Fifty-five marble-making artists from around the United States and two countries (including a dozen or so locals) showed up at Redwood Acres in Eureka last Thursday through Sunday for the second annual Humboldt Marble Weekend. In what turned out to be a wise decision, given the weather, organizers moved all the glass-making demonstrations indoors — and the snowfall created some unexpected challenges for Sunday's outdoor Marble Hunt.

"It will take me a few days to find the perfect words to express my gratitude to the Humboldt Marble Community for the support and love that was shown during our event," said event organizer Topher Reynolds, marble-making artist and owner of Copious Glass in Eureka. "It still blows my mind how many people were willing to travel great distances to attend, donate time and energy, and generally support our second Humboldt Marble Weekend. We are still gathering our final numbers but it looks like we set new records for attendance, money raised for charity and marbles hidden (more than 1,000 over three days)." See the slideshow below for highlights of the event and shots of the glass wonders.

Reynolds said 31 artists each prepared and donated a marble with a laser-etched HMW logo inside and these were auctioned off as a fundraiser. The fundraising recipient of over $3,500 this year was Pay It Forward Humboldt.

"The snowfall made the marble-hunting moments on Sunday even more exciting and I'm sure there's still dozens of marbles still hidden out there," said Reynolds. "The snow did make a nice background for photographs of marbles. Many of my out-of-town marble artists from the East Coast and Midwest were not impressed by our little snowfall."