Stained glass

Have you ever seen a pretty picture made of small pieces of colorful glass in a church or a museum? That is called stained glass!

So imagine you have a coloring book, and instead of coloring with markers or crayons, you colored with little pieces of super pretty glass. Then you put those colored pieces of glass together like a puzzle, and it creates a really beautiful picture!

Now, imagine you cut a bunch of these tiny pieces of glass into all different shapes and sizes - that's how the artist can create a really intricate and detailed picture in the stained glass. After the artist has cut all the glass pieces they need, they can start to put them together like a puzzle.

But wait, the glass pieces need to stick together somehow! That's where a special material called lead comes in. The artist will use lead to make little frames for each glass piece. Then they can solder (that means melting and sticking together) the lead frames so that all of the glass pieces are held together securely.

Once the picture is finished, now it's time to put it in a window so that all the people can admire it! Because the glass is so colorful, when the sun shines through it, it creates beautiful patterns of colored light on the floor or walls. And that's why you often see stained glass windows in churches, because the colorful light can make people feel peaceful and happy!