To celebrate my taxes… Chris and I rode up to the Botanic Garden this afternoon…
where we like to turn around, refill the water bottles, chat, stretch, relax, etc.
And this time as we rode in, we were “greeted” by these really cool flower spikes.
Apparently, the Canary Islands have all the cool plants?!!!

I love the texture, the pattern, the swirling spiral, the spikes, the whole thing!
And the best part?… they will grow to be well over 8-feet tall! But apparently they take
two years of growing before they get to show off their intended, summer-long beauty.
Where else would you expect these stunners other than the Botanic Garden?

Who knew???… the come in purple too!
Not quite as tall, not quite as stunning, but still quite beautiful.

On the way back, the sun was setting… and the deer were out in abundance.
We like to call it “deer hunting” – basically just keeping an eye out for the deer
as we are pedaling past… hoping that none of them dash out in front of us.
Tonight we saw well over 30 deer along the bike trail… not bad for Chicago, huh?

Okay… so one of the studio potters at Lillstreet moved out of his studio
a few months ago. In his wake, he left a lot of mess, supplies, and buckets of glaze!
Now since I already have enough supplies & mess of my own – I claimed the buckets
of glaze! Sadly, I’m not really sure what they are, and I definitely don’t have
the recipes to make more. But free glaze is free glaze!!!

So… tonight I made a batch of test tiles for these “mystery” buckets of glaze!
Complete with stamps & textures to see how the glaze would work on my own
textured work. I’m going to test the glazes in both cone 10 reduction and the
soda kiln. I want to find out if any of them do really cool things in the soda kiln
atmosphere?! Or if they do really terrible things BEFORE I start glazing
a kiln full of work. Wouldn’t that be a bummer?

With my bathroom remodeling now complete, it has taken a little time to get used to
the changes. New colors. New tiles. New toilet. New towels. New vanity. New sink height.
New taller shower stall door that I no longer hit my head on when I get in & out everyday!
It’s the little things that make me happy… plus all of the textures to enjoy as well.
Including one of my favorite cups by fellow potter & friend Cory McCrory!

Another night of stamping in the studio. More pots… more stamps… more fun!
Still working to get some new work ready for the holidays. I have three glaze kilns lined up
in the coming weeks… gotta get the pieces thrown, stamped & trimmed…
and dried in time to get them bisqued & glazed for the kiln firings! Busy, busy…

Stampin’ round & round… quite literally!

Look what I just found on the Internet… groovy fun with bricks!!!

It’s all in how you stack them… sequence… rhythm… pattern… movement.

This brick screening wall flanks the South Asian Human Rights Documentation Centre
in Dehli, India. It’s strangely reminiscent of the wall in Harry Potter whose bricks
rotate in a complicated sequence and then magically open out onto Diagon Alley.
The bricks in this wall, too, almost seem to be in motion. Love it.

So I’ve spent the summer teaching kids how to make slabs… among other things!
We’ve thrown slabs by hand stretching the clay across the tables. Turning those
slabs into plates, cylinders, platters, birdhouses, vases… and even a totem pole!
But then I thought… why not make some slab pieces in MY studio?!
So I did…

Again, I’m referring to the afternoon class of this week as “Part Two…”
and as my final camp for the summer – we had to go out with a bang!!

So Brian, my favorite camp assistant, and I decided to take on a rather large project…
no small projects here… we’re stepping it up and the kids are excited too!
We gave them the choice of normal clay projects… or one large collaborative piece
that would be on display at Lillstreet Art Center for years to come! They quickly chose
the collaborative piece. So we started production… of a terra cotta, textured totem pole!

So on Monday, all of the kids made their own cylinder segment for the totem.
Each of them threw their slabs (in impresssive 28″ long for the circumference of each
segment) and then pressed in their textures & patterns. Each slab was then turned
into a cylinder and attached to another slab base. Brian made a base and I made
the topper – to fulfill & finish off our class’ collaborative effort.

On Tuesday, our campers painted their sections with underglaze and clear glaze!
One step closer to our final “collaboration”…

I loaded our pieces into the kiln on Tuesday night… a little sooner than ideal.
As some of the pieces were still a little “damp”… we had a few kiln “issues.”
Especially Brian’s base that totally self-imploded!!! So who needs a base any way?!

Since the other pieces “survived” the firing, we still had plenty to work with.
But before then, we filled our week with other projects such as abstract painting
and some “tramp art” mosaics with bottle caps & glass beads!

When Friday rolled around, it was time to assemble the totem pole.
Our original plan was to assemble it outside in the garden corner of Lillstreet.
But with some of our “structural” flaws, the rainy day, the muddy ground…
and our desire to keep the totem pole intact longer than the first group of
ne’er-do-wells who decide to ruin it. So we anchored a central post in a large
flower pot filled with gravel and cement. Each cylinder was them placed over
the post and filled with gravel to “secure” it and keep it from shifting on the pole.
Piece by piece… segment by segment… the totem got taller & taller & taller.

By the end of the day, we had a complete totem pole – as well as a groovy cool
“billboard” banner that helped hype the event!!! And the kids were thrilled…

And I was thrilled that it all came together. Glad the the kids were please.
Glad that they were all excited to be leaving a little bit of their legacy behind at Lillstreet.
It was great to hear their giggles… and to see the look of awe as they totem grew taller!
And I was exicited that it all came together… and that the totem pole is still standing!!!

This week found me installing a “few” tiles…
arranging… trying to create that “controlled random” placement effect…
glueing… sliding… straightening… sliding… straightening again… and again…

My sister and her husband had “commissioned” me to do another tile wall
installation, much like the one in my place, but this time… in their home!
So I’ve spent the past few months making tiles, and trying to get enough tiles
soda fired for the installation. Complete with some “custom” tiles with their
names, initials, address and other fun things “hidden” in the textures!

We started with a blank slate – a section of the wall painted dark brown.
The cabinets will “frame” the tile installation as the plasma TV will “float” on top.
Soon to be the main focal point of their family room!

I started tiling with high hopes of finishing in just one session. That plan quickly
dissipated as I needed to leave a little early for a concert at Ravinia. So after
Day One, I was about halfway finished – and very excited about how it was looking!

So I came back a couple days later and picked up where I had left off.
I cranked up the caulking gun and started adhering tiles again! For this sort
of tile installation project, I like to use Dab “Seal & Peel” for the glue. It’s kind of like
industrial strength rubber cement. Idea being that if the homeowner ever decides
to move, they can easily peel each tile off the wall, rub the rubber cement off
the tile and the wall, and re-install the wall at their new place! Plus, we leave the
brown wall paint showing instead of trying to grout around all of the textured tiles!

Well into the second “session” of tiling, my niece Taylor decided to take on
the role of “project photographer” and document the momentus tile event.
Surprisingly, she actually did a really nice job with the camera!

So the tile installation process went fairly smoothly. The real kicker is that
every tile starts to slide down the wall before the glue sets up. Damn gravity!!!
I think that is the main downside to the “Seal & Peel” adhesive… it doesn’t dry
fast enough. So as you add more, you always need to go back and straighten
the others. It’s like keeping those darn circus plates spinning up on sticks!!!

So after two sessions of tiling, a lot of straightening, some bad fumes and a little
playtime & biking with my niece Taylor… the wall was finally done. We re-installed
the plasma TV, connected the bottom speaker then sat back to admire the new wall.

And then it was done… finally…  just a mere 1,145 tiles later!!!

Beyond the ever-present “clinking” of the slot machines… and the in-your-face
card “clickers” on the streets… Las Vegas has some incredible things to see.
It’s the details. It’s the colors. It’s the textures. It’s Vegas, Baby!!!