I Guess I Didn't Need to Pack...

Yesterday morning, I decided to take a quick detour on the way to work, to hit Starbucks. Iced white chocolate mocha, breakfast sammich, and a Puppaccino for Grace! Yum!When I got back to the car I saw I had missed a message and decided to play it while I gave Grace her treat.

It was a message from Laguna Clay: You kiln arrived and is on a truck to deliver by noon today!

Wow! Nothing like a little notice, huh? But hey, why complain when your hard work and sacrifice is getting delivered?

I was dancing like a little kid on an epic sugar high on Christmas morning!

And after the combined efforts of myself, my dad, and the kindest delivery man on the planet (which made the trials of Sisyphus look like a walk in the park), the kiln was in its place!

But there was a small wrinkle...

The socket for the kiln was upside down. I texted my electrician (also a standup guy who I would recommend to anyone who needed work done) and asked if I could just unscrew and flip the socket around. He said I could, and offered to come out and do it, which he did. For free. He also trimmed the bottom of the box, itself, to accommodate the giant square plug.

And then there was the glorious moment when the touch screen lit up! YAAAS! And the touch screen is made to tilt so you don't have to squat down to program it!

And there's a lid lifter! It helps lift the lid so it's not too heavy for me to lift!

And I got the rolling stand with an adaptor for the downdraft exhaust vent system.

So today I get to finish prepping it for the first test firing. Vacuuming out the inside and especially the kiln elements, finishing the exhaust vent setup, putting kiln wash on the new shelves... It's going to be a busy day!

But man, what a triumph!

One More Step

Right shoe by Jimmy Choo. Not.

Unscrewed and screwed, that's me!

I had my surgery to take the screw out of my right foot, which means that other than healing, I'm done with that and everything keeps getting better from here! We decided to have the other foot done at the same time, as we're heading for Ireland in June for our anniversary and wanted to be free of all hardware by that time so I can enjoy the trip.

I did manage to run a kiln load before going in for surgery, with mixed results. It turns out some gifts I was making will be pitched in the trash, as the glaze and clay bodies don't like each other, which caused bubbling and crackling. You can't have that in ware you use for food, as the glaze breaks off in the food and can cause serious medical problems. I'm sure part of the problem, still, is my kiln cooling too fast, but the main issue is the glaze and clay bodies not matching up properly. I went on the boards on the Ceramic Arts Daily website to get some advice on kiln shelves, which turned into a debate on which kiln would be best to buy. I'll debate it more, I'm sure, before I make my purchase! I figured it was only going to be torture if I bought it and then wasn't able to use it until after I'm healed from my latest surgery.

One of the other things I managed to get done before my surgery was to get some pics taken of some of my work, so I can start to re-populate my neglected Etsy store. I have bins of stuff sitting around, and since I can't go to any shows until later this year, it doesn't make sense for me to leave it to sit. So keep an eye out for new things! I'll be sending an email out to my past customers this week, as I get things posted.