Went and saw the new Superman vs. Batman movie. My husband Jimi is a Batman fanatic. I was disappointed. It was an action packed film, to be sure, but there were several times that it became hard to follow and other times it was just redundant. I also wanted more Wonder Woman damn it!!! Haha.
    I love weekends like this last one. Worked on the kiln shed quite a bit. We have three trusses up and in place now. Only nine more to go. Doesn't seem like much maybe, but when it is just myself and Jimi putting trusses  fourteen feet in to the air and securing them, it is quite an achievement. We got rained out yesterday, which was a bummer because we were making such headway. 
   I am becoming quite anxious to get this project complete so we can move on to the next phase of building, a closed in porch room on the front and getting electricity to it. I also want to start the building of a wood kiln. Never enough time or money it seems. Luckily we have collected a lot of the lumber and supplies over the last couple years and that is saving a lot of money.
   I started a new series this weekend as well. An idea I have been playing with for a long time. It will combine my clay and glass in a new way and I am excited to see how they evolve. I will post pictures as I get farther into the process and decide whether they will even work. It is nice to be on a new path creatively though. I function so much better as a human being when my creativity is flowing. 
   

   For me, coming into the spring of the year is so refreshing. I love winter, but it is never my most creative time. Lack of sunshine, or warmth are simply not conducive to my productivity. When the daffodils and the hyacinths begin to peak through the soil I somehow become recharged. I begin thinking about birds, flowers, gardens, going to the beach, fishing etc... I start preparing for our garden. I watch the birds in amusement and enjoy the blossoming trees. I stare off into the sky and daydream about this idea or that idea. I start making goals for the year. It is a whimsical magical time and I embrace it.
   It is also the beginning of show season. It is time to start making new work and revamp old ideas. I try to jot down ideas in my sketchbook, but sometimes it is just on a random envelope or scrap paper laying around. I like to keep these ideas to look back on when I get blocked as to what to make. Certainly I intend to eventually get around to trying them all, but there is always something else coming to mind first. 
   The kiln shed is coming along nicely. We started making the first trusses yesterday. They are calling for storms today so I am not sure if we will get any set this afternoon. I hope so. I am itching to fire a kiln. It has been so long. Running electricity out there is going to be quite a challenge and expense. Still not sure how that will come about, but somehow it will. Have a wonderful creative day!

   I call myself a maker. I make things. Things I hope people will find beautiful, useful, desirable. Things that in a sense are my legacy. Others have labeled me an artist. At the end of the day, all I know is I simply must create things.
   Several years ago my world turned upside down. My husband, after a seven year battle, died of bladder cancer.I was in the last stages of grad school, finishing my thesis work. I almost gave up, but I knew, for him, I had to finish. The work was important to me as it dealt with the contradictions we as humans face every day. Life and death, heaven and hell, truth and lies, good and bad, light and dark etc.... The work is what got me through the heartbreak of losing my partner of over twenty years. My thesis show was a success. I survived. I made it through the darkness and arrived on the other side of a MFA degree. That's where it almost came to an end. I had no idea where to go from there. Still don't some days, but they are fewer and farther between now. 
   Fast forward to today. I have since remarried, moved to Rockford Tennessee, manage my new husband's original hard rock band, work as a photographer and am building my new studio. Life is full again, but the creating is coming back at a slower pace than I would like. I am hoping that through this blog I can regain my momentum and once again find my voice in my work. 
​   So welcome to my journey. Here is the start of my new studio.