June 25-26 2020 Fort Collins, Colorado

From my bike ride this evening. The trees along the river and McMurry pond. 

Cool cloud reflections. On the sign at the water park. 

Sunset tonight.

I got my flat lap up and running and made this faceted/polished piece. I was sweeping up the garage and the dust in this sunbeam is interesting. I am easily amused!

I made this one today. Interesting shot of the sun I took on my bike ride tonight. Looks like the stop light is the sun. 

Most of the clouds went away for actual sunset. But not bad as a backdrop for dinner. Rainy day. Some of the lilies in the yard. 

I went to the Mask exhibit at the Fort Collins Museum of art.  It was very interesting. My favorite was Thor Rockmoninoff made with rocks. The artist is a rock balance artist.  And I am always drawn to the glass ones. The last ones are high school students entries. These really cool clouds were part of a big storm that we only got the very edge of. 

Most of this storm passed north east of us. Good thing, it was huge with lots of lightening. Sunset was lovely over Riverside street. 

For years I have been trying to make a glass piece of this photo I took of John in this lake in the cypress trees in Florida. Finally just dove in, it is not the same, can't cut all those squiggly lines, but it is coming out cool. I have been working on making more faceted, polished jewels. I am getting better and faster at it. The square shape is pretty boring. Last night I made the triangle and decided I like the organic shapes better, more fun. One of the squares fell off the deck onto the concrete below, I think they jewels would rather be organic. 

June 14-21 2020 Fort Collins, Colorado

In the 90's still. Been going for bike rides right at twilight because it is cooler and the colors are nice. Other than that working on glass.

Sunset at McMurray pond the other night. I have been working on making some glass basket centers. I have these precut cats in my studio so I am turning some of them into basket centers. I am also making some centers for Christmas ornaments for later in the year. These are before firing. I added more to the cats too before I fired.

My brother Jerry and his high school friend Cecil came over for dinner tonight. It was good to see them. John cooked a scrumptious dinner of red sauce, meat balls and linguine.  We ate outside for social distancing.  

Sunset from dinner tonight. We had a lovely dinner tonight with John and Mandy. John smoked ribs and John M made potato salad and brought the left overs from last nights dessert. Was great to see them. It was raining so there was a tarp up to the left. 

After the rain there was this beautiful double rainbow. I had a private appointment and D and L art glass warehouse today. They are not opened up yet. You can order glass and supplies online and pick them up or have them shipped. I wanted to buy dichroic glass and I like to look at it. So I made an appointment. Only one person at a time. I was all alone with all of this wonderful glass(with staff) it felt so special. I bought too much. . . 

On the way home was a huge thunderstorm, I missed most of it by taking the slow scenic route home,  but there was a lot of rain. Some of my dichroic glass that I purchased. I am so excited to start working with it. Dichroic glass is a solution of metallic ions sprayed on the glass at a high temperature, so the sheets are round because the sprayer is round. I wish the photo would show how shiny this glass is in the sun. 

More of the dichroic glass I bought today. Some of the quarter sheets and the 4 inch squares are on sale. I got such a deal.  Cool cloud last night. 

Sunset clouds. The bottom one looks like a thought or speech bubble from the comics.  

Some alley art on the utility boxes. It is so cool. Decorative doorway and part of a mural. 

Sunset in one of the alley's. I finished my cat basket centers. I fused the glass and then set them in resin so I could drill holes around them to stitch the pine needles to. The glass is about 5 inches in diameter. These will be fun baskets. 

I got an early start on  Christmas. I made glass centers for Christmas ornaments. I fused the glass and then set them in resin so I could drill holes around them to stitch the pine needles to. These are basket centers I made out of old glass jewelry I made.  I set the glass in resin and drilled holes to stitch to for the baskets. 

June 7-12, 2020 Fort Collins, Colorado

91 and sunny today.

I rode my bike to Mandy and John's for dinner. John drove over. He has spent the day kayaking some fast water and had had enough exercise. These are photos on the bike path. It is sooo green. Even if I didn't just come from the desert. Beautiful day.  

Dinner with Mandy and John in the back yard. It was a yummy dinner and it was good to see them. The temps dropped into the low 80's and John was freezing. Mandy lent him a coat to keep warm. After being in the desert with temps in the 100's, low 80's are cool.  

I took the masterpiece out of the kiln this evening, it was a long firing. But it was worth it, the new bubble squeeze firing schedule actually did squeeze them out. Usually air get trapped between all the little piece of glass in this technique, and I have to break them, refire and then paint over them.  Now I just need to paint some gold paint on this and slump it into a plate mold and it will be done. I am pleased with it. And the finished product, slumped into a plate with gold paint on it. 

I got the last of the garden in. Hauled compost, dug it in, planted the plants and spread mulch. Looks good, will look better when the plants are bigger. I got the garden in just in time for the hail storm last night. But the plants are little and they survived. 

My friend Judy painted this of the view of sunset from Shoshone. I love it. I just got it framed. I need to decide where to hang it. Right now it is just in a stand. A view from the bike path. It was a gorgeous day.

Another bike path shot. I like to sleep in, since I stay up way late working on glass. The sun wakes me up, so I had a variety of sleeping bags, liner, blankets and towels over the windows. It did the trick, but was kind of tacky. I got these  black out drapes at Costco and the fabric on sale at hobby lobby and voila! It is not the most stylish, but it is a lot better than what was there. 

The white water park was busy tonight. The bike path goes right by it. Sunset tonight. 

I made this little spring fairy for my garden. She will help it grow. I already dropped her and had to fix her. I also fused some butterflies. One in my poor little garden.  

Green on the bike path. Sunset from the bike path. 

Horse in sunset light and another sunset over a lake.  

I got my new Ipad today. I have an Amazon Fire, but it does not do much. I wanted it edit photos when I go on trips so I don't have to haul my whole laptop around. It won't even let me hook the camera up to it. The Ipad is supposed to do that. But first I have to learn how to use it.