A lot of people have asked what kind of camera I use for my morning sunrise photos! It’s just a little point & shoot… nothing fancy… that fits in the rear pocket on my biking jersey! Oh yeah, always in a ziplock bag so it doesn’t get all sweaty wet!!!

This one is brand new as today was its first voyage out for sunrises! My previous one was the same brand & style… it was just not working well. Some times the image in the viewfinder window would just wiggle… and then it would automatically shut down after two or three shots… and the last straw was when it totally gave up and stopped turning on… kinda like it couldn’t open its own aperture?!

Sure, maybe it could have broken from all the use… I’ve taken a LOT of sunrises with my old camera. Or all of the jostling while I’m bike riding… or times I got caught in the rain… or the times I dropped it…. or the times I would take it out to take photos on a roller coaster… or any of the other countless times I mishandled the camera!!! HA!!!

So yes, my sunrises are shot with this little baby…
but I do use my iPhone for panorama shots & videos!!!

A dramatic morning sunrise to celebrate the last day of June! Crazy cool clouds, colors & reflections… and that one big cloud right there in the wrong place at the right time to block the sun!!!

Hard to believe we’re already going into July and a holiday weekend, right?! Seems like it was just March the last time I checked.

And of course… flower pots need small plates to catch the water that seeps through the drainage holes. So here are the plates accented with some of the same flashing slips as the flower pots!

Thanking Mother Nature for another beautiful surprise on TEXTURE TUESDAY. Who knew that cactus like these could grow naturally in Chicago? I didn’t think they would survive our harsh winters… but I found these growing around Montrose Harbor!

Tis’ the season for beautiful lilies apparently… so many different colors blooming all over the neighborhood! Like these vibrant pink ones just down the street.

Just painting some details on the flower pots with some accents of colored flashing slips. They may look white & beige now… but hopefully after the soda-firing they will “magically” change to bright oranges & yellows with some cool randomness due to the soda-firing atmosphere!

A quick trio for MUGSHOT MONDAY…
stamped, soda-fired and just hanging out on my back porch before the rain! With a quick reminder that there are always mugs & other pots available on my blog.

If you want to “class-up” your morning coffee… click here!

Classic red Asiatic lilies blooming in my front yard.
Simply saturated color.

Adding a few stamps, textures & patterns to my latest batch of flower pots. Handmade stamps for handmade pots… pressed in one, by one, by one…

The coleus plants on my front porch are all growing so well… so I just chopped them all down!!! Okay, so maybe “pruned” them is a better phrase… but here are the cuttings that I’m going to try rooting. My Peoria gardening friends to it all the time… so I figure if I can even get half of them to root I’m doing good!