“Be still, and know that I am God.”
~Psalm 46:10
The Process of Gold Leafing – A Church Steeple Cross – Part I
Did you know that many of the gold church crosses you see are actually real gold? If you did know that, have you ever wondered what the process is to apply the gold? This is called gold leafing, or gilding, and today we are going to show Part I of that process with you, on a church steeple cross.
In Michael’s business of truck lettering and sign making, he often does gilding. Gilding is the process of applying a fine, thin layer of real gold, to a prepped surface. Often times, letters or graphics are done on flat surfaces in gold on truck doors, boats, signs or storefront windows. 3D letters can also be gilded, to be applied to a building side, sign, etc. Michael has done gilding for all of those lettering purposes.
But he also does weather vanes, and church steeple crosses! He is often-subcontracted by Christopher Burgess, of The Burgess Company Steeple Jacks from Pembroke, MA. As a steeple and tower specialist, Chris often removes (if possible), repairs and replaces these structures for refinishing. Chris strips them and preps the surface for finishing, and often hands off the piece to Michael for gilding.
So while Michael had this church cross in to be gilded, we thought some of you might be interested in seeing the process.
This cross is 5 feet 10 inches tall, and needs to be gilded, picked up and replaced on the steeple as soon as possible.
So Michael starts with these 2 mediums….
Slow-Set Gilding Size, and Yellow Lettering Enamel. The sizing is the medium applied to the surface first, to make the gold adhere. Because the sizing is a clear oil, about a tablesp0on of yellow paint to 1/4 cup of sizing is added, to tint the oil. This way Michael can see where the oil has been applied already as he works.
He also had a weather vane to be done, but for this post we are going to focus on the cross.
Here, for this piece, he is able to roll out the mixed medium on the entire cross.
Then it needs to be left alone for awhile. For slow-size, it takes anywhere from 12-16 hours, depending on humidity, to reach a desired tack. Quick size can be ready in 2-3 hours, but is preferred for truck doors, boats and windows, when it would receive a clear coat over the surface. But slow-size is used for gilded pieces that will not be handled, touched, or washed. In these instances, the gold by itself will stand up to the elements for a number of years. In any case, the desired tackiness Michael waits for is when he can drag his knuckle on the surface and it squeaks.
Once the surface is at the appropriate tackiness, it is ready for gold.
This is how the gold comes – in a box that holds 25 books with 25 leaves per book. This is patent gold, which means that it is adhered to sheets of tissue.
A sheet of gold looks like this. This is very fine, thin gold layer.
It’s applied very carefully, to the surface, as you see above. The sheet is gently laid down, and then rubbed with a finger or thumb.
You can see how very soft and light as air the gold is.
This method, of precisely laying sheets of gold, and rubbing down to apply it, is continued over the entire surface of the cross, until it is covered completely.
The goal is to use every bit of gold off of every sheet. What’s left on the sheets like above, are used for filling in seams, cracks and missed spots.
As we’ve mentioned before, {A} is often a voluntary apprentice on our jobs. She loves to gild with Daddy-Boy. Not to say she doesn’t have an ulterior motive or 2 as well. ; ) More on that later…
This post would just be way too big and long to explain the entire process with all of the photos, so stay tuned to see how this church cross is finished, and how beautiful it looks when it is all done!
Check out PART II HERE.
Photos of Our Easter Day Details – 2009 – Simple Easter Ideas
Just another short post, with lots of photos, from our blessed Easter Sunday. We hope they are simple Easter ideas, to share with you.
The kids woke up to these surprises on Easter morning. They were thrilled!
The kids, looking all dapper, just before heading out to a beautiful Easter morning Mass. {A} altar served, as usual. The kids were surprised with some gifts from friends at church, too. People can be so kind and thoughtful.
When we got home, we had our simple Easter dinner.
This is my plate, below. As you can see, I despise carrots, and I love asparagus. : )
I also forgot to put some potato salad on my plate before I took this photo, which I worked so hard on. lol
The Easter cookies {A} baked, and us parents helped decorate. It was tooooo FUN!
Chocolate Coconut Jelly Bean Cake, which was also more fun, to take photos of.
I took some individual shots of the kids too.
Easter is one of my very favorite holidays to take photos on. The spring-ish atmosphere, all of the colors around, and the sheer joy in the air, as we celebrate Jesus’ resurrection, after a long and soul-searching Lenten season. But the truth is, I just always have my camera in hand, taking photos, because I love to, and I can. 🙂 I like to think this is a great place to share them, with you all, as they all are the details of our days, our life, and our joys. Just so you know…This blog will always have more photos, than wise words spoken. Because I definitely always have more way photos. lol
Our Giveaway winner, Regan, had received her home-made gifts. So would anyone like to see photos of what she received? I took lots of those along the way for that, too. Of course. It’s coming up!
Our family hopes your Easter was all kinds of Blessed and joyful, too!
Creative Coloring Easter Eggs – Photos
Just sharing with you today some photos from our creative coloring of Easter eggs tradition. Our family here LOVES to color and decorate eggs. Do you? We could do it every day. It’s also one of my favorite things to photograph. We do hope you all had a lovely and blessed Easter! Our entire Triduum was so focused and beautiful. We especially enjoyed the services and Masses at our church throughout the Holy days, and our quiet Easter celebration together was pleasant and relaxing.
We will have more Easter photos to share tomorrow or the next day, but have a heavier than usual work week, so we just may not be so chatty until later on in the week, if we are disciplined. ; ) But we’ve got a long list of blog posts and plans on hand-so stick around! And Enjoy!
Hope you enjoyed this fun photo collection of our family memories!
Thanks so much for visiting.
Fall in All It’s Glory
What a GLORIOUS weekend it has been here in southern New England! We’d venture to guess this past week or so has been ‘peak’ foliage season, as opposed to the usually assumed Columbus Day weekend. Not only was this weekends absolutely beautiful visually, but we had very warm temperatures as well, so we really got to enjoy it!
The weekend started off for {A} with a youth group bonfire event. She had a really good time with her friends, singing songs, telling ‘ghost’ stories, and making s’mores! Over the course of the weekend, basking in the warm sunshine, she also spent an abundance of time with her wildlife friends. Chances are I’ll be blogging about that this week as well. All I can say for now is, she continues to amaze us with her love for nature, and it’s love for her!
We did get some much needed shopping done, and some house cleaning, as well as some very worthy house projects! (Well, Michael did the house projects.) For one, we have heat baseboards in the school room now!! After having put on our additions and finishing all of the interior ourselves, it was one project at a time. The floor got done just in time for Thanksgiving last year, I believe. Then we just never got to the heat. So although our school room is right off of our heated kitchen and the rest of our home, it was pretty dang chilly in there with no in-room heat source! Just like an old fashioned school room I suppose. But enough of that pioneer experience >> we’re happy to have heat in there now! Checked that project off our list!
Other than those accomplishments, we enjoyed the outdoors. Today we went on a little hike, and naturally, I brought along my camera. So I thought I would share some shots with you.
This first shot is of a horned caterpillar. We had never seen such an interesting little creepy-crawly before, but we did learn pretty quick that one of it’s defenses is emptying it’s stomach contents on you. YUCK!! (Sorry if that’s TMI….pretty gross indeed. But kind of interesting, in a gross-sort-of-way, don’t you think?). Anyway, the great thing about discovering this caterpillar, is that it solved a little mystery from last year! In researching exactly what kind of caterpillar this is, and learning it is a White-Lined Sphinx, we also discovered it turns into a White-Lined Sphinx Moth….which we recognized!! Last year, I had spotted one of these moths in the backyard, and I was ASTONISHED. I had NEVER seen such a thing. I couldn’t figure out for the life of me, what it was, and {A} didn’t know either. I was seriously afraid of it, but Michael wasn’t home, and I wanted him to see this thing! I nearly destroyed some of my plants trying to catch it. Was it a flying mouse? It sure looked furry enough!! But it flew like a hummingbird. (It is indeed described as a hummingbird-like moth. ) And it sure was SCARY looking!! I got it into a clear glass pyrex bowls, and it sure did put up a fight in there. It was so mad at me, I was afraid to ever let it out! The bowl had a cover on it, but he even seemed capable of taking off the cover. We could see in his eyes that he was thinking about how to do it. lol. So we put a big book, and a pair of shoes on top too, just for good measure! Eventually, Michael came home, and was just as baffled too, and disturbed. We just left it in the bowl for awhile, and then I let him let it go later. I stayed inside, though. With the doors locked. Did you click on the link above?? Check it out. Warning: NOT CUTE!!!
But here is the somewhat beautiful caterpillar it is first, along with a handful of the other shots I took. Enjoy!!
These leaves below are of a maple sapling, that has been growing right outside our schoolroom window. We’ve been enjoying watching the leaves change colors over the past weeks.
That’s all for tonight.
Hope you can come by again soon!!