Hay you!

I just downloaded over a 1000 pictures off of the Nikon. If only I could download all of the stories that those pictures would tell. If there is inflation of the economic variety in story telling  then those pictures are worth a gazillion words. Don't they call that hype? Whatever, it's way more than I have time to recount here.

Summary: The roadtrip to and from Austin with Gwendolyn, pictures from Austin's Art of the Pot,  a visit with an old friend, his family, and his Texas mob, the beginnings of summer vacation with the gals, visits with pottery donors for the NCPC Annual Auction, garden pictures, pictures from Evelyn's play, not to mention Evelyn and Lillian's dance performance, a broken down car, a new van, Cousins in Clay with Ron and Judith, Bruce and Samantha, and our visit to Starworks Ceramics in Seagrove and Star, NC, more pictures of the kids and their friends over for a campout. Oh, and the pictures I promised from the last firing.

In a nutshell, that's what was on that 16 GB "roll of film".

When I sat down to click clack this post out on ye olde keyboard I was a little struck down by the weight of wanting to share all of those stories and feeling slightly lame for not being a better blogger/reporter this past month. But now I feel a little better with the summary. I never want to promise that I will write about all that someday and never do it, that's really lame.

Finally to what I wanted to write about in the first place, before the preamble ramble.  What I will share with you now is a bit of mower's pride.

It's what I call the "table" shot. You know the pic. The one of a potter's studio full of freshly made pots, (aka the 12 x 12 shot). But instead of rows of pots, I have windrows! I took these pictures immediately after finishing the the mowing spiral. The sun had just broken through dusky clouds. I couldn't quite capture the pride I had at the moment, but it's the kind of pride one has for overcoming technical, tactical, or physical shortcoming. Pride associated with taking something to the next level or sometimes just getting something/anything made or done! We all have our challenges, right?

So with the pride of a potter with a table of freshly turned potteries, here are a few pictures of last evenings mowings.

 

Like many a weekend warrior with a lawn, I enjoy getting out there and going 'round with the mower. AND I've been blessed with several acres of open meadow that surround the studio and the house. But only a very small portion around the house and the studio got mowed by moi. The rest was cut and hayed by neighbors. Actually, that weekend warrior part is a little inaccurate. I mow when I can and when I am busy with a firing, the grass can get pretty tall. Tall grass is hard to push a 3.5 hp Briggs and Stratton through, so last summer I taught myself to use a scythe. For those who follow me on Facebook, Instagram, etc. you no doubt, have seen me posing with my scythe or showing a newly mowed row of the field. Well, after many hours of online videos of people all around the world using scythes, I managed to learn how to use the one bequeathed to me by my scything patron, Kent McLaughlin. I had confessed my fascination for the scythe with him at a POTR meeting, and shortly after that he produced a fine Austrian-made "Amercian" (er, American, that is) scythe that I used all of last summer. It was pretty used up, but I managed to figure out how to use it and more importantly how to sharpen it!

It's probably too late to make a long story short, but that's the gist of it.
For this evening,  I have a few pots to decorate and glaze for Kyle's kiln.
Tomorrow, it's time to rake some hay. That is if the sun shines.

Spoiler: more scythe-talk may show up here on ye olde blogge! There's a lot of tall grass outside the studio! Consider yourself warned.