On my nightly walk last week, I heard it! I wait for the chorus every year as it signals something that just sets my knickers a twitter! The screaming of spring peepers in the Paine Falls marsh lands! ( Other wise known as the flooded Gristmill Condo's, still standing after two and half years of complete abandonment by the city, residents and all known forms of homeosapiens.) The peepers have returned! Along with a spry red fox, loads of deer, skunks and raccoons (who have been seen carrying a Barbie head back to the nest; I guess even baby raccoons love Barbie and you should see what they did with the abandoned big wheel left behind). Last week on a sun filled day I collapsed on the patio, just the patio, no chairs as they are still in winter storage (behind the shed, I have visions of those same raccoons having a cigarette, from the butts I keep finding in my yard, while lounging on my patio chairs under the moonlight. These are the Painesville raccoons, not the Paine Falls raccoons!) Yes, I looked like a beached whale rolled over to clear her blow hole........ it was glorious! I squinted into the eternal blue sky and saw big black silhouettes circling. For most that would be a sign to get up and move but buzzards in Northeastern Ohio make spring official! WELCOME BACK, I YELL!
I managed to roll myself over and take a hike around the homestead. The internal inventory sheet rolls past my eyeballs, after a 15 minute survey I roll back to the patio to draw up a triage list. What needs touching first? Plan of attack.......
There is a prediction somewhere back in the blog that Christmas decorations would be dangling until the Easter Bunny showed up. Am I psychotic or what? No need for me to read my daily horoscope or call the psychic hotline. Although this year that big bald elf did pretty well as the lights are the only thing I could find. (I am sooooo plugging these in tonight!)
I am so desperate to see anything living by the end of March I drop to my hands and knees and find
little shoots. I say the garden prayer......... Grow you little bastards, grow!
and then, there they are......... POPPIES! Hands down my favorite early summer flower.
Next week temps are supposed to zoom into the high 60's. Plan of attack: work in the yard as the kilns are firing. Sitting next to the kiln on a 60 degree day is akin to sitting in Hell. Although shorts & flip flops in March are enticing I am opting for jeans, boots and a t-shirt; proper garden attire for a proper garden wench. Pruning, planting, doing the side out rotate with blueberry plants and small shrubs. Some of my plants spend more time in the wheelbarrow than in the ground. I change garden plans more than I change my underwear.
This is my health care program........ BEND OVER! The nights I crawl into bed and am bone tired are good nights. The mornings I jump out of bed and run into the wall because my ankles don't work are good mornings and just forget the stairs........
I can open the doors of the studio and move stuff out, hammer stuff, fill ground hog holes with scrap clay and work on the more efficient studio floor plan I have been rolling around in head all winter. I have plans, big plans!
I signed up to do a farmers market every Wednesday this summer. Lake Farmparks has a sweet little program. I get to stand in a parking lot, next to a bunch of sheep and sell my pots. I go to the farmers market every week anyway so why not spend an extra hour and sell pots. The market has been going strong now for 4 years, they have a good customer base in an upscale area. Hey, I am excited about this! I can sell flowers from my garden also. Not taking a 10 x 10 booth just a table of mugs, bowls, garlic jars, jelly pots and stuff I fill corners of the kiln with.......... and get my grocery shopping done! Double tasking! I can sit on the tail gate of my little red truck and hang with the farmers. Besides it's sailing night and Butch will be off in the lake hanging with the sailors. Perfect!
My studio is drowning in dinnerware at the moment. I have stuff stacked on top of stuff. The progression of insanity. Long about early January I got the idea to do dinnerware. A complete cycle of making and firing takes about a month. Since I have not made dinnerware in a few years there was a learning curve. The more I made the more I learned. One dinner set lead to another and I am almost there. Research and Design........ arghhhhh!! It's expensive and time consuming and not sure the payoff will be there.
stacked on top of the freezer, nobody's getting dinner for a while around here! Also notice the lights for my camera set up...... someday I will be organized but not today!
Finally used my spray booth and I love it so much it will become permanent. For now it's on a table I drag out on the driveway, what a concept. Now I wonder how long it will take me to get over the fear factor of cutting through the pristine vinyl siding on my studio.......... winter?
Pots are waxed and waiting for glaze........
But hanging over my head is my kayak and it's spring and the peepers are singing
and I just might have to run down the river for few hours this week.
No comments:
Post a Comment