With a lot of clouds in the morning sky, it was a question of whether the sun would make it through or not. Luckily, it found a small window of opportunity. And we got a nice sunrise… before it disappeared again for the rest of the day.

Towards the end of the sunrise, I found another beautiful crab apple tree…
made a nice silhouette photos, as well as some beautiful floral shots with a nice morning glow.

Okay, so I’m running late… I get it…
Luckily my new art fair postcards arrived with the aid of some RUSH charges.
So today while I’m “trapped” and firing my soda kiln all day, it’s the perfect chance to add stamps and address labels. About half of them made it into this morning’s mail… the rest will need to wait until Monday’s mail.

And for those who can’t wait for their postcard… and just want some dates…

Schaumburg Prairie Fine Arts Festival
Saturday, May 23rd, 2015 – 10:00am-6:00pm
Sunday, May 24th, 2015 – 10:00am-5:00pm
Robert O. Atcher Municipal Center
201 Schaumburg Court in Schaumburg, Illinois

Hinsdale Fine Arts Festival
Saturday, June 13th, 2015 – 10:00am-6:00pm
Sunday, June 14th, 2015 – 10:00am-5:00pm
Burlington Park on Chicago Avenue between Washington & Garfield Streets
in Hinsdale, Illinois

Evanston Lakeshore Fine Arts Festival
Saturday, August 1st, 2015 – 11:00am-6:00pm
Sunday, August 2nd, 2015 – 11:00am-6:00pm
Along Lake Michigan’s shores at Dawes Park on Sheridan Road at Clark Street
in Evanston, Illinois

Art In The Garden : A Grassroots Art Fair
Saturday, September 12, 2015 – 10:00am-5:00pm
Sunday, September 13th, 2015 – 10:00am-5:00pm
1205 Hutchings Avenue, Glenview, IL 60025
One block west of Waukegan Road, between Lake Street and Glenview Road.
It’s a special weekend to play with some of My Talented Friends!!!
We’re at the home of metalsmith Amy Taylor, with our other artist friends…
including paper clay artist Cory McCrory, glass bead jeweler Donna Sauers,
stained glass by Alison Fox and paintings & sculptures by Martin Chadwick.

Okay, at this point it’s pretty much Fall… but here’s a few more shows…

Art In The Barn
Saturday, September 26th, 2014 – 10:00am-5:00pm
Sunday, September 27th, 2014 – 10:00am-5:00pm
Located on the grounds (and in the barns) of Advocate Good Shepherd Hospital
on Route 22 in Barrington, Illinois – Lower Barn E4 & E6
NOTE : ART IN THE BARN dates on the printed postcard are incorrect… oops!!!

“My Home For The Holidays” Home Show
Saturday, November 21st, 2015 – 10:00am-6:00pm
Sunday, November 22nd, 2015 – 10:00am-6:00pm
Contact me for invitations & complete address information…

After just a couple hours of sleep…
my kiln is all closed up, burners on and warming up quickly!

I loaded my latest “spoon addiction” into the kiln tonight.
Part of the soda firing process tells us that everything “must” be elevated form the shelves so that the pieces don’t stick with the soda build-up. And I didn’t’ want to have any huge wadding spots left on the spoons, so I made my own pointed stilts to prop them up. I also dipped the tips in kiln wash to help make sure they don’t stick.

My fear is that the props might not hold them up as they shrink. With two separate points of support, I hope they continue to prop up the spoons. This was the “best” solution for now… and my fingers are crossed. It’s very similar to how I fire my wheelthrown Christmas ornaments. Those work fine, so I hope these do too!

Finally, it was time to start loading. I love kiln loading. I’t s wonderful, three-dimensional Tetris kind of puzzle. Fit everything in. Leave enough space for the flames & soda to flow through. Shelves. Posts. Pots. Repeat.

Here’s the back half… a single shelf stack all the way to the top. I know that the very top shelf of the kiln usually gets a lot more of the soda blast. And I know that I don’t want the vases to get blasted. That’s why I dropped them down a layer – hoping they get a better blush &  shine instead of a soda blast.

And the front stack of two shelves… complete with a lot of spoons scattered throughout the kiln.

SO now it’s all packed up for the night. Kiln packs in the right places….
all I need to do is brick up the front door. Brick by brick.

Such potential for such a small space…

Almost ready to start loading. My pots are glazed, wadded and separated by shelf depending on what kind of clay it is. I like to stack my soda kiln with porcelain in the back, B-clay in the medium soda areas, and soda clay where it will get more soda exposure.

After glazing a lot of pieces, and spraying some colored glaze accents,
the build-up of the over-spray area dried up and started flaking off. Kinda cool to see it falling off in flakes, some more in larger sheets of dried glaze!

Getting ready for my soda kiln…
so I glazed and added some colored slip accents to my latest batch of textured tiles. They still need to be wadded… with a LOT of wads, as I want to keep them as flat as possible. And let’s just say, the soda kiln doesn’t have a good reputation for keeping things flat & unwarped.

So the spoons are getting one step closer to completion..
and I for one can’t wait to see how they turn out.

I added a temoku glaze inlay to most of them… as well as in the spoon itself.
And then gave some of them a slight spraying with a colored glaze for a pop of color.