Aggravation

Coffee in the Austin skyline mug, "Mystery" by the Indigo Girls (in honor of the week) on iTunes. It wasn't a random choice and I considered "Building a Mystery" by Sarah McLachlan--which might have been more appropriate--but you can never go wrong with the Indigo Girls. Aggravation. I was all set to post pictures of the tumultuous week up to and including the first kiln load in the new studio and I can't. find. the camera. transfer. cable. I can't find the fly-swatter either and we are *infested* with little fruit fly-like things. I can feel myself getting wound up. Breathe. Breathe in, breathe out. Wash, rinse, repeat.

It's Friday now. Yesterday's move wrap-up and install went well. Bertha is level (and wasn't THAT a job in this 90 year-old house with very Un-level floors!) and has a counterweight pulley system hung for the lid, the Styrofoam peanut dispenser is hung, the frit storage racks are mounted, and the middle kiln has been loaded and fired even before the computer control panel has been mounted on the wall. Why did I fire after two long, chaotic, stressful days of moving? Well it's like this...

Jessie is in a new school this year and at her school they have a ritual for celebrating childrens' birthdays. I found out that, yes, the date for her in-school party really is *today* yesterday at 1:00 pm, and I had none of my assigned prep for the party even begun--much less completed. The first step was the cake. The kids make a cake in class and the birthday child decorates it with flowers she brings from her garden. Our garden yielded a couple of impatiens, a few marigolds, some ivy and a lacy white flower. It wasn't really enough so Jessie and her Gramma (newly arrived from Chicago) went off on a walk and gathered the last of the season's roses growing through neighboring fences.

Meanwhile back at the studio... The moving wound down and the helpers went home after hugs all around. I dragged my very tired and sore body home and sat down to start the little story about the milestones of Jessie's life that her teacher will read in class today when I remembered that part of the celebration includes the birthday child giving a little hand-made gift or natural object to all of her classmates... I had planned to have Jessie make little glass sun-catcher ornaments, but that was before the painting and the move dragged out for an extra week. What to do, what to do. As we are fresh out of Popsicle sticks, little magnets to glue and other ideas, Jessie and I headed back over to the studio to see what we could do.

Picture, if you will, a glass studio at the tail-end of the most random, unprepared, chaotic move imaginable. Jessie saw a scrap of clear irid with black streamers in a box on the coldroom floor. I found and assembled the pieces of the Morton cutting system (the cutting oil was the hardest part) and cut the scrap into two-inch squares that we washed and dried. J sprinkled multi-colored frit on them... and then it was time for dinner.

As I was waiting for J to finish dinner, with memories and input from Dave and the grandparents, I finished J's story and emailed it to her teacher. Then Jessie and I headed back to the studio where she put little copper loops in the corner of the ornament and covered them with colored circles. It took about 20 minutes to find the computer controller for the kiln (it was still hanging on the wall in the old studio) but eventually it all came together.

And the day ended. Well, there was also a hot bath and a white Russian with Bailey's instead of cream in it.

Postscript: I found the camera cable AND the fly-swatter so you get pictures and I get dead flies. Enjoy!


Moving Bertha:


Moving glass:


New Studio in chaos: