When I parked my bike to take some more pictures this morning, I found some really great colors & textures growing on the side of the tree.

After bowling, pizza & ice cream, I went back to the studio for an evening of stamping. The pieces that I threw yesterday were a soft-leatherhard, some more so than others. So I started with the drier ones to allow the wetter ones to stiffen up while I was stamping. My plan worked. All stamped and wrapped up again for the night.

Well… when you make small herb flower pots, you need to make water trays.
Don’t want water leaking all over your windowsills. Since the pots have already
been thrown, stamped, trimmed & drying… I had to make the trays.

I threw these last night… and today they needed a little somethin’-somethin’…
so I did a little stamping, fluting and some other detailing. Followed by a bit of
trimming and now they’re all done & drying!

And now that they’re all done…. I sure hope my calipers were still set
at the right size?! They do look a little small… we’ll see…

Don’t forget to “Spring Forward” tonight… and change your clock.
Remember to move your clocks ahead one hour before you go to bed tonight.
It’s time to go back into Daylight Saving Time… or losing an hour of your Sunday?!
And wouldn’t it be more fun if you were changing the time on one of THESE clocks?!

Gotta love a good steampunk clock. And the whole “Steampunk Movement”
for that matter. Rusty. Crusty. Gears. Patterns. Layers. Details. Groovy cool.

My friend Kristen brought her son AJ to Lillstreet today for a kid’s birthday party.
Kristen and I went for ice cream, hot fudge & more hot fudge while he played at his
party. Afterwards, AJ came up to my studio and made a few holiday star ornaments
of his own! So adorable. So much fun to have a little studio “apprentice” today!

Rolling the clay… pressing in textures… and cutting out stars. Instant ornaments!!!

At the “glitter gig” today, the florist was using ornamental pineapples in her work.
I loved the colors, textures, stripes and spikes!!! All in one place.

So here we are… Month #2 in our Holiday Ornament Challenge!
Sarah Chapman and I have committed to creating a new ornament every month.
Mine will be clay, her’s will be metal. Who knows?… some day maybe a combo?

Sarah’s ornament this month is copper with brass chain connecting the pieces and has
a “torch” patina. She made the copper bells using a form folding technique called the
“Heisted Cup.” Here’s a link for all you metal’s people out there who would like to try it.
Click here… “Heisted Cup.” The process is magical. And I especially love the “torch”
patina effect on copper. So much fun… and maybe three angels will get their wings?!

My ornament started out as a star pillow, but then I got a little carried away. I decided that
the “pillows” don’t need to be closed.  So I left the sides open, leaving a nice void inside.
My plan is to soda-fire these – and I hope that the inside gets some groovy flashing marks.
So far, the plan is that one side is painted with flashing slip, and the other side will have some
glaze inlaid into the impressions. Once they’re fired, they’ll also get a metal hoop going
through the middle of the star to hang from like my original ornaments.

Unfortunately, again this month, I don’t have any fired ornaments to show off yet.
I’m still building enough work to fill the kiln before I can fire it. So the pieces are piling up.
Once I have some pieces fired and ready to show… you’ll see these and all previous
ornaments again. Finished & fired… not just greenware… again!

Some of them are dry. Some of them are not.
But of course, ALL of them are textured.

Last night I drove out to Oakbrook to see “Sunset Boulevard” at Drury Lane.
It’s a classic Andrew Lloyd Weber stage production. A musical remake of the 1950
Billy Wilder classic black & white movie. Chronicling the faded glory & delusional life
of silent screen actress Norma Desmond. To this day, the classic movie is still listed
as the 16th best movie ever by the American Film Institute. I’ve seen the movie…
and tonight I finally saw the musical at Drury Lane. It’s a good production with a
creepy, eerie & delusional Norma Desmond…. who is ready for her closeup Mr. DeMille.
Of course we had to get food first… so why not indulge at The Cheesecake Factory!?

While we were at Drury Lane for “Sunset Boulevard”, there is also a lot to see in the lobby.
Lots of things that sparkle. And since I was with my metalsmith friend Pam who is known
by some as the “Queen Of All That Sparkles”, we had a lot of sparkle to admire!

But it’s not just the chandeliers to admire… the pressed textured tile ceiling is pretty
darn impressive too! Love the pattern. Love the grid. Love the subtle coloration.

Sadly, not everything is quite wonderful at Drury Lane. The carpets are quite “lovely.”
And yet somehow I have a weird fascination with the crazy carpet designs found in
hotels everywhere! I may need to start a collection of hotel carpet photos?!