the mold so it took a pumpkin shape. Afterward she brought it over to me and I blew through the tube, filling up the hollow pumpkin with air. No pictures of these steps, I was a little busy :) After the pumpkin was done, she added a little stem to it.







Pumpkin with a stem! It still had to harden over night so they shipped it to me later in the week.







My finished pumpkin!







Some kids in the class were choosing crazy colors! There is a kid blowing air at the other end of the tube (can’t see it in the picture). While the staff member kept the glass moving and pumpkin shaped.







Giant pumpkins in the gift shop!







So pretty!