just more of the same

Thursday morning I woke up to frost on the ground 

crunchy

and a layer of ice on the birdbath. Uh oh. Some of the foliage on the angel trumpets and most on the morning glory bush is shriveled but not all and the little jasmine buds seem OK so that's good but I think I lost the porterweed. It might come back from the roots, maybe. The ponytail palm looks unscathed. 

It was a beautiful day out there today, mostly sunny, with a predicted mid-60s high and mid-40s low. My kind of winter weather. The turtle was out on her sunning board and the dog was going berserk.

you can't tell from the picture but Minnie is barking hysterically

The goldfinches got over whatever shyness they started with and have been mobbing the tea cup and bird feeder the last several days.

crappy picture through the window on zoom, two goldfinches and a cardinal, the cardinal got tired of waiting and ran the goldfinches off

I've been working on a hibiscus flower in the modeling glass the last two days. The flower, about 5 1/2" wet, is done, 

now needs to be dried out before firing. I'm thinking of expanding the piece, adding leaves on a rolled out square with the intent of using it on the other hinged box from last December that I never used but first I need to draw out the composition which is proving to be elusive because I can't decide if I'm trying to do it for the box or maybe a piece not constrained by a square border or just an exercise with no final intent for its use. I should probably go with that last though, otherwise this could balloon into a BIG PRODUCTION, especially since I made no progress today. So, tomorrow I'll just do a single leaf shape and another try at the heron feather.