They just keep going and going and going.........

I'm still not sure how all this blogging business works but i plan to keep a-pluggin' away slowly and researching and making new friends. Hopefully it'll all just flow together nicely and all these fun networking tools will pay off. Besides that, I think this is a great way to keep memories alive.

It may seem odd, the ramblings of a broomchick, but these brooms have taken me through some outrageous adventures and in time I will tell some tales. Today I have a tale to tell about an old broom. I often get questions about the durability of my brooms and can tell folks from experience that I have brooms in my house that I use regularly that I made 15 years ago and they are still in fabulous shape.

**THE GOLDEN RULE IS TO ALWAYS HANG UP YOUR BROOM**

Well, I have to say, in all honesty, that my brooms are still fabulous after all these years and i HAVE NOT always hung them up. The very small group of broom makers that i have been making brooms with have been in business for over 25 years and I can also say that I have seen much older brooms around the shop that are also still in great shape.

I get many letters and emails from folks who have had our brooms for many years and they have nothing but compliments. The broom corn we use is very good quality and because it is dried naturally it retains a fair amount of it's elasticity from it's natural oils.

*While the broom itself will hold up for a very long time, the binding on top (which we call platting) will sometimes come unwound after many years. That is very easy to fix and can be done for free if you walk the broom into my shop, or for just the cost of shipping if you send it to me. *

I received a letter just yesterday from a woman named Cynthia who bought a broom from us in at a craft fair in San Francisco 25 years ago!!! She sent these pictures.

Hand Brooms for Glass Blowers

I work 9-5, Mon thru Fri at the Eugene Glass School and the glass industry has become another great passion to me. While walking through the shop a couple of months ago i noticed a raggedy old make-shift hand broom hanging from one of the benches in the hot shop. It was obviously made from an old broom that someone cut the bristles off of and bound together with a piece of wire. It was badly burnt and i wondered what the heck it could possibly be used for.

Apparently handbrooms are used to brush colored glass powder and frit on hot glass pieces I assume to even out the color and possibly texture. The make-shift hand broom appeared to be made of the thicker portion of the broom corn making a stiffer broom than a regular hand broom.

Well, I got to thinking....... there has to be a better hand broom out there for glass blowers who spend a considerable amount of time and money on their tools so i went looking and i didn't find a thing. So after talking with some glass blowers and making a few trial brooms I think i came up with a good little broom for the job.

This little hand broom can be soaked in water and used to sweep hot glass. Because it is made of good quality broom corn it doesn't just catch on fire and burn up it burns slowly so you wont burn through it too fast. I will have a few sizes available as i have found that some glassblowers like to use shorter ones that are more stiff ands some prefer longer bristles.

Available for sale now on my ETSY: http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=41805429