I am spending the hottest part of the day up here at the house.   Several sculptures await down at the shop. 

Yesterday I went to the State Fair, and helped out in the education Minnesota booth.   I got to sit at a computer and take peoples pictures that went on a free calendar.    The time really flew by doing that for three hours.  The rest of the time we went around and saw the sites and ate bad food.   Good bad food!!

Now we are preparing for the first firing of the neighbors kiln.   I have to get the sculptures drying.  

Well today I am recovering from a 72 hour firing that never reached temperature.   It was just  Paul, me and Lily taking turns and sleeping very little.  It stalled out at cone 3-4 all day Thursday when it should have been  finishing off we got more wood  and kept on.  all night Thursday and all day Friday.  There are definitely issues with the kiln, it just wasn't drawing like it should.   We have a solution to the immediate problem of getting the order out.  We'll refire the order.  I'm glad my sculptures were not dry enough to go in this time.  The load looks pretty ugly. It maybe made cone 6 or 7.   Much of it can be refired in  the inagural firing of  our neighbor's kiln in September.  

I have one more week with darling daughter before she goes to college.   I really am going to miss my only child, and wish the time hadn't gone by so fast.  

Well i'm too tired to write any more tonight. Tomorrow  is  another day.

Well I need to catch up here, and then get the heck outside.  I am trying to create a balance here with my online duties, and the work( and fun) that can be enjoyed outside right now.   I am trying to give myself regular business hours, and work my online business like a job.  

We had visitors from Ohio  this week, and it was sure fun to see old friends again!   They had been up for the Uptown Art Fair in Minneapolis.  Pictured are Justin and Becky Theilet , Also Dustin Harris , and Sabrina, and Anthony Hounder the woodsman of Blaine,  a former employee of ours.  

 There is so much to do in addition to making the items.  We have gotten an interested apprentice.   If she starts showing up regularly,  it would be nice to utilize her for packing /shipping.   I keep thinking of ways I can get more studio time in.    With this being our last two weeks with our daughter, there have been  many spontaneous fishing trips, and she even came to our monthly jam session last week.    Today she's shopping with a friend.  I'm having trouble putting into words  what empty nesting is feeling like for me.   It's just that it goes so fast!!!  I joke I should have had more kids, but the one I got is very special, and is such a gift in my life.   I am really , really going to miss her.  

  On the other hand, a new life is starting for me now, and I have started some wheels rolling , if only in my head.   I signed up for a job at the school, not subbing.  And I just keep forgetting to do the paperwork to start subbing again.   Subbing is behind me, as well as waitressing,  I was happy for the  extra income each job provided, but it's really time now for me to go for it with the clay.   I have been practicing all my life, and now I am going to make the best work of my life!

  And if I want a part time job, I am going to paint and take painting classes.

  It was a great weekend.  Although I missed the last few parades that my daughter marched in, we decided to go t o Alexandria for the Vikingland festival of the bands.   So it was me, and four  now former band menbers that drove to Alexandria yesterday.  What a great parade!  When we got there I asked a parade official  what street they were going down, and she told me how to get there, and where there was an empty parking lot right by the TV cameras.   The kids ditched me, leaving me with a cell phone.  I found my corner, and was feeling a little lonely, but struck up a conversation with a neat kid who was selling pop and water.  He showed me a billfold that he made out of duct tape,  and said that he was not artsy but he just liked doing stuff,  I told him he would make a good craftsman, and that was art too.  We chit chattted throughout the parade, inbetween his runs back for more pop and water.  When he finally sold out toward the end, he gave me a free sprite, and thanked me for keeping him company!  I was thankful too for not having to watch the parade alone.   When I got back with my crew, and told them about the cool kid,  one of them said, "didn't his mom tell him not to talk to strangers?"   Well I was grateful that he had made an exception,  that day.....

  The highlight of the parade itself was a visiting band from Oslo Norway.  Now, as one of the speakers at the awards ceremony put it,   3/4 of the people in Minnesota had Norwegian ancestry, so you can imagine they had quite a warm welcome. 

Pictured is Big Ole , the mascot of the town.   It was not too far from here that they found the Kensington Rune stone, the controversial relic that may or may not prove that the Vikings were here waaay before Columbus, hence "birthplace of America"

Now that band is over with for the summer,  the kid has a bunch of traveling lined up before she heads to college in the fall.  My life is changing,  and I can't help but get a little emotional over the fact that I'm sending my daughter off into the world.  I believe she's well prepared, and ready to take on new challenges, and I should be too.  I am sure going to miss her and her friends.   This was the perfect day though!  What a great memory it will make.