Red buffalo, teacups, jewelry and pottery frames

The red glaze came on Monday evening, and I had the kiln fired up 2 hours later. This morning I opened it to find most of my beads melted onto the kiln shelf. I learned a lot about glazing beads this time around. I wish I didn't have to learn most lessons the hard way...

But, the good news...6 little buffalo, oh, so happily, standing up nice and tall and proud! I love the new glaze - it is a rich dark red, and the feel of it is wonderful, too. I think I'll try it on some mugs and other things next time around. Everything except my jewelry and my biggest bowl came through the firing intact, with no surprises. The biggest bowl has a crack on the foot ring - darn!

I've started working on felting and weaving landscapes inside the new pottery frames...the first one is flax fields, with a river in the middle and a stormy sky. I love the wonderful blue color of flax fields and decided to incorporate it into my landscape. I'm trying to get it finished so I can hang it in at the Dakota Harvest Bakery on Friday (the show will be up until Nov. 17).

Waiting for a glaze...

I ordered a new Cone 6 glaze last week and was really hoping it wouldn't take the week to arrive that the salesperson said it would...but today it has been a week. It is a red shino and I ordered it especially for my little buffalo. Everything else is glazed and sitting in the kiln, so I should be able to fire the kiln up an hour or two after receiving the glaze.

Tomorrow I'm taking some art to the Dakota Harvest Bakery. It will be in a mini-show for about 6 weeks...including the next and last Art & Wine Walk for this season. I made two new clock faces last night, with Sculpey clay so I need to pick up the clock mechanisms for those today. Hard to think that it has been 6 weeks since the Art & Wine Walks for this season started. Time marches on too quickly!

I'm working on a large felted madonna. So far the basic design is complete - the mother and her child are on the background felt. Next I'm going to either felt some shiny fibers on top, or sew them on, but I'm having trouble deciding which colors to use. I hate taking things apart so I'm trying to make the right decision from the beginning. I didn't weave a basic structure first for this one and it has worked out well, except my felting brush is so small that I'm constantly moving it. I could use a large piece of thick foam but I really like using the brush instead.

I'm hoping to post some photos this week of my new glaze and my new madonna!

Light globe and glass paint yields visual art!

The donated glass globe painted up beautifully and came out of the oven with narry a crack! Hooray! Now I'm busy getting the wood table top and middle shelf primed - they will be painted a bright red. The legs and additional fittings will be white PVC pipe and caps - I think they will look sort of industrial, bright and cheery against the red wood shelves. My husband, Eric, is helping me with some of this project, so I am grateful for that. I can't wait for it to be done, and all lit up, hopefully in time for the Art & Wine Walk on Sept. 20. I'd really like to get another one done, too - one with copper legs and barnwood shelves (I'm going to my sister's farm this weekend and hopefully will be able to scavenge some from her!) and celadon and copper frosted on the glass globe...visual art made from recycled stuff. I'd like to do another one with driftwood - too bad there are no oceans nearby! I've been trying to list items on sell-arts.com and have had so much trouble. I'm really lousy with computer stuff and lose my patience with it quickly. There are so many other things I'd like to do with my time than sit at the computer! I started on a new herd of pottery buffalo this morning, got two mom and two babies finished so they can dry over the weekend.