Head in the clouds

In case you didn't know this already I am a Pre-school teacher and my job entails playing with kids 5 days a week. Well this past week our lessons were on the weather and clouds. For a fun project we painted clouds on blue paper with white paint throughout the week and then today while my kids were taking their nap (which we do for 2 hours everyday and I must admit that this is such a wonderful thing not only for them but for me as well) my co-teacher and I hung up all of their paintings, as well as a few of our own, on the ceiling of our room so that when the kids woke up they'd be able to see all sorts of things in the clouds. We were going to have a day outside where we all lay in the grass and looked up to see what we could see but unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate. Don't get me wrong we had a couple beautiful days this week but either no clouds or clouds too big to picture anything, so we made our own sky filled with all sorts of creatures.

I loved (still love) to look up at the sky and make pictures out of the clouds. Even making up stories about what I saw up there. Just ask my friends, I think I've tortured them enough on our road trips where I tell stories about what I see in the sky (it's their own fault for having a sun roofs in their car).

If you get the chance spend some time outside now that the weather is getting nicer and enjoy the wonderful world above us. Oh and if the weather doesn't cooperate check out the book Sector 7 by, David Weisner from the library and enjoy his wonderful book (also check out this one if you get the chance!).

To get started here some pictures for your imagination.......

Oh and just for fun some clothes on the line now that it's warm enough outside!

Sculptural Art?

This past week I had to do a sculptural installation for my senior seminar at school. Being an "artist" who has no background in sculpture whatsoever I decided to make things that could be used and display them in a sculptural way. I don't like to make things that won't or can't be used for anything. It always feels like I'm wasting my time and energy on something that is going to go to waste and end up in a landfill someday.

As you can see in the picture I have a bed in the middle of the gallery here at school and on top of it and around it are various objects that I have made all out of recycled materials. The quilt on the bed you may have seen before in a few of my first posts. Then there are two other blankets. The green one is an old army blanket that my Granny left behind when she died that I added a little color to and the other blanket an afghan that I made out of recycled sweater yarn and some yarn that I had on hand. Then there are two rugs. One a braided rug that I used up a bunch of my mother's fabric on that had been sitting in a box for years and the other one made out of yoyos from bits of fabric that would have gone to waste otherwise. All of these items have been made over the course of the past year and a half.

My love for working with fabric is a gift from my Grandmother. She taught me how to sew when I was 12 and I haven't been able to stop since. I've made quilts, clothes, costumes, banners, and recently flags. There's so many things that I haven't tried yet though and I continue to enjoy the process.

I love to make things for people that I love. I always have and I always will. I know that not everyone appreciates the handmade gift (a certain sister of mine), but that's okay one of these days you'll really want me to make something for you:). And when you do I'll be ready.

Raku Firing!

Just in case you were wondering what I've been up too................


I've been working in the ceramics studio an awful lot lately working on various projects. Mostly just playing around with clay. This semester I took on an internship working with my ceramics Professor and learning the different aspects of a ceramic studio. One of the things that I've been working on is firing pieces in our small kilns here (pictured above). This is the initial firing for all of the pottery made here. It's called a bisque firing. After this firing we glaze the pieces and fire them a second time in a much larger kiln where they're fired at a higher temperature. After that firing the pieces are complete.

One of the new firing techniques I've been taught is Raku firing. This technique is where you have a bisqued piece of pottery with a special glaze on it specifically for Raku and we then fire it in a different kiln outside for about 45 minutes at very high temperatures as you can see below.


Now I don't know all of the technicalities of it all but the basics are that we take the pottery out of the kiln while it's still orange and put in inside a garbage can filled with sawdust.


After placing the pottery in the garbage can we throw a few fistfuls of sawdust on top of the red hot pieces and cover them up so they can burn some more (you can see me in the picture below getting ready to throw the sawdust on top of the pieces once placed in the garbage can).


After letting the smoke and fire die down for about 10-15 minutes in the garbage can we take them out and dunk them in water.


This type of firing is very unpredictable but so much fun and has some amazing effects when finished. There's lots of different glazes and the two cups below are Copper Penny. Very glossy and iridescent in some places.



The cylinder below was glazed with Gun Metal Black. Very cool! I think I'm going to try this on a few of my pieces. It's not very practical or functional but it's so much fun to do and the outcomes are quite stunning (most of the time).


For now though I have quite a bit of glazing to do for the regular glaze kiln. A lot of these pieces are going to be Christmas gifts and contributions to a Craft Sale that I'm helping to coordinate at school.


Back to glazing!

William Waite

This is going to be a short post today as homework is keeping me extremely busy.

At my school we have a Gallery where the Art Department features a new artist every month or so. This month the artist happens to be an artist by the name of William Waite. His content is religiously based, but it's not always obviously so. His choice of medium is highly varied and he's constantly experimenting with new materials. It has been interesting to see his work and borrow some of his techniques (which I absolutely plan on doing as soon as I have time!).

Here are just a few examples of his work:





I'm particularly fond of his canvas within a canvas paintings. They are simply stunning!