ABR Imagery Glass Shipment! Yay!

It's time to be honest here. I'm not in a monogamous glass supplier relationship. I get around. ABR Imagery isn't the supplier I usually solicit, but as I was looking around they showed me they had what I needed.

In all seriousness, ABR Imagery stocks every brand of borosilicate glass and there were some colors I wanted to try from a couple of the smaller companies. Most of the major suppliers ask that you buy a minimum of a quarter pound, which costs in the range of $15 to $22. What's nice about ABR is that they let you buy by the rod. Okay, so it's still on the expensive side. At my local glass store, at retail prices, I can get a rod of Moretti/Effetre COE 104 soft glass for $0.60. The borosilicate rods, depending on diameter, cost between $3 and $8 per rod. But, like any metal rich glass, like the soft glass rods available from Double Helix or Trautman Art Glass, sexiness comes with a price ... and it's totally worth it ... but sometimes you want to make sure it's as sexy as you imagine before you fully commit. Borosilicate glass has the ability to create magnificent visual texture and color inside a bead that it was impossible for me to resist. I've actually been doing hard glass for about 5 years now ... but only socially ;)

A set of borosilicate beads I did last November.
They're still on Etsy if you like them!

So, here's the stack of glass I got from them. I can't blog about the order without at least showing you the glass. Boro COE 32-33 on bottom, three colors of Lauscha COE 104 glass on top.

Normally a new shipment of glass, even boro, wouldn't be motivation enough for me to blog about it. I'd rather blog about what I make than what I buy. It takes the pressure off. But, part of what they shipped made me laugh so hard that I couldn't help but share. Sure, they'll sell you amazing glass, but the'll also send you what you *really* need ... adhesive bandages! And *stIckErs*. For FREE! These guys are mindreaders. Seriously. My husband almost had to go to therapy when I got hot glass shards down my cleavage - not once - but twice. Yeah. Second degree burns. Stickers? They just make me happy.

TWO cases! These guys aren't messing around.
Can you elite guess which is my favorite?

AwEsOmE. Right?! I totally feel like I scored. lol. We now return you to our regularly scheduled non-sexual-innuendo blogging.