Fatal...or so I thought.

Well, I finally got around to getting a glaze fire in! Yay! I've been busy the last few weeks "home shopping" for my mother. The whole process of finding her a nice place much closer to my home is going to drive me to drink...but, that's another story. It's been an eye opener, that's for sure.

Anyhow, back to my glaze fire... I had the kiln all fired up the other night & decided to check on it & happened to see on the the digital readout: "FTL". First thing I thought was: "fatal" as in my kiln just "died".  Oh sh*t!!!! So, I jump on Paragon's site to see what "FTL" meant...thankfully it stands for "fired too long" as in it was taking too long to reach the desired temp. Oh thank goodness! I reprogrammed it again & hoped for the best. I was really worried that whole batch of beads were going to be messed up, but they turned out just fine. So, either it just had a little hiccup or I'm thinking the elements are reaching the end of their life is more like it. I'm certainly not looking forward to changing out those elements...sure hoping they come with REALLY good directions, because it looks like a bitch! Anyone have any experience with this? I've looked on YouTube & didn't find much info. On a positive note ordering some elements is a great excuse to order some new glazes to play around with while I'm at it!

A peek...

A peek into my little Paragon kiln at some beads about to be bisque fired. Not nearly a full "load" like I usually have, but still quite a few beads! There's a bangle on top of the pile for me. Just a "test" piece to see how durable it would be if I wear it every day along with my copper & silver stack. I rarely make anything for myself, but I do love my bangles! I'm still trying to decide what color I'm going to glaze it & how. I want some of the naked stoneware to show, plus that would make it much easier to fire. Hoping to get a glaze firing in tomorrow night so I can wake up to my "treasures" in the kiln on Monday morning.

Paragon Q-11 test kiln

Bisque fired at cone 05

Off track.

Okay, so I got a little off track this week... One of our dogs had a little mishap that I've been fretting/worrying over. Max stole a bone from Furby a couple days ago & it turns out Max fractured a tooth. :-( While this may not sound like a big deal... it is. It is painful because a little bit of the pulp is exposed & that pulp being exposed makes him prone to a nasty infection. So, I called the vet in a panic. For now we are taking a wait & see approach feeding him canned food & washing his mouth out with a rinse from the vet. I've been weighing the options for his tooth & I'm planning on taking a photo of Max's fractured tooth to show the vet to see what we should do. Why am I taking a photo to show the vet you may ask? Well, you see Max is a bully at the vet & he has to be muzzled or he will bite! Kind of hard to get a look at those toofers with a muzzle on! A photo is the best solution I could come up with for the vet to get a good look at Max's tooth situation. Right now, I'm leaning towards having the vet knock him out & pull that tooth now, rather than have it get infected in the future & have to worry how to treat it then. Max is 10+ years old & is in great health right now, but I still worry about anesthetic. I think it's much harder on me than it is him. Last year when he got his teeth cleaned & 7 teeth pulled, I was a complete basket case. I sobbed & sobbed when I had to leave him at the vet. So, Max is getting lots of TLC & extra petting/snuggling at the moment.

Here is an old, but favorite picture of Max (top) & Furby (bottom). <3 my boys!

Patience...

Lots more beads, caps, flowers, buttons, connectors, links & a couple experimental shapes are drying as I type this. I'm seriously considering getting that big food dehydrator off the pantry shelf to speed things along! Mom was right...I never use that darn thing! May as well get some use out of it I suppose. But getting to it would require a major pantry clean out, which I'm not in the mood for...maybe the next batch of beads. Anywho, I'm hoping to get them smoothed & ready for a bisque fire tomorrow. Then comes my favorite part: painting on the glaze & the final glaze firing!

Cubby relaxes after a "ruff" day.

One of my favorite photos I took with my Photojojo bokeh kit. What a fun kit to play around with now that things have slowed down.

You guys rock!

 I'm just in awe of the beautiful things you all make with my beads! Thank you! Here are just a few of my favorites:                                                                 

pipnmolly

Lorelei Eurto

lunalove

                       

fancifuldevices

                                                                     

ancientdesign

                                                                     

THREADACHE'S Carol Perich

KikiBirdJewelry

                                                       

nusquam

Starting over!

Okay, so I'm resolving on my (37th) birthday today to actively blog as a way to give you a peek into my creative adventures & life outside of creating. Bear with me as I attempt to put my thoughts/ideas into words here AGAIN! I started this blog way back in 2007, but I didn't keep up with it, so I've wiped it clean to start fresh. Reading & deleting those previous posts reminds me how my life has changed so much since then & so have my artistic interests. What started with making knitting needles with personalized tops out of polymer clay somehow led me to my true & current love of "real" stoneware clay  now that I have a small test kiln. Oh how I love that little kiln!!!!