The birds...

As I have noted a few times on these pages in the past, on my lunch break I often go walking along the Finley River, on the trails south of the Ozark Community Center.  They have a paved trail and a loop trail through a wooded area along the river.  More often than not I will walk the wooded trail.  Today I went for my lunchtime walk in the woods, and noticed something that seemed downright peculiar to me.  It began when I startled a large flock of grackles resting on the forest floor, just off the trail head.  Once they took off, the woods sprang to life.  Every 30 to 40 feet down the trail, I would disturb another group of grackles roosting in the leaf litter.  It just seemed odd to me that there would be that many grackles taking refuge in the woods, on the ground.  This went on for a good 100 yards down the main trail.  As the last of the grackles dispersed into the canopy, I began to see flocks of robins (half a dozen to a dozen or more in a bunch) on the trail ahead of me. Some of them were even reluctant to take flight, waiting until I was nearly 10 feet from them before they scattered into the nearby trees.  At every bend in the trail, without fail, I would come upon another large group of robins.  As I said, the whole thing just struck me as odd.  I'm no ornithologist, but it sure didn't seem like typical bird behavior in my experience.  Normally there is also a small band of crows that routinely scold me from the tree tops as I make my way along the trail; they were nowhere to be found. Temperatures are in the upper 80s to low 90s, and it is muggy, with a pretty good breeze in the tree tops.  And that may be the key, right there.  The remnants of hurricane Isaac are headed our way, with the first bands of showers predicted to arrive tonight.  That's really the only thing that I can think of that's different from any other summer day around here.  The wind blowing in ahead of the storm may have them spooked, or maybe the change in barometric pressure is messing with them.  It has been very dry these past few months, so it also may have something to do with the promise of heavy rain coming our way.  A nature mystery.  I asked several of the birds what was going on, and not one of them would tell me.  Hmmm, bird brains.                    

I'm still here...

This morning, a couple of minutes before running out the door for work, I was down in the basement checking on a bowl I made last night, and I noticed these pots sitting on the drying rack together, just hangin' out.  I figured it was about time I documented a small bit of what I have been doing these past few weeks, so I pulled out my phone and snapped a couple of quick pictures.  The form of these pots is based on a style of prehistoric pottery made by Native Americans who lived within the central Mississippi River catchment, during a period of cultural florescence which began several hundred years prior to European contact.  This is the same culture that built huge ceremonial mounds such as Monks Mounds at Cahokia, in east St. Louis.  There is some Mesoamerican influence in the designs, as well.  This is my humble attempt at recreating some of those pottery forms.  Over the past 20 years or so, I think I have made maybe half a dozen of these "effigy" style pots, mostly out of local clays, fired in charcoal. Very few of them have survived (as with so many of my early attempts) although we do have one pot similar to the guy on the far left, who has sat in our TV room for many years, partially hidden amid the foliage of a heart-leafed philodendron.  I also made a stoneware version of that same pot form early last year, and had it kiln fired (a couple of pictures of that one can be seen in a post from April 11th).  That pot now resides about 3 feet underground, in my front yard... spreading good karma over a repaired section of our water main (ha!). Hopefully it will be there for hundreds of years, and some archaeologist can dig it up and ponder its purpose.  It's always good to leave little notes to the future. 
Anyway,  all of these new pots were made of red earthenware, and were hand built using slabs and sculpting. They will be fired in our kiln to cone 04, glazed on the inside, and fired one more time.  The guy holding the fish is a rattle head water bottle (not to be mistaken for the deadly water mouth cotton rattler).  No, this poor fisherman has rocks in his head.  I put a small bundle of clay balls in his head before I attached it, and when it is fired, they will add a rattle effect to the bottle.  There are examples of this being done in prehistoric times, so it's certainly not a new idea.  Not sure why they added the rattles to some of their pots back then; it may have had some spiritual significance, but I can't help but believe that maybe it was just for fun. When I set my mind to make one of these pots, I can normally finish it in a single evening... four hours or so from start to finish; to the point where it can be set aside to dry.  After that, I normally will go over it with a piece of fine sandpaper, or one of those green ScotchBrite pads, to smooth out any rough areas before bisque firing.  I have a few more to make, along with some other things, before the next bisque firing.  I'm shooting for the first week of September.               

Glazed...

I thought it was about time I posted a few pictures of some of the pieces that came out of the June 20th glaze firing.  Overall, I think it turned out pretty good.  I am pleased with the results.  As I was unloading the kiln Thursday afternoon, I was all smiles.

The beautiful glow...

It's a few minutes after 10:00 and the kiln sitter just dropped.  A little while ago I heard a disheartening pop come from the inside of the kiln, but I'm hoping it was just the soft brick or steel encasement expanding, or something.  I doubt it, but I guess we will see tomorrow afternoon... what survived and what didn't.  I normally don't have much trouble with that sort of thing, but I guess it's bound to happen sooner or later. 

bisque day!

Loading the kiln for a bisque firing this afternoon.  Yahoo!  Had to kick the dogs out of the garage this morning, and they were not very happy about that (ha).  But they have since been distracted by a neighborhood cat that decided to taunt them by walking past our house several times.  The nerve!  Now they are asleep in the back yard.  Tough life.

Out in the middle of nowhere...

This past weekend, on our way to Colorado and back, we spent a lot of time out in the middle of nowhere.  Kansas to be exact.  And while we were there, the wind was blasting across the state with a steely eyed focus on Canada.  That was where it wanted to be apparently, and nothing was going to get in its way except a few cars and trucks, some cows... and these giant windmills.  In truth, I suppose we weren't actually out in the middle of nowhere, because we were west of Salina when we took these pictures, and according to all the maps I've seen, that is  somewhere.  The windmills (or wind turbines) are part of an enormous complex known as the Smoky Hills Wind Farm.  There were hundreds and hundreds of these huge wind turbines scattered in loose clusters along I70.  We saw one of the blades for these things sitting on a large flatbed trailer, at a truck stop, and it extended out past the end of the trailer.  It's encouraging to see so many of these being built.  Anywhere the wind blows consistently, there should be wind farms.  But from what I understand, all of the windmills in this complex are owned by an Italian company.  Seems we can't even get our own country to seriously invest in this kind of technology.  That is truly unfortunate.  But over the years I am sure that the coal and oil industries have applied a great deal of pressure on the politicians (always for sale to the highest bidder) to find subtle ways to underfund clean and renewable energy R&D.  Washington pays lip service to it, but when it comes down to making it a priority, and really  getting behind it, the money and initiative always seems to be lacking.  So much of what we do, how we get from one place to another, how we power our lives, is fossil fuel based.  It is ubiquitous; and because alternatives are not being given serious attention here in the U.S., the deck is stacked against the average consumer.  Going green is expensive.  So the car we drove across Kansas (at 75 miles per hour) runs on gasoline, and we used quite a bit on this trip.  That's just the way it is for now, I guess.  Don't get me wrong, this petroleum based system of ours has served us well over the past 150 years or so, but it is clear that the extraction and use of those products is harming our world, and it will eventually become too costly, in a number of ways, to obtain and use.  It is not going to last forever, despite what some would like you to believe.  "Drill, baby, drill!"... the rallying cry of the slack-jawed masses.  The people who embrace that philosophy are inclined to look no further than the tip of their nose, apparently... or they are in deep denial.  There is no such thing as generational thinking for them, it's just what serves them best right now. The future will take care of itself, I guess.  Ugh.

A few pieces headed for the kiln

I am slowly getting enough pots made to have a kiln load here in the next week or so.  I am looking forward to it.  It all just takes time.  In this next firing there will be more skyblue terra sig ware... bottles & jugs, footed bowls, small platters, flower vases, and so forth.  I really like the look of the blue terra sig pots... to me, they have a very light, peaceful quality about them.
This time around, in addition to the blueware, (and a few pots with underglaze deco) I am making some pieces specifically to be glazed. The jug I'm holding (which still needs some finishing) will get a nice burnt orange glaze in the second firing.  I'm hoping that the star figure will catch the glaze nicely and add some dimension to it.  The plan is to have enough pieces ready by next weekend (the 16th) for a bisque-firing.  So far everything seems to be on track.  Keep your fingers crossed.      

Dave Farabee

I lost a friend yesterday.   Dave was diagnosed with leukemia in mid May.  They started his chemo right away, and he was finished with his first round of treatments by the end of the month.  He celebrated his 60th birthday in the hospital; and despite the weight of his situation, and the drain on his body from the treatments, he was upbeat and ready to get on with his life.  Always positive.  On Sunday he suffered a massive brain hemorrhage, and passed away the next day at 4:50pm, June 4, 2012.  Another light has left this world.  Dang it.  It just seems unreal to write those words.

I first met Dave Farabee in June of 2008... not so long ago, I suppose, but it seems like Dave and I have been friends all our lives.  He was that kind of a guy.  I was playing in a band called Electra 225 at the time, and our lead guitarist, Steve Thomas, asked if I would be interested in playing a couple of sub gigs for his other band, Cahoots.  I was more than happy to jump at the challenge.  A few week before, I had gone out to hear them play at a local bar, and even sat in with the band, so I knew their set list, and knew that they were a solid band, with good players... and easy to get along with.  Dave played bass in that band, as well as local favorites, the M-Dock band.  So for two nights on the weekend of June 20th, I played with Cahoots, and started getting to know Dave Farabee on and off stage.  My first and lasting impression of him is that he is a friendly guy, with an intelligent, easy-going manner about him... always ready with a smile and a corny joke, or when the occasion called for it, sincere words of encouragement.  I don't think I have ever met anyone who didn't like him.  In the past four years I have had the privilege of playing music with Dave on many occasions.  Among the most memorable have been the annual Mardi Gras and Halloween gigs at his church, Saint James Episcopal, here in Springfield.  The band included Dwight Gann on guitar, Dave on bass, Greg Hale on keys, me on drums, and Clay Stuckey on guitar.  Those gigs, with that group of guys, were always very enjoyable.  Those are times that will never come around again.  David Farabee was one of the good guys, and I will miss him.   So long Dave.  Rest in peace, brother.

A beautiful day...

for sitting under the oak tree and doing some sgraffito.  Gabriel kept me company this morning while I did some deco work on a couple of pieces of pottery I made this weekend.  I'm about half way through another 50 pounds of clay... leading to my next firing.  I'm anxious to get another load in the kiln...  it's addictive.  It's been a very nice weekend... the weather has felt like mid-July.  I've got today off, too, so.... yahoo!  Peace. 

A quick look at a few pieces from the May 4th glaze firing...

Hefty earthenware moonshine & cider jug.  Hand built using slab and coiling and underglazed with light gray and walnut brown.  This jug was bisque fired to cone 04, then clear glazed inside and out and fired one more time.  Measures 8 inches high, and will hold a generous quart of your favorite beverage!  "I'll hush up my mug, if you'll fill up my jug with that good ol' mountain dew."

White earthenware bowl and bottles.  These were also hand built using slabs and coiling, and finished with several washes of silky smooth, sky blue terra sigillata.  After bisque firing, the bottles were clear glazed on the inside and fired once again, to make them waterproof.  The taller of the two bottles measures about six and a half inches high.  These pieces have really grown on me in the past couple of weeks... the unglazed surfaces have such a wonderful look and feel to them.  They remind me of a lazy summer afternoon.

I'm working on how to describe my pottery, so these might sound a little stiff until I get the hang of it.  Hopefully here in the next few weeks I will have an Etsy site set up and ready to sell my wares!  I've been reading all of their tutorials and seller bios, and there is a lot involved, if you want to do it right, but it doesn't sound too difficult... it just looks like it will take some time.

Spouted decanters.  These unique little teapots, hand built of earthenware, were made without any real direction at first; they just sort of happened. But after they were done, I could see them being used for serving soy sauce, or coffee creamer, olive oil, or even warm maple syrup.  They are clear glazed inside and out and are food safe, microwave safe and dishwasher safe (although it would be best to hand wash these, so they will have a good, long life)

Lidded earthenware jar.  I thought this one turned out pretty good.  It measures about 5" in diameter, and was hand made using clay slabs.  It was finished in a walnut brown underglaze and decorated with trailing vines.  The design was produced by scratching through the underglaze with a pointed tool; a technique known as sgraffito, which exposes the white clay body underneath.  After the initial bisque firing, the exterior was clear glazed, and fired once more.

Finding my way...

ever so slowly.  And that's OK. 
I had a little set-back this evening.  I loaded the kiln for a glaze firing, got it going... and about an hour or so in I decided to take a peek in the bottom peephole, just to see if the coils were warming up properly.  Well... it appeared that they were not.  The top set of elements were glowing a beautiful reddish orange, and there was a nice glow rising in the kiln, but then I realized that the bottom elements were not cranking it out like the top ones.  Bummer.  Both sets of elements were on high  by that time, but they were clearly not performing at the same rate.  After some internal debate, I opted to shut it down for the night, and check it in the morning.  That didn't last long.  I went back out after the elements had darkened, and fired up the bottom pair of elements only, and son-of-a-gun if I didn't see a faint glow building in the kiln, through the peephole.  So I cranked it back up (it was still very hot, so I wasn't too concerned about thermal shock at that point).  We'll see how it goes.  Looks like I will be up for a while longer.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it will work, and I'll have some nice, glazed pots by the end of the weekend.  I guess I'll know for sure tomorrow afternoon. 

Boy Howdy!

I got home from work today and went straight out to the garage to see if the kiln gods were smiling on me last night.  They were!  I didn't lose a single piece, and they all turned out great.  It felt like Christmas morning ;)  I was surprised that the kiln was still warm enough that I needed gloves to pull out the pots... even after cooling for almost 16 hours. 
As for the pictures I added below?... they are stunning, aren't they.  I especially like how the pasty white flash brings out the rich colors of the fired clay and underglazes. (ha)  I'll try to take some better pictures once everything has gone through the glaze firing.    
At around 11:15 last night I went out to check on the progress of the firing (for about the 20th time) and I noticed that the kiln sitter was edging very close to release, so I stuck around to see if I could watch the trigger fall.  It finally did at 11:28pm.  I turned all the knobs to the off position, flipped off the main power switch on the breaker panel and unplugged it from the wall... and said goodnight. 

The next step (for most of the pieces) will be clear glazing and another firing.   That will be the last hurdle.  Again... I can't wait.  I don't want to jinx it, but I think they are going to look really nice.  Once those are done and I feel like I have something to offer, I will probably look into opening an Etsy site.  But for now... let's just take it one step at a time.

Here we go...

cones...

Here are the witness cones from the middle of the kiln, second shelf... It looks like they performed exactly the way they were supposed to.  I was very happy to see these.  The kiln is oval in plan view, and some of the other cones I placed in it show that there are areas that didn't quite hit the target temperature.  But from everything I've heard, that isn't that unusual (not a big concern)... just something to keep in mind when I'm loading it.  I was firing to cone 04 (that's the middle cone in the picture) flanked by an 05 (the one tipped all the way down... the guide cone) and an 03 (the guard cone) on the other side.

kiln god

I was very pleased to see that a kiln god has shown up in my garage this morning. As you can see, it is bearing an appropriate degree of irreverence over the upcoming (inaugural) firing of my pottery kiln this afternoon. I am trusting that he/she will see to it that everything goes smoothly (please) ;)

This firing was actually just a trial run. There wasn't any pottery in the kiln today, just kiln furniture, witness cones, and the small kiln sitter cone. The main objective of this firing was to test the kiln sitter (an automatic shut-off device) and to see if there are any hot spots or cool spots inside the kiln. It was actually a pretty quick firing. From the time I turned the switches on, to the point when the temperature hit cone 04 (a little over 1900 degrees F, probably) only three hours had passed. I was impressed... and surprised. I went out to the garage and saw that it had shut down, and I though something had gone wrong. Then I noticed that the kiln sitter had been tripped, and I looked through the peep hole and the cones that I could see, looked just like they were supposed to look. I think I did a little happy dance at that point (ha). The temperature in the garage rose 8 degrees in those three hours, even as evening was settling in.  At 3:30, when I turned it on, it was 72 in the garage, and it was 80 in there by the time the kiln shut down.  There's some serious heat going on there.  Gabriel will love that during the winter months.  Tomorrow morning I will open up the kiln and check the results. That's when I'll know for sure how it went. THEN... I will be able to fire my first load of pottery! The beginning of a great, creative adventure. Pretty dang cool. 

That's one serious toaster... and it's glowing orange!

Finally, some big pottery news to share with you.  The electrician came out today and wired in the three-position switches on our kiln, and installed a new 50 amp power cord and plug in the garage.  I ran it through a quick heat-up this evening, just to see if everything was working properly, and it looks good!  Over the course of about 15 minutes I notched the switches up, beginning on low  then to medium and on to high, and the elements were glowing like a giant toaster (ha).  Beautiful.  If all goes as planned, this weekend I will do an empty test fire up to cone 04, and make sure the kiln sitter works, etc.  I'm very excited to get underway.  I've got greenware anxiously waiting in the basement.  I can't believe I've actually got a working kiln sitting in my garage!  Yikes... let the adventure begin.  I've been dreaming of this for a long time, and now it's happening.  I'm a happy guy tonight.   

White Oak

I planted a sapling white oak in our back yard (about 6 to 8 feet tall) in 1999, as a birthday gift to my wonderful wife Pam.  Today it is taller than our two story house, and a very fine looking tree.  A couple of years ago, it actually produced a modest crop of acorns!  This afternoon I came across some pictures of the fall colors that I took last year, and I thought it would be nice to capture the new leaves of another year, as well.  There's an old saying that when the oak leaves are as big as a mouses ear, you can plant your corn... Hmmmm... I think I'm behind schedule.  All I've gotten in the ground so far is our potatoes.  Normally we would still have the threat of a hard frost this time of year, so we rarely even bother to get our tomatoes and peppers and such until late April.  But this year...?  Any time now, really.  It's a little chilly today, but I think the chances of seeing any frost now are all but gone.  That's fine with me.  As I noted in a previous post, from last month, we really didn't have much of a winter this year.  Who knows what that means for summer temperatures, fire danger, insect populations... could be an interesting summer.     

Sock Monkey

The guys in the band, on a beautiful Spring evening.  L to R: Del, Rus, Ellis, Ray, The Professor and Sly.  We had a good two year run, but it looks like we are going to hang it up.  We've agreed to have one more Sock Monkey blowout, to end it.  Don't know where it will be yet, or when... but probably within the next month or two.  In the top picture, Ellis & Ray are holding our twenty dollar bill.  After expenses, we figure that's about what we all ended up with after two years of gigs (ha)... we'll split that between us, of course.         

I had no idea!...

After checking my e-mail this morning, I was cruising around on the web, and came across this blog that looked kinda cool. I spent a few minutes reading some of the posts and looking at the pictures, and then I realized... hey, this is MY blog!?   Apparently I have a blog.  News to me.  So anyway, I figured since I have one, I might as well write something.

Let's see...the tri-fold paper towel dispenser in the office bathroom was empty, so I dutifully refilled it a few minutes ago.  It actually has a key you have to use to unlock it.  I think maybe there must have been a time when paper towel thievery was rampant.  It's nice to know that things have settled down.  I feel safer just knowing that people aren't as inclined to steal paper towels as they once were.  It's a positive sign, I think.  But as they say... locks are there to keep honest people honest.
It's been a busy couple of weeks here (see above note regarding the paper towel dispenser... perfect example).  We capped off the end of March with a Sock Monkey gig at Cartoons on the 30th, which actually went pretty well.  It was a fun night.  An old band mate of mine from back in the 80s, Rick Toombs, had been visiting family in Arkansas, and was passing through Springfield on the way back to Colorado.  He and is wife Rhonda, and their daughter Hannah stopped by the house, and later came out to the bar to hear our band play.  It was good to see them.  The 31st was my sister's birthday (Happy Birthday Diane!).  As is my normal routine for that occasion, I spent a good part of that afternoon flagging down cars on the highway to let them know.  Most of the people I stopped acted like they really didn't care, and frankly were kinda rude about it.  Hmm.
Sunday (April 1st) I played drums at church, in our production of Jesus Christ Superstar.  We've got a good, talented bunch of people in that group, and I'm happy to play with them.  The production went off without a hitch (more or less) and was well received.  Several weeks ago I was handed the task of finding an electronic drumset for the church.  I've been playing drums for close to 40 years, but I really don't know much of anything about electronic drums.  I finally found a nice set of Yamaha's at Guitar Center for well under $1000, which was the hinted budget.   I played those this past Sunday.  They are OK, but I still greatly prefer acoustic drums.  One nice bonus, however, was that when I was done playing I picked up a couple of things from behind the set, and I was out the door.  No more lugging around two hundred pounds of drums and hardware and cymbals in and out of the church for each performance!  That was nice.
So... this is blogging.  Ok, that wasn't so difficult.  Hopefully I will do that again some time soon.  Maybe with pictures next time.  I like pictures.  have a great Easter weekend!  Peace.

Summer clouds...

Amazing.  Mid March, and we had a high of 80 degrees today here in southwest Missouri!  Not a record, but dang close... it felt like summer.  When I got home from work I put on some shorts and a t-shirt, and officially started my weekend!  We cooked out on our new grill this evening... burgers, brats, chicken and a few steaks, grilled taters and onions (Mmmmmm).  Most of it will go in the freezer for later.  It was a great evening. This beautiful summer cloud formation popped up at around 5:30, out to our east.  I'm almost tempted to get the garden ready (ha).  It's hard to believe that we could still see below freezing temperatures... and snow.  It's not that unusual in March, but I'm hoping that the possibility has just slipped away.  We really haven't had much of a winter here.  That's OK with me.