Merry Christmas

Hope everyone has a Merry Christmas.
We had our traditional family Christmas party tonight. Too much food and lots of kids running and playing. Transformers and dollhouses everywhere. Now, all the babies are home, waiting for Santa. Noah is the most excited. The other two are a little young. Wouldn't you know it, toys everywhere and the two little ones are playing with plastic ornaments and tissue paper. hahaha Tomorrow everyone has family to visit and I am going to RELAX!!
I guess I'll get back to the studio eventually, but first I'll have to clean up the wrapping paper disaster.
Wishing you all a wonderful holiday season.

Running out of time

I truly thought that finishing shows earlier this year would leave me sooooo much more time to organize and finish Christmas decorations. Well, the joke's been on me. I stay overly busy, but nothing actually gets accomplished. I have been spending a lot of time with my 3 little helpers, but they really aren't that hard to work around.

I only have 3 more things to finish in the studio, naturally they are supposed to be Christmas presents. Nothing like waiting till the last minute. I did have a pleasant surprise yesterday. A customer came out for one small piece, ended up with 3 pieces, one of them larger.

(Pralines , cranberry chocolate , date roll cookies)

What I have really been spending the majority of my time with is "THE CANDY MAKING" It has really taken on a life of it's own. What started as me learning from my Grandmother has morphed into a yearly marathon of sugar dipping endurance. The last few years, we make a party of "Opening Day". My close friends, Terri and Lauren, and my parents come to help, laugh, throw things and generally see who can make me snap first. Even in the decibel registering melee that follows, we accomplish a lot.

Still to do:

Finish making candy...finish cleaning the disaster from making the candy... decorate the empty tree...wrap ALL the presents...make the rest of the presents so I can wrap them...shop for groceries so I can cook Christmas eve...ship presents...visit family...cook, work, clean, cook, stress, clean, cook................ HAPPY HOLIDAYS YA'LL

Show time

Took glass to Gallery 459 in Lafayette today.

The show will be Saturday from 6 - 8 pm at the gallery on Jefferson St. (459 Jefferson St.) to be exact.

One piece didn't make it intact. The largest piece, naturally. I may try to repair it by then, but may not have time. Also took a good bit of glass to Sans Souci gallery. An assortment of things from fused fleurs to 3-d's. Even some Christmas trees.

I REALLY need to make more purple and gold to take to New Orleans before Christmas. With the BCS national championship on Jan 6 and all those LSU fans in town, need to stock up Adorn on Royal St. Tiger's eyes, lots and lots of Tiger's eyes. plus fleur de lis, LSU wind -chimes, and all things purple and gold.

Finally started Christmas shopping today, Online on Amazon doesn't count. I'm actually looking forward to pulling out the tree tomorrow and starting to decorate. Noah was disappointed with our sparse decorations last year, so this year I'm going all out. Big tree, little tree, lights ( I probably have enough for a landing strip in there), garland, doing the whole works. Dickey may not be so enthusiastic when I tell him we are doing the outside too, but he'll get over it. It's probably best if I stay off the roof.

I want to wrap my crepe myrtle with lights tomorrow and freshen up the rustic log reindeer , if it stops raining. It's the unwrapping that gives me problems. We may be the Griswold house by the time I'm through.

I also have to find time for the "candy making extravaganza". Seems to grow exponentially every year. I'll need supplies sometime this week, may need a bigger van, hahaha.

Ok so that means tomorrow is "clean the disaster day"

Thursday is "buy more stuff day" (candy stuff)

Friday is "make stuff with the stuff day"

Saturday is "Dress up and Party day"

Sunday will be " baby watch day"

Monday will still be "baby watch day"/ maybe

cook a little

Tuesday will be "cook a lot "day

Wednesday will be "OH MY GOD< ITS BEEN A WEEK AND THIS IS ALL IVE GOTTEN DONE" day

Better known as abject panic day

There's more gifts to buy, more gifts to make, more glass to deliver,more glass to make, more house to decorate, more house to clean, more candy to make, more presents to wrap, more, more, more, more

And now that I have thoroughly freaked myself out. I'll take a deep breath in.

Let it out slowly. and repeat after me

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night

lots of purple and gold

Hello and welcome to my "pretty kitty" world. I was riding the ADD express today. Sad thing is I don't have ADD. hahah

Right now, If you're not an LSU fan around here, you should hide. haha It's a purple and gold world. Luckily, I'm an alumn, so I'm good. Unluckily, I'm running out of purple glass. Not good!!!!!

I started my day deciding to repack glass I need to take to the gallery in Lafayette. I need to have it all done by Tuesday. That was going pretty well until I decided I needed several boxes to pack in that were in the house. When I walked in the house, (ok, I did stop and pull up a few weeds along the way, "pretty kitty"), I forgot about the boxes and decided to work a little more on setting up my etsy site.

Oh wait, back it up. On the way in I was shanghaied to drive a bulldozer to pull off a tractor. I have to admit, the bulldozer is a bit intimidating, but I managed with no serious misfortunes and headed back to the house, boxes forgotton. Spent a few hours, no seriously, hours, trying to make a regular picture into a long, narrow horizontal picture. Just LUVE computers!!!

Went into the kitchen for a diet coke and decided to start supper. "PK"

Started soup, then back to the computer, then back to the studio, back to the computer, back to supper, etc... throughout the day. I even had a little helper come in for a Mickey Mouse break.

Suprisingly, I accomplished some of everything today, but all of nothing.

The soup, I named "throw it in the pot" soup, came out pretty well. It's a good thing, there's a lot of it . Never mastered that 'Just a little Bit' thing. It Grows....

Ah well, tomorrows another day. Maybe I'll make a list. hahahahaha

For all of you who live in "pretty kitty" land like me, just look at it as a way to combat boredom and get lots of exercise running from one thing to another.

See ya soon, ya'll

Happy Thanksgiving

Hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving
Busy day, Lots of cooking. Had my little helpers
this morning. They stir and drop, but mostly just
run around the kitchen and play chase and scream. The pie turned out, only a couple of bites left.
It was a beautiful day to play outside. Throwing the football to toddlers rounded out the day.

I am so not one for black Friday shopping, so I think I'll work in my much neglected flower beds.
More than a one day job, but I have to start somewhere.

AHHHHHH!!!

Can't believe I have a break from shows. I've spent the last few days trying to clear a path through my house. haha It's really not that bad, but I have been letting things go. I have a lot to catch up on. Burned up a vacumn cleaner last night. I think it died from shock.
I'm cooking for Thanksgiving tomorrow, so I have the alarm set to put in the turkey. Most things are ready to bake except the pecan pie. I haven't made one in a while, so good or bad, we'll have to see.
Even without shows, I have to get back in the studio soon. Need to finish gallery pieces and a couple of pieces for the "Girl's Who Kick Glass" show.
A few Christmas presents too. My new goal is to take more pictures to post and master my website. Well, at least take more pictures.
See ya soon

Purple and Gold

Seems most of my kiln work lately has been full of purple and gold. For those of you who don't live near, those are LSU's colors. Ranked #1 football team in the country and undefeated. The only downside to this, Saturday during gametime, art shows are a ghost towns. Oh well, guess you can't have everything.

Yes, you do see a little black and gold in there too. The last kiln was full of it. The Saints arn't doing to badly this year either. We southerner's do love our football.

That reminds me, there's another kilnload of glass to be unpacked before I leave for Broadmoor in the morning. It's still above 250 degrees, a little hot to deal with, which is not to say I haven't pulled 300 degree glass from a kiln and wrapped it in towels when I've run out of time before. It's just a lot less painfull to wait until it cools. hahaha

At least tomorrow I'm not going to be in a rush. I can take my time, arrange the glass, sign the pieces I've forgotton (which involves a diamond tipped glass engraver, not as easy as it sounds), polish, (there's ALWAYS more to polish) and put together all the windchimes I keep firing. I'll bring a book, just in case, but it looks like I'll be pretty busy.

See ya soon

Go Tigers!

It's a little hard to see, but I fused a tiger's eye. Still have to put on the chain for hanging, but we'll see how they do.
This weekend, Friday and Saturday, I will be at the Broadmoor show. Anything LSU is usually well recieved. I've been wanting to make a large panel with a tiger's eye fleur de lis. I think I may have to keep that one for myself if it comes out well. Maybe that can be one of my off time projects.
Should be a beautiful weekend, see you at the show.

Working, working, working

How cool is this poster.

Michelle Fontenot is getting a gallery show together with a group of "glass girls" on Dec 10. Have no idea yet what I will bring, but it looks like it will be a lot of fun.

I really have been working, working, working.
I have one more show this fall.
Broadmoor Arts and Crafts in Baton Rouge
We will be there this Friday , 3-9 and Saturday
9-5. The weather looks great and will be cool.
I will be in booth 6000, which makes no since, but is my usual spot, right inside the front gate. Can't miss me.

I will be taking some new pieces to Lafayette crafts guild gallery after Broadmoor and hopefully a few new things to Le Jardin's in New Orleans on Royal St.
I really can't wait for a break in shows. My house and yard look abandoned, hahah, and I have a lot of ideas for new pieces I would like to
work on with out looming deadlines. I even have a few Christmas presents to start, much less finish.
I haven't even bought the 1st present. At least I have started making a list and working up ideas.
I will try to take some pics of new pieces I finish this week and post. That's what I'm worst at. I finish the piece, but take it to the show before I can take the picture. Guess that will have to be one of my new years resolutions. hahaha I'll start a list.

A few new pieces.

Had a wonderful time at the Peter Anderson festival in Ocean Springs. Fantastic weather, great friends and good sales. We all went out for our "traditional" Italian dinner Saturday night and then found a place to watch "the Game" after. I have a friendly rivalry with my show neighbor that's been going on for years. She's Alabama and I'm LSU and we have a lot of fun with it. I think it was more fun for me this year, haha
It's taken me 2 days to rest up, but I will get back to work soon.

Geometric day

Two new geometric circles I worked on today. All wrapped and ready to solder.

Had a change of plans for today. Kiln issues, so I wrapped panels to have ready to solder.

TOMORROW I solder. hahaha

Kiln load in

Did a lot of cutting in the studio today. Cutting, grinding and loading the kiln. Lots of small things in there today. Night lights, alligatiors, a few fleurs. Have to wait till tomorrow to see what comes out. Some of these are experiments. The glass chips I glued to some things may come out really cute. On the other hand they may go into the "OH WHAT WAS I THINKING" pile. The christmas trees I can't wait to see. Planning to wrap copper wire around them in a curly q . Oh well, guess I'll find out tomorrow.

I did do other work. Lots of grinding on bigger pieces, getting them ready to wrap and solder. It's kinda been the ADD workshop. I flit from one thing to another, not sure what I want to work on today. Well! Tomorrow I WILL SOLDER, until something else distracts me, (pretty bird), oh, that reminds me. I need to cut out birds. hahahahahah

Back to Work

Spent most of the summer goofing off and vacationing. Went to the beach and the mountains. Riding 4-wheelers way up high. Didn't spend a lot of time at work. I'm trying to do better, haha. Working the studio lately. Finishing some new pieces for my next show. Busy, busy, busy.

I've already had 2 shows this year. Fairhope Art by the Bay and Canton flea market.

Happy Mardi Gras

New Years resolution (a little late) "Be more consistent with blog posts"

It's been a year since I've posted to my blog. I haven't been keeping up with my website very well at all. Well, a new year and new plans. Last year was a really busy year, lots of shows, new work and grandkids.

I will be having one show before Mardi Gras.

New Orleans Art market in Palmer park will be

February 26 from 10 to 4

I will be in my usual spot under the tree

Lots of mardi gras masks, fleur de lis and maybe even some voodoo dolls

Working on some new panels for a resturant in New Orleans. One with a pelican and the other with a heron. Can't wait to get some pictures posted.