Chess Camp is moving along nicely this week. All of my kids have been working hard making their chess pieces. They’ve painted their boards… and today had an extra “push” to get all of their playing pieces constructed. For tomorrow we start painting them all with underglaze!

The yellow papers indicate which pieces they still needed to complete around lunch time!
And by the end of the day, all yellow papers were gone!

So we’re in the middle of Chess Camp, and one of my kids is “struggling” with focus, attention and generally being “able” to make the chess pieces we’ve all been working on. And then all of a sudden out of nowhere, in about 5 minutes, he cranks out this adorable lizard!!! A bit too large for a chess piece, and nothing to do with his theme, but an amazing piece of kid’s sculpture!!!

Let’s just say “the jig is up” and I’m onto his game.
He OBVIOUSLY is “able” to make things… now if he could just focus?!

Today was the first day of Chess Camp. Lots of brainstorming of themes, designing concepts, and then started handbuilding their pieces. Like these adorable little Peasant Pawns!

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CHESS CAMP at LILLSTREET  :  Monday, July 10 – Friday, July 14  :  9:00am-3:30pm

Are your kids looking for a fun Summer Camp for the week after 4th of July??
Well, we will once again tackling thematic Chess Sets with one of my favorite Summer Camps at Lillstreet Art Center. We’ll spend the week making thematic chess sets… handbuilt chess pieces with whatever theme the kids want!!! That’s a LOT of pieces to design & build… all building up to the big climax of actually playing chess with the complete set they’ve designed & built all by themselves! And they get to play with ME!!! How cool is that?!

Click here for more information or to register your kids!!! Only a few spots left!

Considering I just threw these pots last Sunday… I guess I shouldn’t be all that surprised that I might be taking the proverbial  “warm” pots to the art fair tomorrow. Two sizes of terra cotta flower pots fresh from the kiln… straight into a crate in my car and headed to Schaumburg in a few hours!!!

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Quick production… fast turn-around… trimming and trying to get them done quick!!!
These flower pots need to get in a kiln quick so they’re ready to go to the
Schaumburg Prairie Arts Festival this coming weekend!!!

Just trying to squeeze in one last batch of work. Terra cotta flower pots that I “hope” will be done in time for the Schaumburg Prairie Arts Festival next weekend. Plenty of time… ha!!!

I had sort of ” forgotten” how dirty, gooey & gloppy throwing with terra cotta can be!

My friend Claire works with a great group at a local Montessori School. Her students decided to build a totem pole for their auction project. Claire saw one of the totem poles my Summer Camp kids made a few years back… so she’s been using my blog as a reference for her totem pole project. I can’t wait to see the final results by the students at the Montessori School of Lake Forest, Adolescent Program. Their slab-built sections look great so far… even better when they’re glazed, fired and stacked!!!

Slab-built terra cotta sections… rolled into a hollow cylinder with a slab base. Each section will eventually be stacked into the finished totem pole.

To see more about my own totem pole adventures, click on the “totem pole” category in the column to the right.

A beautiful morning to kick-off Day Two of ART IN THE BARN. So fun to be greeted by this smiling face when I arrived to replenish & restock the shelves. Come quick though… there’s only four Jack-o-Lanterns left!!!