A beautiful start to what was going to be a wonderful day of pedaling!
A much better way to wake up in the morning that the cold rain of yesterday.
Too bad all of the school’s parking lot lights were in the way!

But then minutes later… the sun began its rise and the sky began to brighten.
The entire sky turned from a dark blue to shades of pink & orange.
Washing the entire sky with waves of color. Stunning.

It was another dark morning on my bike.
Dark when I started. Dark as I pedaled south. Dark as I paused at Northerly Island.
Just as the sun was “thinking about” rising on the horizon…

My niece Taylor stopped by the studio today to play in the clay!
She brought her Mom & Dad (my sister) and her grandparents (my Mom & Dad)
to play with her. Since fall is quickly upon us, we decided to make autumn wreaths
out of terra cotta. We all started making clay leaves of different shapes & styles.

After we all had plenty of leaves, it was time to connect them all, layer them and
score & slip them all together to create our leaf wreaths. Layer after layer, leaf after leaf,
the wreaths came together. We then painted them with some underglazes to give
them some autumnal coloration. They’ll dry for the next couple days… then I’ll glaze them
and fire them! Sadly, we didn’t have quite enough time today. As always, the time flew by…
too many leaves, not enough time. So we did finish them… barely… but we would have
all liked another hour to finish them off & paint a few more details! Maybe next time?…

Back in the studio… replenishing he inventory… making more mugs!!!
After the pieces are thrown on the wheel, I allow them to dry partially so that they are
malleable, but not squishy. Once they are at the proper stiffness, I stamp the patterns
into the sides with my handmade stamps. After stamping, the bottoms of the pots
need to be finished to give them a more professional look.

I place the pieces back onto the wheel upside down and re-center them.
They are affixed to the wheel surface and then spun really fast. With a sharp trimming
tool, the clay is cut off the sides and bottom into thin ribbons of clay.

As the cylinder spins, and the ribbons of clay removed, you can finish off the bottom,
the sides and create a nice footring. The footring is the circle of clay that is left on
the bottom for your pot to stand on. This is your last chance to “finish off” the pot
before you let it begin to dry. Once dried… it’s off to the bisque kiln firing.

Today was a spectacular morning. Possibly the best sunrise of the summer?!
It had so many variations… so many colors… in the course of about 15 minutes.
Simply gorgeous. Simply breathtaking. Simply perfect.

Here are just a few of the beautiful shots I took this morning during all the different phases
of the sunrise. From dark indigo, through blue, pink and orange. Sadly, after all of this
stunning beauty… as the sun cleared the horizon it went behind a cloud and it was gray
and rainy the rest of the day. Go figure.

Dark this morning. Cool this morning.
With dark clouds on the horizon this morning.
Still a wonderful morning to be on my bike!

Simply stunning…
but even cooler with my bike in front of it!!!

The morning started with a sliver of sunrise… but then opened up to reveal
the mass of dark clouds on the horizon and the wispy clouds above.

So the past few days have been very gray and cloudy.
This morning was much like the rest. Gloomy. Windy. Cold.  Luckily…
there was a thin sliver & glimmer of hope on the horizon for my morning bike ride.

As I turned around to head home, the sky was getting brighter,
the clouds seemed to be breaking up a bit… but still no sign of an actual sunrise?!

But then, just as I had almost made it home… there it was.
Finally… a little bit of sunrise!