Love this time of the year when everything is in bloom. Especially the lilac bushes with their fragrance wafting around bringing childhood flashbacks.

Some pretty pincushion protea also enjoying their time in one of my mugs…
perfect for Mugshot Monday!

Celebrating a little Mugshot Monday today with some “found flowers.” I’m not above “saving” some special event flowers from the trash to let them live a little longer in my studio! And I have plenty of mugs that will work as a fun vase for a few days!

So it’s been a busy week… with working all day, teaching three night classes, cleaning the kiln, biking & doing my taxes!!! Yes, I’m still working on my TAXES!!! But here’s the inside my soda kiln from last weekend… finally! Another beautiful firing with some great colors & flashing marks all the way through! Looking forward to spending some more time with each of these pieces as I start to prep & price them all for the upcoming art fair season! After I finish my taxes of course…

Plants everywhere are loving their ceramic homes! So happy to be living their best lives in a handmade, stamped & soda-fired flower pots. And you know I want to make more happy plants… so I’m making more flower pots! Thanks Rick for sharing your beautifully blooming African violets!

And since I had tasked my THROWDOWN’ers to make a trio of candlesticks… and knowing that we would see them all again during our final potluck… I knew I wanted to make a set for myself!!! So I did… and then I soda-fired them too!!!

Okay, so “maybe” I made four… just as a back-up in case the soda kiln gods didn’t look favorable upon all of them?! Luckily, all four came out quite nice!!! If I do say so myself…

Fresh from the soda kiln… my little boxes! Done just in time for “4×4 : FOUR MAKERS”… our Pop-Up Exhibition & Sale that starts tomorrow in Evanston! If all goes well, all four of the 4×4 artists will be making “little boxes” in their own medium for a very special display. I made a few extra… as I only “really” need four. But always hedging my bets in the soda kiln. Four boxes by four artists.

Get it?…. 4×4.

You know how I promised you more… we’ll here are the last of them for today!

More textures. More patterns. More colors.
More flashing effects from the soda kiln.
And wonderful textures from my collection of hand rollers from MKM Pottery Tools!!!

Even more textured fun for TEXTURE TUESDAY! You know I love pattern, texture & color… and how perfectly the soda-firing process works to make it all come together!!!

Celebrating another TEXTURE TUESDAY with some beautiful textures fresh out of the soda kiln! These are just a few of the surfaces created with my hand rollers from MKM Pottery Tools. Along with a bit of colored flashing slips, some glaze accents & the beauty of the soda kiln all coming together to make some great surfaces! More to come…