Etching - Beautiful But Deadly

The AntiCraft has a blog about etching that made the whole thing sound really accessible. So I decided to give it a whirl.

I purchased a container of Armour Etch for $17.99 at the Hobby Lobby. Yeah, it's a little pricey, but there's big payoff. (Just for kicks, stop by the etching aisle one day, pick up a bottle, and read the warning label. It's pretty scary.) I also got a package of popsicle sticks and a roll of contact paper. I already have the Sharpie, exacto knife and surgical gloves.

We have a ton of juice glasses that we hardly ever use, and I also have a giant glass mug that I have found absolutely no use for. These became my victims. I Windexed the glasses and attached contact paper to each. (DO spring for the Windex. Generic glass cleaner sucks ass, and I am usually a huge fan of generics, as I am a cheap mofo.) AntiCraft suggested monsters, but I'm more of a skull girl, so I sketched out a boy and girl skull on the juice glasses and a skull with crossbones on the big mug.

I cut out the boy skull first, slathered it with paste (while wearing surgical gloves), and set the kitchen timer for 5 minutes. While the cream ate away the first glass, I cut out the girl on the second one. After five minutes you have to rinse away the paste while trying to not get any on the parts of the glass you don't want to etch. This can be tricky. Then pull off the contact paper, Windex the glasses, and Voila! you have your etching.

By the way, pulling off the contact paper and Windexing are more easily done without the gloves on. In addition, the paste works IMMEDIATELY, and if there is any on your glove and you touch the glass, it will start etching. I go through a lot of disposable gloves during these projects.

Here are my first attempts at etching:

Not bad, but don't look too close.

My grand plan was to etch some beer glasses with Rorschach blots for my friend that is a therapist. I thought it would be fun for her to analyze her drunk friends (me) at parties.

Good old reliable Google Images provided the blots, which I traced onto contact paper and applied to some beer glasses I got at Goodwill. (I didn't want to get some expensive ones and then screw it up - best to go cheap. That's my motto!!) For these blots, I traced the pattern on the contact paper before attaching it to the glass. I didn't with the practice ones.

I did the first four blots in the series. Of course she now wants the other six, so I need to go beerglass shopping:

After that I became an etching fool. One night while watching a sci-fi movie marathon on AMC, I decided to etch the movie posters for "Destination Moon" and "The Blob":

Then Xmas rolled around, and my knitting group drew names. In a bit of twisted karma, the vegetarian (me again) drew the huntress in our group. So I etched a vase that depicts her in her deer stand taking dead aim at Bambi:

View of the forest:

The tree stand:

AntiCraft suggests reusing the etching paste, as it is costly, but I didn't want to try that with these gifts. I have a big project planned in which I will attempt to reuse the paste, and I will report back.

One more thing - try not to breathe in too much of the fumes while you're doing this. I did get a little light-headed after a while. The Sharpie probably didn't help matters.