enormously cute

If you had such enormously cute dogs, you would sculpt them onto sugar bowls too, wouldn't you?
(Buster and Penny, penny by herself and new pottery by Gary Rith)

cats, dragons and zebras.....

I was like "SPIKE! Sit here, lemme get a pic of you, me, my shirt....."

AND
You will recall I talked about making a tall dragon sugar bowl, where here tis! Most awesome eh? I was thinking "I have made a lot of zebra things lately, dragons are similar to make, I should........this and a skull mug, just added to my etsy shop....

FRANZ the FRIENDLY turtle....

You will recall I told you Helen was like
"My old roomie took off and left me with only one mug. You had made it, it has a bunny on it! I need 4 more. Like, one with a frog, one with a turtle, the others with amphibian, reptile type things." and I was like

"snake and inch worm?" and here they are....

WELL, when I delivered them, I had not realized exactly WHY Helen wanted turtle etc...until I met FRANZ, Helen's awesome turtle. He was found in a dumpster last JANUARY and brought to the shelter, and when he thawed out, Helen adopted him.....Franz is the most friendly turtle, he gets all excited when people come in the door!

in other news, I told Michelle "let's go a little shorter than usual, up top" and the wife thinks I went too far, but I am like "hair is a nuisance, I don't want to think about it...."

ten years ago...

Ten years ago today I recall having 36 piggy banks drying that needed to be finished. If things are drying out, you have no choice but to work on it, get it done. Both of my sister-in-laws live in NY city and we were on the phone at different times, the one looking out her office window, watching the whole thing burn directly in front of her.
They were fine, but I recall thinking that day, as the radio played the news, the sun shone beautifully, that it was quite a contrast, to be sitting there working on something so cute and sweet as piggy banks while such a horrible event was unfolding.

my BRILLIANT idea

(new pottery above and below by Gary Rith)

More about the dragon sugar bowl in a minute...first, my brilliant idea, in a dream? I was dreaming just now that I needed to pee and I go into a public john, where all the urinals are electronic video games. You, um, pee into the usual sort of lower bit, but up higher is a video screen. So, there is a sensor in the lower bit, and you direct your stream around it, killing the usual space aliens and whatnot, which registers on the screen up higher. The only problem was fumbling a quarter into the thing, also, well, most of the time, its gonna be a really quick game isn't it? Gives new meaning to the equipment name "JOY STICK"

(gals, its true, men are always thinking of little games and missions and other flights of fancy like target practice when.....)

OK, the dragon sugar bowl up there? Not much to say, i just wanted to try it :)

back to normal-ish!

OK, so our house and home remained dry through this hurricane and flood, very lucky for us! I made applesauce, excellent recipe below, using apples from the tree in the neighbor's yard. I am gonna make more today, holy cats it is easy and stores well.

In other news, these pics show Penny down at our PO--our town is so small we have no home delivery, we all get boxes at the small PO ....but we are going to lose it, sadly. The postal clerk always puts a treat in my mailbox for Penny...we are sure gonna miss that.....

Take 3-4 pounds apples, about ten, and remove seeds and dice. Toss into large pot with a cup of water, zest of a lemon plus the juice from that lemon, many sprinkles cinnamon, 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup brown sugar, and start it boiling. When it boils, lower heat and simmer for 30 minutes stirring from time to time, pour mixture into blend and blenderize. Eat hot or cool and put into fridge and can even be frozen for up to a year!

flooding, hopefully, going down....

I think our flooding river peaked about 3pm, not a record, luckily...below you see me at the spot where the river is closest to our street, Main St, and another foot or 2 up and it would have flooded..but did not....ditto the back yard of Bruce's green house down there, he lives four doors down from us and the river came up to his back door.....and then a couple shots a bit down river including the Pinkney bridge--still above high water! We are VERY lucky in our town of Etna, but further downstream, like Binghamton, it sounds like the worst they have ever recorded on the Susquehanna....

eNORMOUS flooding!

This is a small 3 foot wide creek in our neighbor's yard--30 feet wide now---that creek feeds into the river below.

Below

in 2 diff. pics and angles, I am pointing at our backyard and how the river has come WAAAY up. Our house and yard are just behind those trees. Our house is high and dry. Fall Creek rose from yesterday, 1-2 feet deep, maybe 25 feet wide, to 7-10 feet deep and hundreds of feet wide---FLASH FLOOD.

Us at the bridge by our house, and below, a little downriver, super high water....

huge FLOOD!

Hurricane Lee has been messing with us, and dumping on us, and there are wicked floods all over central New York. We have a pretty little river behind our house, and suddenly it has come up several feet in depth and is over the usual banks and spreading. Our house is pretty high, and we are keeping our fingers crossed. It is worse for many people downriver from us, as the land is low and flat in spots further down...this pic from last night, gonna get more pics today....and don't we have some cute pots here too??????

**update later---the river is up to the edge of our yard, higher than ever before, but our house should remain dry....the sheriff has closed all the roads and ordered cars off the roads

****another update, at 11 am---we are personally still dry, the sun is out, the sheriff has re-opened roads :)

good things

(new pottery by Gary Rith)
Looking good eh? Kinda tinkering with these glaze color schemes--YES. Keepers! And you know I love the cow over the mooooon.....a favorite sculpture I like to make....I should make a 3 pigs one today too....

mega-kitchen MONDAY!

ALRIGHT, so, the pics all loaded backwards, OOPS. Welllllll, at the end of mega-kitchen Monday there was the spicy hot salsa....Joy of Joyful things shared her salsa recipe, and it includes the usual suspects, tomatoes (remember I told you we were at Amy's farmlet with Zippy the dog on Sunday, snagging tomatoes?) and garlic, hot peppers and lime and onion and is wicked tasty. I baked little quesadillas to go with that salsa--a little vegan cheese on a tortilla with seitan...and peanut butter chocolate cookies! The wife needs treats for the work week and it is my job to make sure she does not dry up and blow away...and actually, MOST of the day was spent:

making 22 jars of apple jam. You will remember we picked apples from the untended neighbor's tree on Saturday--suprisingly healthy and beautiful little apples, and we used ten pounds to make 2 batches apple spice jam. The longest part was chopping them, and we are too lazy to peel them. Basically, apple spice jam is apple pie in a jar, ready for your toast, and the house, these many hours later, still smells like apple pie :)
(when we were selling our house a few years ago? I would burn an apple pie smelling candle before customers came over, and believe me, the house smelled great and it sold quickly!)

not buttery colored, more buttercup colored....

You will be noticing a number of things here! As I said, I have been painting my display, and GOLLY it turned out a much more bright yellow than I thought I was buying...when you look at the crates above, I am sure you will admit that it is tres cheerful! Tres sunny!

In other yellow news, as you see here, we went to Amy's farmlet where the tomatoes and other things have TAKEN over. THOUSANDS of tomatoes...waiting for me....we brought Penny. Penny hates other dogs, but as you see here, she does not hate her "cousin" Zippy, another small dog who would kick ass if needed, but they like each other. Only the 2nd or 3rd dog Penny has ever liked, the rest she has tried to tear to pieces (well, she has barked anyway).

Lastly, you will see the small pigs above, salt and pepper shakers! The same design as a piggy bank, just small....and below a cute little pot....