Truly a Nomad

So I’ve been staying at Todd and Angie’s house since Tuesday afternoon because they asked me to baby-sit the three kids while they made an impromptu trip to Fargo, N.D. They had been invited to go up there and see their new tracker and to tour the plant where it was made. They got back very late Wednesday night and I therefore stayed until Thursday, but before I got around to going home Mom called me and told me I should consider not coming home. I was like, okay . . . why? Then she told me that she had the stomach flu and didn’t want to give it to me. (Thanks for the warning!!!) So I’m still at Todd and Angie’s house. Although I did have to do some laundry and borrow a t-shirt. Hopefully I can go home this afternoon or tomorrow.

Update

Well, I thought I it was about time I updated you all on what’s been happening.

My BFA show was a success, several people came to the opening reception and several more came later during the week. Thanks for all the support!

I spent Christmas with my family in Pratt. Surprisingly there was no real drama so that was a blessing. We had about 17 people in my parents’ house, it was very crowded. However, not as crowded as it could have been considering there could have easily been another 10 people there.

The weekend after Christmas Mom and I made a flying trip to Manhattan to pack up my apartment. The next day my dad came up in his truck with a trailer. Mike and Carolyn came by and helped us finish packing and Lyle came soon after to help load everything up. Everything happened so fast – my parents and I were on our way back to Pratt by 3pm. Now the one thing I didn’t realize is that my parents had no plan to unload the trailer. Yup, most of my stuff is still in the trailer. I did go out and find the box with my shoes in it and some bathroom stuff. Not that I have any place to put anything, but at least I can get to it now.

I’ve been staying with my parents for a few days. She’s got some ideas on how I should get started; she just hasn’t had time to share them with me yet. Hopefully we can talk tonight. I’ll be headed back to Pratt tomorrow probably.

That’s about it. I’m missing everyone back in Manhattan, but I’m doing okay.

Nothing New

Well, nothing to exciting has happened since I last posted. I officially resigned as church secretary just before Thanksgiving so that I could focus on my school work and actually finish my projects for my show. I went home for Thanksgiving, things there were fairly typical for my family.

While I was there my brother Todd was kind enough to let me invade a space in his heated shop to refinish an antique wash stand that had sat in my parents basement ever since I can remember. I stripped off the extremely dark finish and re-stained it with a lighter more natural color. In the process Todd told me it's actually made of oak and pine. I said, "Well, I wondered why part of it had this nice grain to it and the other part didn't!" Regardless of the differing woods the piece is much prettier now. I just need to polyurethane it again.

Since I got back to Manhattan I've been living in the metals studio trying to finish a couple of pieces that I desperately want in my show. Although, I did spend 3.5 hours down in blacksmithing last night. My final project in that class is a small table (about the size of an end table). I think I finished the first step, but I have to talk to my teacher. He's saying to do one thing and I'm thinking I should do something else.

Well, that's pretty much it. My show is December 15th - 19th. I'll have much more time to post pictures of my pieces and projects then.

Costumes

So I realized about a week ago that I completely forgot to post about the Centennial Celebrations we had at church on October 5th. Everyone was asked to dress up like it was 1908. Seeing this as a great sewing challenge I took on the task on making my costume. Skirt, top, and jacket! I had so much fun! The last time I made clothing it was all for Mike and Lindsey, but this time it was for me.

Miss Lindsey and Miss Cherry pose for a picture as they await the festivities.
Gossiping, I mean chatting, with the gals!
Undertaker Harry and his lovely wife Donna enjoy the fact that there will be no undertaking today.
Everyone who dressed up posed for this picture. No one is smiling because no one ever smiled for pictures back in the day.
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Last night of course was Halloween! The church put on a Fall Festival and once again we were asked to dress up in non scary costumes. I once again took on the challenge of making my own gypsy costume. The skirt, top, sash, hair piece, one of the beaded necklaces, an anklet, and my favorite the hoop style nose ring. (Unfortunately you can't really see it in the picture.)
No shoes, did Gypsy's have shoes? This one didn't!
Well, this being a church function, they wouldn't let me tell fortunes. So I was the face painter. Emily was the first "kid" that I painted. Pastor Linda was the first adult, but as she's the one who took all these pictures I don't have one of me painting her.
I don't know how many faces I painted. Lots! I did two masks (both on adults), a snowflake (on a snow princess), rainbows (on a rainbow princess), pumpkins, spiders, bats, flames, dripping wounds, a power cat, some letters, a leaf, several flowers, heart, and even a couple of butterflies. I did get one request for a squirrel or a duck, but Miss Lindsey (renaissance lady) walked away with a flower instead.
Emily was a big fan! She just kept coming back for more!
Hope you all had a wonderful Halloween!

Repair Days

Note: This is the last of my catch up posts. It will make better since if you start with the once called SIMS and work your way back up to this one.

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Hooray! Repair Days 2008! Time to travel 11 to 12 hours in a van to volunteer our time, energy, and skills to repair other people's metal items for 2 days, see an exhibition in the "National Ornimental Metal Musium", get an apron, maybe a new catalogue, spend some money, and then drive the 11 to 12 hour back! Hooray! Repair Days 2008!

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Look it's a portable blacksmith shop! Complete with coal forge, vice, anvil, and other various hammers and tongs.

This is a picture of Bonnie taking a picture of the way cool stair case to nowhere. I didn't even notice that Bonnie was in the picture until later.

Spencer is attempting to fix a huge silver plated punch bowl.
Kylee spent a good 30 minutes to an hour filing a piece of brass down to the right size, just to be told to use steel instead. She was trying to fix an old fashioned door bell. This is when Elloitt was teaching Bonnie and I how to lead solder. We had found this mirrored tray with feet. Well the mirror had been replaced and in the process of replacing the mirror they had bent and broken most of the feet.
Since the tray was only silver plated, we had to use lead solder. Lead solder melts at a much lower temperature than silver solder (which is what I'm used to). But lead soldering was super easy to do and it was kinda fun!
There was an auction that Eric and Elloitt both donated pieces too. Eric's "Little Apple Express" went for around $350-$375 somewhere around there. Elloitt's "Copper bowl" went for something like $600. It was really cool. They also had a raffel. I won twice! Got a hand grinder, and a drill set. Good thing Todd gave me a drill for Christmas 2 years ago! We came back Sunday afternoon/night, rolled into town about 11pm. Whew! I need a nap!

Elizabeth Brim

Stories through pictures! This is 1 of the 4 drawer pulls that I made as my first ever blacksmithing project. Unfortunately in this picture the pull isn't actually finished. I just took it home to make sure it would fit. The next day I sand blasted it, put a black patina on it, and put two coats of butcher's wax on it to keep it from rusting. So the finished piece is actually a shiny black color.

John made a snake hook for his first project, and then brought his snake in to show us that it worked. As you can see it does work and Six (the snake) is actually quite fond of it. This is Eric's reaction to Six. Ha Ha he's not to fond of snakes!
This is Elizabeth Brim. She came as our visiting artist for this semester. She makes these amazing pieces out of iron; flowers, high heels, hats, camisoles, tutus, even iron pillows!
Oxi-acetylene welding!
Leaf making demo!
To make the iron pillows she would weld two flat piece of sheet steel together, attach a tube, heat the whole thing up, and then blow compressed air into it. This process it just a little dangerous (ok maybe it's a lot dangerous) because sometimes the weld seam will pop and then it sounds like a bomb goes off and hot steam can come up and burn you. This is what that looks like. Oops! (Ha! I didn't scream, but someone else did!)
This is the blown up piece after we let it cool off.
Then Eric had to inflate a rocket that was going to be his and Elizabeth's auction piece at Repair Days. This one didn't blow up.
This is the "Little Apple Express" all finished. (Eric didn't have a camera so I have lots of pictures of this thing. Need to make him a CD.)

The next morning after Elizabeth's demo we all loaded up and headed to Memphis, TN for Repair Days. That's in the next post.

SIMS, September 26 & 27, 2008

Ok, so this is the first in a series of me catching up. The last weekend in September I went to Carbondale, IL to attend the Southern Illinois Metalsmithing Conference (SIMS). This year they had three blacksmiths.

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This is Michael Bondi, he's holding up a piece on Aluminum that he forged into this sculptural piece. The piece he started out with was about 1 inch round bar stock about 6 inches in length. By the time he was finished it was about 3 feet long! This is just a way awesome picture of the scale flying off a hot piece of iron when the power hammer hits the metal!
This is Ries Niemi. Yes, he is wearing a utility kilt. Eric (my teacher) told me he watched Niemi demo in a tuxedo once. So that should give you a glimpse into this guys character. This is John Medwedeff. Better known as "Duff" his demo was on scroll making, he also gave a talk about his business. He's done several public commissions. The last picture is on one of his pieces. It's a pretty good sized fountain. The picture isn't the best, because it was dark and I didn't have a tripod to set my camera on so it was really hard to get a clear picture.
Anyway, it was a good trip! Had lots of fun, learned lots of cool stuff. Time to do the next catch up post!