Thy leaves are so unchanging!

Our Christmas tree has been de-decorated for quite some time now, but Kev only just today took the lights off and carted the tree out of the living room.  We’ve been enjoying the lights so much that we both procrastinated.  The tree was surprisingly still keeping its needles well, mostly losing them only by the small clumps the cats chewed off (mostly Fat Murray).  We got the smallest tree we’ve ever had in this house... since 1993.  This year’s tree was once again a Frasier Fir (our favorite kind), and it was only a little bit over six foot tall.  Our typical Christmas tree has been closer to twelve feet, so this tree at first seemed tiny.

Kevin and Sam went over to the Christmas tree lot that we always go to, and they picked this tree out together.  I was still recuperating from the knee surgery I had in early December, so I didn't go with them.  (Arthroscopic surgery for torn meniscus... the most common of knee injuries... of course!)  The tree was the only Christmas decorating we did this year, foregoing all of the other stuff... Sam, Kev and I all had trouble getting into the decorating spirit this year.  Me because of my knee, Kev because of so many extra hours he had at work, and Sam because I am pretty sure that if any further decorating got done, he’d be hauling boxes up and down the stairs all by himself.  Not a lot of fun.

So now our living room is so much bigger!  Isn’t it nuts how the day you take the tree down, your room grows.

I thought the cats would be pissed off at Kev, but once he moved the loveseat back where it goes (where the tree was), they both plopped their butts on it and went to sleep.  The cats enjoyed the tree immensely... I thought they'd miss it more...

Kevin also got the Meyer snow plow on the old ’78 Chevy pickup today.  Kev uses the tractor to plow our driveway, so he gave the old truck to Mike and Joyce for their incredibly long, straight driveway.  The plow hasn’t been on the old truck in about five years, but Kev said it went on pretty easily and worked like a charm.  That old truck is rusting out like crazy, but she’s still dependable as heck.  Love that old truck. 

We’ve had a spell of nice weather... the annual January thaw.  This past week was lovely.  It started to get cold and a freezing rain began just as Kev finished with the old truck this afternoon.  Shortly after he got inside for evening, it turned to big, fat flakes of snow.  Now it’s snowing small and fast.  Little snow, big snow.  That means it should accumulate.  Yay!  Love the snow.

Sam wants to do some more senior photos in the snow... he did a photo shoot in the fall with the beautiful autumn colors.  So here’s hoping we get a lot of beautiful snow, because I would like to have some photos of Sam in the snow, too.  The same photographer who did Joyce and Mike’s engagement photos and wedding is doing Sam’s senior photos, and he’s so good.  Joyce and Mike did their engagement photos in the snow, and they were awesome photos.  There is something about snow... I have loved snow since I was little.  I love the first snow... I can smell it in the air.  It’s a wonderful smell that first snow.  Like the first cold morning you can really smell autumn.  Makes you wanna hug the air.

This past week, I have finally been able to get back into the pottery studio.  I didn’t get in there hardly at all during December, due to my knee.  I had two tears in the meniscus of my right knee, so it was very painful for a while.  After the surgery, it was amazing how the pain was gone.  I had pain from surgery, but that deep, intense inside pain was magically gone.  Very nice.  Then almost exactly two weeks after the surgery, I fell outside on the frozen ground directly onto that knee.  I was afraid I had done some damage to the meniscus, but I didn’t... but... I did bruise my patella.  The surgeon said it would just take time to heal.  And then he said he could give me a shot of steroids into the knee which would help with the pain.  I said, “Now, please.”  That was Monday afternoon, and by Tuesday morning, I was raring to get into the studio.  Wasn’t even limping!  I’ve been making things like a woman possessed.  I’ve missed clay so much. 

Most recently, I made eight tumblers which are currently in the kiln, just bisque fired over this weekend.  I will hopefully be able to glaze them all tomorrow, and they’ll go through a glaze firing this week.  These are a test lot, because I’ve taken on a commission to make 200 stoneware tumblers which must each hold 20 ounces.  I had made a luncheon set of stoneware dishes last year that’s still at the Serendipity 181 shop downtown, and a husband and wife saw them there.  They are opening a pub just down the street from Serendipity 181, and they want the 200 tumblers to look just like the ones they saw at the shop for their “mug club” at their pub.  I am very excited about this project.   And nervous.  200 tumblers by May 1st.  Gonna be fun!

But I don’t wanna do only tumblers from now until May.  I’ve been dreaming ideas for clay... I have more ideas than time!  That’s a lovely feeling.  Since I’ve been selling pieces at Serendipity 181 (which is an artist consignment shop), it’s like I’ve been freed up to try anything with clay.  I don’t have to make something that I want in my house or I want to give to a family member or friend... I can’t make any crazy thing I want!  And, the pieces sell.  It’s awesome.  Gives me money to keep my clay habit going.  I love being at the studio, being there with my friends, working with clay, creating something and then seeing it come out of the glaze firing.  Opening a kiln from a glaze firing is like Christmas morning.  So freakin’ fun.  And now my fingers are itching to get into clay right now!

This past Saturday I worked at the studio from 9am until about 2pm.  It is amazing to me how many muscles are used when making stuff at the studio.  Being forced to take a month away from it, this week has reminded me... but it is a wonderful type of soreness.  By 2pm on Saturday, though, I felt almost too tired to drive myself home.  Joyce worked the front desk at the studio, and she was busy working, but she was there (I love it when she's there), and we had lunch together.  Joyce helped me take care of a couple of things when I was cleaning up... she carried the heavy things for me because she could see I was struggling by that point.  I got out into my car to leave and realized I had left my water on the table... totally too pooped to go back in and get it so I called Joyce.  Setting in my car on the other side of the glass door, I talked with her and told her I left my water... she laughed at me and then got it and ran it out to me.  Love that girl. 

I made some ridiculous little salt and pepper shakers yesterday... I used a plaster mold of a baby face, so the shaker is a baby’s head.  Joycie said they’re freaky.  I like ‘em!  It’s a Duncan mold from the 1960’s that I bought at an estate sale last summer, along with about one hundred other molds.  I took quite a few into the studio for everyone to use, mostly simple shapes we can use for slump or hump molds.  I also have quite a few in my garage that I picked up for a friend, and this included 2 Duncan baby doll molds, a boy and a girl.  There are also little hands/arms and feet/legs parts in these molds... I might try using those for something wacky, too.  These plaster molds are meant for slip-casting, but I am just pressing clay into the mold, using the bit I want of the face... we don’t do slip-casting at the pottery studio.  I do a lot of hand-building (that is, instead of throwing on a wheel), and I like using plaster molds for some things.  I will have pottery on the mind all through the night now.  Sometimes I get up in the middle of the night to write down stuff, so I can remember my pottery ideas/dreams.  Often I can’t make sense of what I wrote.  But it’s damn fun.

Life is so good.  I love being retired.  I worked for 35 years, and I have not missed it at all, not for one minute.  I'm so happy.  A bad day in retirement is still better than the best day working.    I am totally grinning as I type this!!!

Sam and Allie are at the movies tonight.  Sam just texted me and asked me to set up a timer to record Honey Boo Boo on TLC.  I did it, though I could feel brain cells dying from it.  That’s crap TV Big Time.  And my son and his girlfriend wanna watch it.  Sigh.   Our family enjoys our TV.  Kev and I are hooked on a lot of shows... Blue Bloods, CSI, Elementary, Bones, CSI New York, Castle, Rizzoli & Isles, Rookie Blue, Person of Interest, Sons of Anarchy, Justified, and so on... so basically anything to do with crime!  We also like New Girl, Parenthood, Revenge...  And I have to have my Big Bang Theory weekly fix.  Many of the TV shows we watch are not Sam’s choice.  Now that we have the Dish Hopper, we share the DVR with Sam... before the hopper, we had a DVR in the living room and another upstairs, so we never saw what shows Sam recorded.   I know I sound old when I say this, but I can’t believe the shit Sam watches!  Damn kids, get off my lawn!

Wakey wakey

Since I've been using my CPAP machine, I've not been sleeping well. By well, I mean very long. I used to be in bed for the night about 8 or 9 hours each night, but now I'm lucky if I make it to bed by 11pm and stay there until 4am. I just can't get my mind settled down to be sleepy. My body is tired, but my mind is whirling. I think it's adjusting to the new level of oxygen. And though I think the 4 or so hours of sleep on the CPAP I'm getting are better than the 8 or 9 hours I was previously getting, it just ain't enough downtime...

This has made for some interesting nights. And many, many eBay purchases. Right now I have about 12 unopened packages from yesterday's and Saturday's mail. I also found a great place to buy New Balance shoes, Joe's. Highly recommend Joe's. I also bought 3 used books from Amazon.com sellers, and they're awesome. And cheap! What a deal!

I found some real super cool etsy stores... dyenah from California who cold-water dyes vintage textiles, like tablecloths and aprons, and they're beautiful! That's what some of my eBay purchases are... vintage tablecloths because dyenah has inspired me to wanna try cold-water dyeing. But now I've ordered 3 tablecloths from dyenah, too. I couldn't resist... she had them on sale!

I've liked etsy for a long time. Before all this late night computer obsession started, this etsy artist, Jessica Grundy, easily convinced Joycie and I to purchase several prints... we have plans to use them in a future girl's nursery, among other places. We bought her prints: Roots, Jenny, Swarm, Little Sharpshooter, Duet, Take Warning and Layers. Layers is going in my kitchen area. When the prints arrived, extremely well packaged, I might add, the artist had included a hand-written thank you note and some free goodies. I love etsy shop owners... they're so nice!

I like to get on etsy and pick a word to search items... like spike. Search that one and you'll love some of the results. I don't remember what search led me to this awesome charm bracelet, but it also led me to discover the term, "steampunk." I know! Where the heck have I been?!

Tangent: Wikipedia for me is just like the old-fashioned, printed World Book Encyclopedia set we had when I was a kid... I'd look something up, and that would lead me to something else, so I would have to go pull out another letter of the alphabet (there was a book for each letter, for those youngsters reading this), and pretty soon, I was sitting on the floor near the bookcase surrounded by 14 volumes of the encyclopedia. Ahhh... good times. Sometimes on Wikipedia, I get so far linked from my original topic that I forget what I was looking up in the first place. Ahhh... good times.

Anyway, back to etsy... this photographer, Wild Life Prints, from Nova Scotia, is someone who I think I would really like to meet in person. I'm sure he must be a fun person to be around.

These salt and pepper shakers made me laugh out loud!

This artist, who lives in Hawaii and makes a lot of masks, inspired me with her tomato face mask. By inspired, I mean that I pretty much copied it, and then I made a matching green pepper and jalapeno for my sister, Kathy, to add to her collection she puts on the side of their shed near her garden, which collection has grown large enough to expand to another wall of the shed...





And based on this item and this one, and also this one, Uturn is also an etsy artist/shop owner who I'm sure I would like to know.

Just like eBay, of course, there's a whole lotta crap on etsy along with all the cool stuff. I know as hours and hours of research lately has proved it. But I still love searching on it. I've been semi-obsessed with wall hooks lately. And this feature of etsy is awesome.

Thanks to my friend, Michelle in California, I've been enjoying some new web sites, like this one. And thanks to my niece, Michelle, I've been enjoying StumbleUpon, too. My niece is very talented, by the way...



I've even begun keeping a list of words, phrases, names of people & things that I hear on the radio, on TV or in conversations, or that I read, such as in magazines at the doctor's office waiting room, that I want to look up later. That Internets! So interesting!

I also have been searching for the perfect purse on eBay. And in the process have given away 2 purses to Joycie, 1 to my sister Janet and 2 to my mother-in-law Sharron. Only 1 I've bought is okay, but it's still too small. I've been trying to get a good deal on a Vera Bradley Stephanie now, but those people who sell VB on eBay are crazy. Too much money. But I did find a great Tignanello wallet real cheap. Score! Update since I started writing this post: I forgot! I won a VB Stephanie purse auction, and it arrived and I like it. Still too much moola, though.

Along with not getting sleepy enough, I have also discovered that I can't stand to sit for long in the recliner and watch TV in the evenings anymore. Kev and I follow a lot of TV shows. I do mean a lot of them... many shows. We are American TV junkies and proud of it. We rarely ever watch a show that we haven't recorded on the DVR, and we fastmercialize though most of the commercials. We do stop and watch some of the commercials; I'm really enjoying the SubWay ones where the adults talk like little kids. I can't explain why those appeal to me, but they do! Especially the "do you wanna be my boyfriend" one.

So anyway, back to my point, which is though I have not only enjoyed vegging in my much-beloved recliner for many evenings, I've craved it often (since 2008), but now... now I sometimes feel like I'm gonna go crazy if I don't get up out of it and move.

I think I've been gravitating to the computer because it keeps my mind active. I've been Googling all kinds of junk, er... I mean information. But don't quiz me about it, coz I don't think my short-term memory thing is quite back up to par yet.

The many hours, many in a row with no break, spent at my desk in the dining room on either my company laptop working or on my home computer the past couple of weeks has brought up a new problem for me. My poor old feet swelled up like big, fat cantaloupes. Too much arthritis and too many hours hanging down... not used to it, so it caused holy havoc on me feets. At present, I'm wear old person socks, and I confess I love them. Those socks, along with a dedicated effort to raise my legs as often as possible, have really helped. It's nice to walk again. File that one under "if it ain't one thing, it's another."

Curious thing, though... it's taken me about 5 days to actually complete this blog post. That's the other thing about the past couple of weeks... I think the only thing I've been good at, and actually productive at, is the work I've done on my job. With all the stuff at home, I start, I stop, I go back, I get distracted, I stop, I start, I go... ya get the picture. What a mess. And today is Saturday, and at our house, that means that mom goes to the pottery studio. But I didn't make it in there today... I just couldn't get to it. And I wasn't feeling creative. This past week being back at work into the office was hectic and exhausting, and I feel flattened. Flattened and strange.

Speaking of strange, I leave you with a photo I took one evening a while back. Joyce and I were on our way home from her trying on wedding dresses, and we passed a church that had a sign that caught my eye...



Good to know.

Apropos of nothing, something in my house has been emitting a single, very high-pitch beep every so often, like every 1 hour, 17 minutes and 23 seconds or so, for DAYS. At first I thought it was our smoke detector in the living room telling me of the eminent demise of its battery, but that's not it. I cannot find the source. It is bugging me.

Birds for Joyce

Even though I have been trying to practice throwing on the wheel at the pottery studio, I still love hand-building. I made a set of small, shallow dishes for Joycie recently by using slabbed clay (the studio has a slab roller) and plaster forms.


They are squarish bowls, about 5" diameter and only about 1" depth.



My thinking when making them was to use them for olive oil dipping for breads, because we love that... a good olive oil, a nice spice and some balsamic vinegar. Yum.

I ended up making her a set of 9 because they all stayed intact! A couple of them had cracked when I was making them because I dried them too quickly, but they all made it through the bisque and then the glaze firing just fine. So now she has extra.

I decided to paint on the dishes doing something from one of my favorite illustrators, Charles Harper. I love his work. I've mentioned him before on my blog, from the "Twenty Froggies" poem in Childcraft. I searched for images of his work on the 'net, and there were just so many of his birds I liked, that I finally settled on doing all birds... but then there were so many birds to choose from, it was difficult to narrow it down to 9! Have I mentioned I love his work?!

The studio uses a medium-fire stoneware clay, white. I made the bowls and let them dry, then I traced the birds onto the bowls with carbon paper (remember carbon paper?!). I then used underglazes to paint the birds and the outsides of each bowl. Underglazes are basically like colored clay, and you can mix the colors to achieve different colors... and pretty much the color you paint onto your greenware piece (prior to bisque firing, or on bisque if you prefer) will be the color on the final piece after glaze firing. This is much different than typical glazes for bisque which are made up of glass and chemicals, and where your green glaze will be a shade of gray until it goes through the final glaze firing in the kiln. After the bowls were bisque fired, the underglazed colors were very dull. I dipped each dish in clear glaze, and then after the final kiln firing, they were all nice and shiny. I like working with underglazes for detailed painting. Unfortunately, I can't draw, so I usually trace and then paint.

I surprised Joycie with them the other day, and she was pretty happy. Another something for her "hope chest"...



















Mike liked them, too. I can't believe they are getting married in less than a year. Time flies! Like the birds...

I'll give you one hint, honey, you sure did put on a show

This morning on the way into work I saw 2 Budweiser semi-trucks. Great big red ones. I called my husband. Since Kev left for work a little bit earlier than I did, he saw only 1 of them. I told him the universe had sent us a sign. It wanted us to stay home from work today and drink Bud. We should obey. But... sadly, he didn't buy it.

I haven't had beer in a while, but I had a few this past Saturday evening. An ice cold beer on a hot muggy evening was very nice. Several were even nicer. Ryan and Megan, two awesome CMU students who were working at the pottery studio, were putting on a wood fire. Ryan had built the wood fire kiln, etc. outside behind the studio building, so we took our lawn chairs and watched them work. And oh my heck, what a great amount of work those 2 did. I took some really cool pictures and will do a post on that.

After we got home, even though it was quite late (for me) and waaaaay past my usual bedtime, I was wide awake. Sammy, Kev and I, and Wiley, ended up watching some TV. We watched a recorded episode of "Royal Pains", the "Comfort's Overrated" episode. This one had a guy who did a "Mac Truck" business, and he sold mac & cheese with lobster out of his truck. It was a good episode, and we like that show.

Kev and Wiley fell asleep together on the sofa. Sammy and I were still wide awake... so we did the best we could with what we had... no mac & cheese with lobster (man! that looked really good on the show, and I'm sure this recipe from Barefoot Contessa would be close or even better!), but we did make Tuna Helper Creamy Broccoli... at about midnight! The box said it would serve 4, but Sam and I split it while watching the latest episode of "Persons Unknown". And though I've heard that show has had some bad reviews, Sammy and I really are enjoying it. It's weird. We're big fans of weird.

I've been trying to listen to the radio station that Sam likes, 102.5. I usually can't stand most of the songs, but there are couple that are ok. Which is a good thing because every single time I turned to 102.5 I hear one of the 2 songs... one about "you think you're cooler than me" and one about "Alonso Fernando". Seriously, I think 102.5 has those 2 songs on a constant repeat, kinda like the French language distress message on "Lost"... over and over. And over.

I listened to 102.5, heard the "you think you're cooler than me", switched over to an "oldies rock 'n roll" station to hear the Stones "Under My Thumb", which would have to be the antithesis song to the 102.5... followed by the most awesome Billy Joel and his song, "Big Shot"... ah, the irony.

long overdue, pottery pieces done...

I haven't posted photos in quite some time of things I've finished at pottery, so here's an update...

I made this bowl using a slab of clay and a plaster mold, along with real maple leaves pressed into the clay. I gave this bowl to my brother, Jim, and my sister-in-law, Sue, because of the maple leaves. Jimmy makes maple syrup and gives us some each year, so it seemed fitting they have this dish.





I also made a small pen and pencil holder for my Dad...



But unfortunately, turns out the cattail leaves are not only pointy and sharp, but also not very practical. They've broken off now, so I'm planning to make Dad a new one, this time with the leaves flat against the side. Live & learn... that's pottery...

I made some more small box pots, like this one with a blue flower, which I gave to my friend, Carla, because she's quite the gardener...





And this box pot with a frog for my friend, Renee, because she also is quite the gardener, and her gardens include ponds with many, many frogs...







Then I did another try at a blue bird, since I gave the original one to Kathy... but the bird turned out more black than blue, so you guessed it... it's my black bird box pot...





And then I finished up a strange box pot that I started in the fall of 2007, left it wrapped up for months, and then finished it. My niece, Susan, liked it when I showed it to her, so I wrapped it up in bubble wrap and gave it to her...









When I unwrapped the piece, after it had been in plastic for many months, it was covered in mold. I cleaned it well, which really brought the grainy feel out in the red clay. But I think it affected the glaze, since it's not super smooth... but I think it made it look like something really old, like antique old... Susan liked all the little pieces and the "hidden" drawer... I was happy she liked it.

I think it's fun to give the pieces away. I've made a few other things that I will have to post photos of later... since I have to mail them to a certain someone (Happy Birthday, Sandy!!!), and it wouldn't be so much fun to post a photo of it before she unwraps it!

I've also made a bunch of "critter shaker balls"... they're all about the same size, about 4" in diameter, with little pieces of clay inside so they rattle when you shake them.

Here is "bird man"... I gave him to Michael...





This one was going to be an acorn, but then I stuck the squirrel on top reminiscent of "Ice Age"... which is a much beloved movie here at our house, and I gave this guy to Mike because he liked it...



This is "bed head yawn guy", and this one was inspired by Kendra at the studio one morning... I had made a bunch of balls up, ready to turn them into critters... I had one left and didn't have an idea for it (strange for me), and Kendra kept yawning... ta da, "bed head yawn guy"...



Little sleeping blue cat...





Blue guy, who I personally think of as a monk...



Calico cat with copper whiskers, which belongs to my Mom now...





This one I call "Fashionable Alien" and it's wearing real jade earrings... I gave him to Michelle because she liked him/her/it...





This one I called "Frogman" and he also belongs to my Mom...





Here is "Jamaican Dude"... I outlined his dreadlocks in gold leaf pen... I like his purple eyes...





This one I actually made especially for myself, and he was supposed to be Santa... but the glaze I used acted up on me, and now he looks like a demented lumberjack or something... oh well... We call him "Odd Santa"...





Meet "The Professor"... he reminds of some cartoon character, but I still can't think of which one, or maybe it was a cereal character, eh, who knows...





This one was inspired by the Carolina Face Jugs, and I call him "Wacky"... I like his freckles, don't you...





And last, but not least, "Walter" who I made for my nephew, James, and gave to him at his graduation open house. Walter is a character of the comic/ventriloquist Jeff Dunham, and James likes that guy...





So that brings y'all almost up-to-date. Still some I need to photograph yet. Something to look forward to! Ha...