arranging, cooking, arting

I spent Friday and Saturday setting up the table I moved over to the studio for mold making, rehydrated the clay, washed the glass pieces he uses for dams, washed the buckets, gathered the miscellaneous stuff and put it on a shelf, moved a trash bag lined can in that can be filled with water for plunging the bucket of plaster in if things go south, cleaned and brought the little table in for steaming out the wax. The work sink is just out of sight on the left.

I also worked on a wax model Saturday until it got too hot. I had been over there with the air conditioner on and turned it off when I left and then when I went back the AC wouldn't come back on. That's when I worked on the wax til it got too soft. Went back later in the day after looking at new AC units and it came on again. So yay for that but I imagine it will eventually have to be replaced. It would be nice to have one that wasn't quite so loud.

Sunday was deal with tomatoes day. Two vendors finally had more reasonable prices on their tomatoes. So, another batch of tomato sauce

and the rest I skinned, cut out the lion's share of the stink bug damage, and stewed them for freezing. I only got four cups after I drained off most of the juice which I then froze in ice cube trays for use with soups or stews or bloody marys or whatever.

And then my daughter and grandgirls Jade and Robin came by Sunday evening and set us up with a fire stick and set up our accounts so now we have 5 options (cable and 4 others) for watching TV. First up, The Mandalorian.

I spent about 3 hours in the studio yesterday (and the AC cut off twice but fortunately it was overcast and a little rainy and we didn't even break 80˚ so with a fan it was tolerable), worked on the wax model and then worked with the modeling glass to make the lichens I intend to glue on the piece once the lizard on the log is cast.

I fiddled with those a little bit then covered the model with plastic film and set the lichens in place to dry. I plan to add at least 6 more lichens, 3 at each end. It's going to be tricky to keep them curved while they dry out and then fuse together in the kiln. And they will shrink about 15% so who knows how they will fit once everything is fused and cast.

This is what I'm going for. The color of the ones I made will darken after they're fired.

Not sure my first attempt will be successful at this point. While I was doing that Marc made a test mold with the old plaster and silica flour to see if it is still viable.

Then it was my half hour or so of quiet time before leaving for yoga class. And then coming back you never know what you're going to see. These two steers came wandering out of the grassy field just as we were passing by.

Today I head back over to the studio to work on the lichens again.