• Thoughts

    What Will You Be?

    A friend was standing on the front stoop after picking up her son, and she thanked me for sharing my mid-life crisis post. She had been having similar conversations with friends, one of whom observed the ridiculousness of her own crisis when her high school junior was on the precipice life-defining choices. It struck me that I’ve never felt like I had arrived or become what I owed it to the world, my parents, God or the foundations that funded my education to become. At times I fear I’ve missed the window of becoming. But then I look at my children and remember I love them as they are, having…

  • Thoughts

    By a Thread

    Nearly weekly I’m hearing of mother-friends in a similar season of life, with kids in elementary school or slated towards middle, heading back to their careers or starting off in new vocations. They are doing what is called “going back to work”. It must be relieving for them to no longer have to answer the question that everyone is thinking and some explicitly ask, “So what will you do now that the kids are in school?” I’ve witnessed this migration for a few years. Some friends blossom a hobby or side-gig into a successful small business, some increase their hours in a part-time job, and some head back to school…

  • Pottery

    Fall Planning

    It’s been a very slow summer in regards to making pottery. I had hoped to produce more, but happily traded productivity for pool time with my kids. Monday they will both be back full time, and I will then have some hours in the day to do something with, I figure about 30 hours a week. Here’s my estimated breakdown, which coincidentally does not add up to 30 hours: (8-10 hrs) My fall graduate course “Introduction to Land and Water Engineering” has jumped up to eight students, so that will certainly take a chunk of my week to grade assignments and help them with the problems. (6-8 hrs) Pottery at…

  • Pottery

    Insplosure!

    This Saturday I’ll have a little table at the Pour House for the 7th annual Insplosure. It is a free event and a nice way to step indoors while hanging out at Artsplosure. I still have several mugs, succulent gardens, some tall vases and PLENTY of pendent necklaces. I’ll bring along the nature prints too. This is probably the last show of the spring season before I get back to the wheel. Production completely halted the beginning of May to give my shoulder time to rest, so now I need to build up some new inventory, and plan on focusing on mugs, small planters, and small kitchen prep bowls. On…