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| Frequently Asked Questions How long will it take to get my hourglass order? Please allow approximately 3 to 4 weeks after you place your hourglass order before it will be ready to ship. This will allow for production time. Each hourglass is custom made as ordered. In the event that earlier delivery would meet your needs better, please contact me and I will do my best to accommodate you. When you select FedEx Ground or FedEx Home Delivery for your hourglass order you should allow from 1 to 5 working days for delivery after your hourglass order ships. FedEx Ground delivers Monday through Friday only. FedEx Home Delivery delivers Tuesday through Saturday only. If you need your hourglass delivered earlier, please let us know when you place your order. We will do everything possible to accommodate your needs. It may be necessary to upgrade to a FedEx Express Service. Additional charges will apply. What is FedEx Home Delivery? FedEx Home Delivery service is dedicated to residential customers. All ground deliveries made to a residential address, including a business operated from a residence, are delivered by this service. FedEx Home Delivery cannot deliver to P.O. boxes. What is FedEx Ground? FedEx Ground is for business-to-business, small-package delivery, with business-to-residential service available through FedEx Home Delivery. To qualify for FedEx Ground service you must provide the name and telephone number of the business to which the deliver is to be made. If this information is not provided, we are required to use FedEx Home Delivery. The delivery address of a business must be located in a commercial or professional building to qualify for FedEx Ground service. FedEx Ground cannot deliver to P.O. boxes. Can you ship my hourglass order to foreign destinations? Yes. Insured shipping for your hourglass order is available to locations outside the United States using Global Express Mail Service from the USPS. During the check out process after selecting your hourglasses choose the Export Shipments via USPS Global Express Mail (EMS). Charges for packing, shipping and insurance for your hourglass order will be verified by email for your approval prior to shipping. Click here for contact information and for personal assistance with your shipping needs. What do I have to do to join your mailing list? Enter your e-maill address in the box, click the "Go" button, fill in a few more blanks, click the "Submit" button and you are done. Note: In each email you receive, there will be a link to unsubscribe or change your areas of interest. Your privacy is important to us. Will unmounted glass stand upright by itself? NO. The unmounted glass shown in the Hourglass Store is standing on a napkin ring (Not included) to support it for the purpose of photography only. All glass must be mounted in a case to minimize the possibility of breakage. How does an hourglass work? The hourglass works by having sand or another material in one bulb passing through an opening into another which is below. Time is regulated in combination of the size of the opening and the size of the material. My friends are going to stay on the beach for their honeymoon. If I provide sand from their honeymoon beach can it be added to the glass? Yes. Here are a few tips that may help. Put the dry sand in a dry water bottle. This should be enough to fill the glass for our most popular size which is the 9” high hourglass. Leave out all but the smallest shell pieces and stones. Can you make it run exactly one hour using my sand? No. Sand comes in so many sizes and types that this is not a possibility. We will do our best to ensure that the sand will flow freely from one end to the other. Why can’t you ship my hourglass order the same day that you receive it? All hourglass cases are handcrafted in my shop located in Des Plaines, IL and are made one at a time. In most cases I ask that you allow a minimum 7 – 10 working days after an order is received before it will be ready to ship. What are die charges? Die charges are the cost of making the custom die of your image to be used for stamping your BRONZE MEDALLIONS. Die charges start at about $400.00 and depending on detail could be more. This is a one time charge. Which woods can be laser engraved? Our entire selection with the exception of Cedar can be laser engraved. Cedar will not work because it is a softwood. All of the others are hardwood. The selection includes Walnut, Cherry, Maple and Padauk. Click here for contact information and for personal assistance. FLOODING UPDATE! Thanks to all who have inquired in the past few days. Des Plaines was on the national news for two days running because of the flooding. Fortunately we did not and are not likely to get river water. Another thing that we can be grateful for is although we continue to experience occasional power outages all that we got is lots of rain – no wind or the damage caused by it. Here are some photos taken in our community. On Saturday September 13th we spent the entire day staying ahead of the flooding. We managed to keep the water level on our basement floor to about an inch deep. This was backup from the storm sewer system that came up the floor drain. We could not block it because our back yard was flooded – the water there was within fractions of an inch of going over the foundation. Water was coming in through foundation cracks. This seepage did not stop until late Sunday. At one point I switched out our sump pump for a bigger one while sitting in water on the rise in the crawl space. While doing this a hose connection came apart and I had a cold “storm sewer water” shower – ugh – as the water shot up and bounced back off the floor joists above back onto me. I watched the water rise 3 inches in about 20 minutes. Fortunately the new pump did the trick once it was running and caught up after about an hour. We have been in cleanup mode since Monday. Although we have managed to get things relatively dry it will take approximately 8 to 10 more days to get the humidity controlled and back to a level where I will again be able to apply finish. In the meantime we are continuing to clean and deal with the stench left by the sewer water. While our flooding has caused a disruption in my ability to produce hourglasses, all that I need to do is look at pictures like these of the Galveston and Houston area to realize that although what has happened in Des Plaines is an inconvenience, it is not a big deal. I hope to be able to resume shipping on or about Wednesday October 1st. Because of this unexpected delay, normal delivery times are not possible. Please let me know if you have time specific requirements and I will do my best to accommodate your needs. Thank you for your patience and understanding. Our thoughts and prayers go out to all who have been impacted by Ike. Tom & Kathi
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