A Little Color

Bare clay:

A little color before it goes into the first firing:

When it comes out of the first firing, I'll add some more color and some Gerstley borate to shine up certain parts. Maybe I'll put on a bit of low-fire glaze as well. We'll see.

Here's a couple more pics of the newest sculpture. Yesterday, I painted the roses, teeth, and the whites of the eyes.

 This is her with the lid removed:

You can stash your treasures!

She's coming along.

Friday

On Friday evening, we were waiting for the plumber to come unplug our drains. I used the backed up drains as an excuse to order a pizza and wings for dinner. That was about the highlight of my day.

Saturday

On Saturday, we had dim sum for lunch with Chris and Lu Ann. I ate way too much at lunch. I'm not supposed to have salt and dim sum I'm convinced is mostly salt. Anyway, it was nice to catch up with them and to hand over a set of sauerkraut crocks that Dave threw and trimmed and that we both glazed. We've been driving those crocks around for weeks, waiting to hand them over.

In the afternoon we went to the studio. I worked a bit, mostly underglazing. Dave took apart one of his clarinets to oil it. Judi and Paul came out to chat awhile.

Dave showed Judi a website online that lists houses for sale along with interior and exterior photos and we spent some time looking at the houses for sale in their neighborhood. All this was prompted by us talking about a house in our neighborhood that is for sale with an asking price of $1.2 million, which is ridiculous.  The houses in Judi and Paul's neighborhood, a much nicer neighborhood than ours in many ways, top out at just under $500,000. We looked at a couple in that range. They were hideous, built in the 1970s and 1980s and never updated.

When it was time to take Crunch for a walk, we went by a couple of the houses that we had looked at online. I introduced Judi to a Spanish word that I use to describe Dave all the time: mitotero, which is like a busy body, someone who has to go around getting the latest gossip and peeking in windows, that kind of thing.

After our walk, we worked for awhile longer then headed out to dinner with Judi and Paul, to a local hamburger diner type place. I had a salad and a veggie sandwich (I wanted a cheeseburger, but realized that I hadn't had a single vegetable all day) and I shared a basket of sweet potato fries with everyone and split a vanilla malt with Paul. 

Sunday

On Sunday, the weather took a turn for the worse and it was windy, cloudy and gloomy all day, so Dave and I stayed in. He went out at lunchtime to pick up a burger and diet soda for me (I stayed home in my pajamas and made him Quorn nuggets and broccoli). Mostly I read the internet and watched more episodes of MASH.

I've been sneezing pretty continuously for the last week and a half. I always forget, in the middle of winter when I'm dreaming of spring, that spring means pollen and pollen means allergies. I'm always conflicted about taking antihistamines to help ease the symptoms, so on Friday I didn't take anything. On Saturday I tried a mask. It worked, but only so much. On Sunday morning I finally took some Benadryl. It worked--until it wore off and I went back to sneezing. I hate the dopey feeling I get when I take it though.

In the early evening, we had a pilates lesson. After, we stopped by Whole Foods for some groceries. At home, we put together a quick dinner of whole wheat pasta, jarred sauce, and sauteed bok choi.

I got online to check the Oscar results. Not that I care so much about the Oscars, but I did want to see Michael Keaton win. Oh well.