Proof

Evidence of Thursday's efforts.

Since LibertyTown is a working pottery school with limited space, I have found it best if I work in small batches, get them through all their steps (trimming, slipping, painting, carving...) and in line for bisque firing before starting the next batch.

(Some of you will be impressed to see that yes I made TWO lids for the jar.  Just in case.)

I have a commission for a cookie jar...I am very limited in my skills when it comes to throwing larger objects (anything over 5 pounds of clay!) especially when the pot has to go UP as opposed to OUT.  Larger bowls and plates are much easier for me then tall cylinder shapes.  So taking on this request was a big chance.  But luckily it was ordered by a friend FOR a friend.  And how big is a package of cookies anyway?

Slipped and drying.  Ready for decoration tomorrow.....

Evidence that Dominion came to lay the new power line!  All I need now is for them to come back and actually hook the new line to the house and the 2nd line to my studio.....

PATIENTLY (!?!?) waiting.....

Almost There!

I'm nearly done painting the new part.  

How do you like the colors?  We have decided we don't want to live in a dark house this time around.  And I am so thankful to be able to do most of the work before the furniture is  delivered.

The colors are pretty true to life.  At least on my monitor anyway.  The bedroom blue is a different intensity depending on the time of day.

I love the crazy green in the bathroom.  The taped area was helping me decide on an old cabinet I found in an antique store downtown.  (I bought it today.)

This morning the cleaning crew came and the place looks amazing!  I was beginning to wonder if we would ever feel like it was ready to move into.  Now it is shiny and nearly ready for us!

While that was going on I was actually sitting at a potters wheel!  Yup, it's true.  After 2 months I have finally gotten back to it.

By the time I was finished I had 10 small bowls, 2 yarn size bowls and a cookie jar with 2 lids, you know, just in case.

No pictures to prove it yet.

But my back is telling me it's true.

BOY did it rain last night!!

Our normally sedate river was raging when I woke up this morning.  I knew it would be wild.  Last night it poured and the wind BLEW.  It was still windy today.  74 yesterday.  Today I think it may have been in the high 40s but the wind made it feel much colder.

I know I have mentioned before how much I love living literally right across the street from the river, especially this time of year...not so much in the summer when everyone starts gathering and invading My River Space....

We are high enough to feel perfectly safe, so I can enjoy the power and sometimes unpredictable personality that defines the Rappahannock.

Our house is located right on the Fall Line, the point where the river was no longer navigable by the tall ships.  Just down stream is the tiny, now almost non-existent town, of Falmouth.  Falmouth and Fredericksburg were MAJOR ports during the eighteenth century.  All the local growers would roll their hogs heads of tobacco down the dirt and rocky roads to the ports to be shipped off to England.  Living here now it is difficult to imagine the hundreds of ships that would be docked here.  The river is tidal, and the silt build up over the years hardly allows the small paddle boat to make it to the City Dock.  (Oops!  Sorry for the history lesson, once an historian always an historian I guess!)

I especially like watching the geese.  I have never seen them in the water when it is raging like this.  Today proved me wrong.  This group was having a ball.

The six of them (obviously three very adventuresome couples into extreme sport) would fly upstream to a calmer area of the river....

Situate themselves with their backs facing downstream....

And just ride the current.....

Then they would call to each other, and fly back up stream to do it all over again! (Layla tugged on the leash as I was trying to take this picture...but you can see the geese in flight there in the center if you look closely.)

Luckily our new place, though not just across the street, will be an easy walk to the river path.

And SOON we will be moving in!  They are working on the last few details...and we are still waiting for Dominion to put the line in to my studio.  But the house is nearly there!!

One last thing....I can't help but boast.  Tiny A Story about  Living Small, the movie made by my niece Merete and her friend Christopher has been accepted into the SXSW Film Festival!  I am just so damn happy for them.  Such a creative, talented and motivated couple.

Makes me feel like it's time for me to get back into the studio and do some creating myself!!!

Snow!

We finally had a little snow last night.  IF my shovel and broom weren't packed away somewhere it would be easy to clear walks and the car. But a MOP had to suffice....

(If you look closely you can see it leaning next to the door.)

Killer Bunny is our snow gauge.  (He's about 2 feet high.)

Tracey's talk of weaving pushed me to get to the studio and work on my latest wool blanket.  I work in stages to save my back.  It is nice to finish all the warping one day, so that you can walk in and just start weaving the next.....very satisfying.

It's going pretty quickly with this simple pattern.  I will probably be painting at the house but hope to finish  this over the weekend.  Greg is driving to Florida for a week of "work" so I will have only Layla to give me a schedule!

Foggy Days of Winter....

It has been a wet and foggy several days. It started at as warm (hence the fog on the river, isn't it beautiful?) but now the cold is creeping in.  Greg struggles with this kind of weather, but luckily he is heading to Florida for work in a week.  Layla and I will stay here and continue to provide Quality Control at the house project.

But the tile is going in!

And the old cabinets have been placed as of this picture, but installed yesterday.

We just don't have the cash right now to do a full blown kitchen renovation, so we had the room gutted, the wiring replaced where we WILL want it when we do the rest of the work and new dry wall was installed.  I'm going by in a bit to hopefully find that "we" managed to salvage the old (ugly) counter top as well.

The house ended at the end of the cabinets in the picture.  Everything beyond is new.

Lesson learned. (AGAIN.) Expect a home renovation project to go over budget AT LEAST 10%.  We are beyond the bottom of the barrel now.....but it I think we will make it!

In the mean time I have decided this will not be a pottery month.  My folks are downsizing (I may post more about that...) so I have been helping them go through their treasures (being the closest geographically and the only daughter you KNOW some have come home with me.)  I am trying to get another blanket on my loom at the studio, but between being called away to put out fires at the house, painting radiators (golly but spray painting is hard on the hands!), working on a knitted sock commission and just my own lack of motivation with the yucky weather it isn't getting done.  (Throw in DVRd Downton Abbey....)

Maybe today...

And Layla's tail is nearly healed!  We will retire the Cone of Shame in a week or so.

(Her tail is even blurry because she's waggin' it hoping for a cookie!)

Merry Christmas!

The Latest

First of all I must apologize once again for the stellar pictures.....The last month has been such a blur I seem to rarely have the patience to dig out the camera especially when I have the camera phone in my pocket. A poor excuse. But there it is.

The mystery from my last post turned out pretty well I think.

I had hoped to knit these guys all their own winter wear ....but instead came up with a creative alternative.  SOCK toes! :)  (The blue scarf IS hand knitted and the other scarf is felted.  That's where the handmade stopped.)  The snowmen with 3 "balls" have removable heads for that secret post Christmas candy stash!

In the midst of the Christmas preparations Layla had a cyst removed from her tail.

She is not very happy with me.

I take her with me in the car this time of year to save her from having to spend the day in her crate.

But leaving her in the car she gets bored....

Hence the cone of shame.

We found out today the cyst was benign.

The BEST Christmas present ever!  She is such a faithful friend.  And will be 12 in February!

The house is coming along!  You can see them working on the siding here.This picture is only a week old and they have already dry walled the interior!

It's time to start doing my stretching exercises for all the painting I need to do.  It was a trade.  I paint.  And we can afford new storm windows for the old section of the house.

Here you can see the side of the studio.  Soon I will be able to wander out any time of the day and jump right into work.

I can hardly wait!!