Just like yesterday, this morning was still quite WINDY with crazy-cool waves crashing all over the place! The ride headed south was great fun… whoo-hoo tailwind!!! Then some fun playing with the splashing waves… almost getting doused a couple times! Always exciting when the waves are high enough to crash up & over onto the bike route! Dangerous… but exciting nonetheless!

One of my former students went up to Waukesha, Wisconsin this weekend for the FIRED ARTS EXPO. A bunch of pottery, tools & fun for we mud-lovers… wish I would have remembered about it?! Shoot. Anyway, it was fun to see that Ellen stopped by the MKM POTTERY TOOLS booth to buy some new texture tools… and apparently the discussion turned to ME!!! When worlds collide… former students & pottery loving tool-makers! So glad Ellen got some cool tools… and an MKM postcard featuring ME!!!

By the end of the week, we had SEVEN full trays of chess pieces. All painted with underglaze… and hopefully all scored & slipped with poked air holes. Very impressive to see them all together like this… tray after tray after tray. A grand total of 382 CHESS PIECES!!! Not bad for a one-week camp… as I had a wonderful group of campers! It was a fitting end to another successful CHESS CAMP!!!

An incognito camper with her own sunglasses… a perfect fit…
also known as the “knight” on her beach themed chess board.

“Paint the chess pieces.. NOT your hands!!!”…
says the teacher with a smirky grin, as it is kind of adorable to say the least!

As Friday neared an end, it was a full-on press to get all of the CHESS CAMP pieces painted with underglazes. So much fun seeing their terra cotta pieces come to life in color. Even better when they get glazed & fired with clear glaze later! The kids had a great time painting… and they were thrilled with the results!

It was Friday of CHESS CAMP… and one of the campers was falling behind and did NOT have all of his pieces built yet. So it was all-hands-on-deck to help Henry… and it was so great to watch all of the other kids pitch in so eagerly! Assembly line, score, slip, score, slip… GO!!!

Last week at Summer Camp it was my favorite week… CHESS CAMP!!! And yes, my 9-10 year old campers made full chess sets out of clay! All handbuilt to their own imagination. Lots of parts, lots of pieces… and “hopefully” a LOT of scoring & slipping to hold it all together!

Dark & moody without much chance for a sunrise this morning! Just a lot of clouded drama over the lakefront… reflecting on the quietly rippled water. Enough clouds to make part of the skyline “disappear” into the clouds.

Fresh from a bisque firing… a pile of cutie-patootie mini vases! Waiting for some glaze… in the stamps & inside the vases. Just getting ready for my upcoming soda firing!!!