Oh Nuts!

I've been making plaster molds for Laura this week. Just as I had finished pouring the plaster into the last mold of the week and leave work before the snow storm got too crazy, the mold let loose and sent a wall of mixed plaster slurry. It was quite the mess. I guess 15 lbs of water + 22.5 lbs of plaster is too much for one pour into my gerry-rigged mold form. Crud. Oh well, let it harden then clean up is the only thing to do.
Once the plaster was all spilled out in a big puddle it reminded me of watching Tom Spleth working with plaster to create vase forms, if you've never seen that check it out here.
On a good note: Happy Holidays! Quinn and I went to Sears earlier this week and got our ugly holiday-sweater-portrait taken.

good morning

I woke up this morning and for some reason the light through the bathroom window was really striking so I had to take a picture. This window is also one of the reasons we first signed our lease for this place. Quinn and I are both really big fans of hot dog plants; they have such beautiful flowers. Some times we talk about farming hot dogs as a business venture.
In all honesty, we don't know who made this window, but it's always a pleasure to live with.

Islamic Platters

I've been looking at these platters recently. I saw a picture of a similar platter a year or two ago and was just floored by it. I can't remember which book it was in but the other day that platter came to mind and I just had to find some images to look at. There's something so alluring about them. The Arabic sayings that are painted around the circumference are so stark and intentional. There is a beautiful simplicity to the stylized script. The one above is from the 10th century and is a serious 18 inches wide! These are all Central Asian from Nishapur or Samarqand.



This one (below) says, "Whoever talks a lot, slips a lot." This one (again below) says, "Frugality is a symptom of poverty." At first that seems pretty obvious. But what's the deeper meaning? It comes off as if frugality is a negative, perhaps poverty is a positive state of being. hmm...