while i am waiting.....

here i am sitting at the keyboard, killing time blogging rather than cleaning up the pigsty that has become my studio. i'm waiting for the kiln to cool down so i can see if my double dog sculpture fired properly in copper.  i haven't had as much experience with copper, and one copper cast failed on this project already.  instead of firing them last night, as i told you i was going to, i put them back in the dehydrator, and weighted them.  i wanted to make sure that they were very very dry, as one scource told me that not being 'gently' dried, and not being fully dry could be the reason that the first copper one cracked and failed.  never occurred to me, as i can fire bronze completely wet and it does ok. 

so here i am tapping my toes and waiting, and it will still probably be tomorrow before the blinkety blink thing is cool enough to take out of the kiln!

so..... let me tell you about the PMC level three certification class i took in purdue at the end of july.  it was held at purdue university, here in indiana.  i stayed for three days, and met alot of really wonderful folks.  class instructor was mary ann devos, both experienced and accomplished.  she gave us the traditional level 3 projects---one little hinged box and one setting of a large natural stone in two setting methods: prongs and bezels.  i aquited myself well except for forgetting to put the plaster duplicate of my stone in its setting before firing the piece!  the whole piece shrunk way too much to fit the stone, but lucky me!  my stone was a fossil and very soft, so i could file it to fit.  it actually looks better with the smaller stone.....sure it does....  such are the happy accidents that come with inspired lunacy.  here it is.   

my friend caorl meyers gave me two gifts before i went on this trip.  one was this nautilis fossil, and the other one was a bee bead.  the tree and the spiral are recurrent images in her work, and as i contemplated how to use this stone in my project i thought about how many times she has inspired me.  so how could i not make a piece called 'carol's inspiration'???  we are now in a friendly arguement about who will eventually get to keep it.  i'll keep you posted on that.  my dad would say that posession was nine tenths of the law.