Late July in Idaho

Porcelain buttons, nichrome wire fired in

Little hand-built porcelain pitcher

We are moving into the dog days of summer, and I'm realizing that I've done a worse-than-usual job of documenting my work. I guess that happens when one closes a business, and just works as one wants to. A luxury, but hard to keep track of.

The temperatures are reliably into the 90's now, and triple digits will be with us soon. The nights still cool a good 30-35 degrees F, which is what saves us. It means that dog walking and gardening are necessarily done in the mornings, and past noon one is best working in the basement on any number of projects, from sewing to painting to my favorite, clay. I made this little pitcher a couple of months ago. I fired it twice, which is why I think that some of the glaze is bubbly looking. Cone 5 porcelain, textured with bisque rollers that I like to make from found objects and bits of leaves and other organic matter that I find while walking Jasper. What a dog he is. He took off after a coyote when J was walking him a couple of days ago. He rarely breaks into a run, being retired and all, but he is occasionally inspired.

 On the left is a hand-built bowl. . .perfect cereal size, made of cone 5 B-mix with grog and glazed with Floating Blue, a recommended glaze from JH, who is a wonderful artist and high school teacher. I like it, though blue is almost never my first choice. Green, of course, is. Plant scientist turned artist, and the plants just can't leave me alone.

Spring in Appalachia. Porcelain. 6 X 8"

These wall pieces were experiments with unglazed porcelain. Believe it or not, they are both that bright white color, but I must have edited them differently when I downloaded them. The first is a piece I made for my friend, K, in an exchange where I received some beautiful handmade copper and sterling earrings.

Poppies. Porcelain. 8 x 8"

Poppies is one of two 8x8 tiles that I just delivered to Baker City, Oregon (a nice little getaway for J and I in the time of Covid) for a show they call the Biggest Little Show, still set to open on August 7th.

I hope they can do it. Baker City looked like a ghost town a week ago, though we found a great little AirBnb that welcomed us and Jasper. Jasper is far and away the more mannerly of the three of us, but try to tell folks that!

We had a spectacular hike on Elkhorn Crest Trail, above Anthony Lakes. It was our first foray into the world beyond Boise since the Covid lock-down on March 15. It really was nice to get away, and wonderful to get back to our spacious shaded nest. We all say it all the time, but it bears repeating. Strange Times.