A Visit to Vermeer Glass

 A guest post written by Rachael Sitzman. The views expressed are solely hers, and

may not represent the views of Red Stone Art Studio.

 

Ugh. If I have to listen to my daughter (who is the reason my heart continues to beat because I love her so completely) whine and pout about wanting another Barbie, baby doll, or any other kind of toy, my eyeballs may literally pop out of my skull with the force of the eye-roll that will trigger. At five she is already a consumer-driven being. No matter how many times we watch the “Monkey Jocks” episode of Bluey (if you know, you know) I just can’t seem to unload enough toys to make our home feel less cluttered.

It was this intrinsic panic that guided me into Spring Break (also known as Easter) this year. I had no intention of getting her, or her younger brothers, anymore toys. No more cheap crap to fill their baskets, none of the plastic toys that are discarded or broken within a week, no spending oodles of hard earned money on material goods that they will outgrow. Although her brothers were too young to partake, Fred was just the right age to have her first “big girl” art experience.

*Insert sparkly flashback transition here*

On March 4, 2023 I discovered my newest hyper fixation, making art with glass. Haley, your blogger extraordinaire, and I had our first date together alone since… IDK, before she got married and we had kids. It was great, we had brunch, caught each other up on our daily lives, and with the promise of the latest matinee movie to end our day together, the highlight of our time together was creating a unique piece of art at Vermeer Glass Art.

Vermeer Glass Art is a small business in Spencer, Iowa owned and operated by Jim and Julie Vermeer. They have a great corner building on main street where they sell hand-made glass art in the charmingly cozy and clutter-free front portion of their building. In the back, glass art in the charmingly cozy and clutter-free front portion of their building. In the back, however, is where the magic happens. Jim and Julie have opened up the world of glass art to anyone and everyone that would like to have a new experience.

*Insert super sparkly flashforward transition here*

I bought Fred a pair of purple kid’s safety goggles in preparation for her first experience at Vermeer Glass Art. I didn’t need to, they supply goggles for both kids and adults, but I did it as a teaser. I didn’t tell her where we were going to go. All she knew was that it was going to be fun. We started the same way I had with Haley, and the friends I went with the time after that, we had a meal at my favorite sit-down restaurant (shout out to Family Table in Spencer!).

After a delicious meal of pancakes and eggs we were on our way to our “surprise”. Every time Fredders had asked what we were doing, what her surprise was, I would reply that it was an experience. It was something fun that we would get to do together. I don’t know how excited she was, but I was so stoked to help her create her own glass art. I had no idea what to expect, what she would design, but I was excited to find out.

We were at Vermeer about an hour early, some numbskull had forgotten what time their appointment was (spoiler, it was me). Jim had no problem letting us start early which was nice of him. Having been there twice already, and having taken notes like a nerd both times, he asked how much of the presentation I wanted him to give Fred. I wanted Fred to understand that what we were doing was a privilege and a responsibility, so I asked him to give her a simplified version of his normal presentation. Afterward the real fun began.

 

I asked for and was given a piece of blank paper where I drew a rectangle about 5x7 inches. I slid the paper over to Fred and told her she could draw whatever she wanted and we would turn it into glass art. After designing on paper with pencil I asked if she was done. She said she was so then we got to start picking out glass. I did my best not to interfere with any of her choices and many of them surprised me. Fredders picked out blue for the base of her project.

After the blue base, we went through the tubs of smaller glass pieces. These are the pieces that are left over from bigger/other projects. When Fred had picked out her five colors we went back to our seats and I gave her a silver sharpie to draw the tops of her flowers on the glass.

The only part of the experience that Fred didn’t take part in was cutting out the flower tops she had drawn. I got to do that part myself. I followed the instructions and techniques I had been shown the first time I visited Vermeer to cut steadily around the silver sharpie marks. I positioned Fred, safety glasses on, where she could watch me cut and got down to business.

 

Side note: It is super fun and somewhat exhilarating cutting glass with a big saw thinger. At any moment I could cut my finger, and that makes it edgy. Just dangerous enough to make me feel like the Fonz jumping a shark on water skis. /End side note.

 

After cutting out flower tops, Fred helped apply a tiny dab of glue to the back of each flower and place it on her blue base. Then she picked out her favorite green raw-spaghetti noodle-like glass rod. I showed her how to measure how much of the rod she needed and then to break it with her fingers. She used an angled tweezers to apply a little glue to the rod and then place it under her flower top. We sprinkled super fine frit with a sifter around the noodly glass rods so that they didn’t roll around. Then we finished up the flowers by adding a single piece of coarse frit to the center of each flower top in the colors Fred picked. She did an amazing job wielding those tweezers, way better than I did the two times I had worked on my own projects.
 

When Fred had finished her creation she was so proud of herself. I had her pick out a little glass button to use as her signature. This was a move I totally stole from Haley, and one that I plan to steal for as long as I continue to go back and work on glass creations. Fred liked the idea so much she picked out two, one for each bottom corner.
 

In the end, our experience was only 45 minutes, tops. Fred is five and a half years old though. 45 minutes of intentional and purposeful creation isn’t something to scoff at. She was engaged and entertained by the entire process. Creating together was something you couldn’t put a price on. There was no fighting, whining, begging, or tantrums. She didn’t become bored with her choices or have regrets because she was asked to choose her favorite anything. Best of all, Fred was so proud of her work. She was ready to start another one as soon as she was done with the first.

Now that I’ve doubled the amount of words Haley asked me to use when writing, I should probably wrap this up. This latest experience at Vermeer Glass Art in Spencer, Iowa was on par with my first two experiences. Even though I wasn’t really the one being creative, I enjoyed helping my daughter create. It was probably even more fun because I got to experience the joy of doing it all again for the first time but through the eyes of a young human.
 

I will definitely be going back soon, like, the weekend after my next payday soon. If you are in the area and looking to create both memories and art, Vermeer Glass Art is the place to go. I don’t have any catchy phrase or final nugget of classic humor to end with. But imagine something cool I could say here, and then pretend I said it…

Well done, us.