"Somebody's got a case of the Mondays" ~ Office Space

So, even though I went to bed fairly early and did absolutely nothing yesterday I was exhausted this morning when I woke up.  I blame it on the fact that I woke up 24984198165 times last night and this morning.  Then when my alarm went off I rolled around in my nice soft bed (maybe I shouldn't have gotten such nice sheets at Ikea) and fell back to sleep.  I woke up at 8:37 cursing and running out of the house to school which starts at 8:50! But I made it, and I even ate a little bit of breakfast.  I have learned I can't make it through the day without 3 solid meals with all this glass blowing!

So, needless to say in the morning Mia (after she finally showed up) was like "whoa... are you really here today?!" to me at one point when I couldn't blow a damn bubble straight.  But it got better.  I made a few really good bottles and was OK with my output considering how tired I felt.  Mia had a pretty good morning and mostly we just giggled at each other over things that weren't funny at all.  

After lunch (where I ate mushroom pie and laid in bed) I went to the cold shop.  Rebecca and Tove said I should pick out a pattern from the book that I want to do and they would help me get there instead of doing each tedious exercise in the book.  I found one that combines the deep cutting and flower cutting.  So, today I practiced making deep cuts on a curve! It was so hard.  I got a little discouraged and then reminded myself that its pretty hard to draw a nice curve (like eye shape) on a glass bowl much less do it with a crazy grinding wheel! Then I felt better and made some very pretty curves.  Then I was done with the curves I added a star in the bottom (tres hard) and some dots to make it pretty.  I have decided to call this my Crown Pattern:

I don't really know why now that I am looking back on it... 

I guess I thought the dots on top of the 3 straight lines looked like a cartoon crown... sort of...

Tomorrow I will practice on the pattern I picked out.  Tove will be around and be able to give me some insider tips on making it easier.  Rebecca and I today just kind of winged it with the curves... I think they turned out pretty damn good though!  While we working on which grinding wheel to use Rebecca told me that Stig-Allen said that I was a really great student and they need more students like Theresa! I can't believe it! It made me really happy, I kind of thought Stig-Allen thought I was a little bit of an idiot... not in life in general but in glass blowing at least.  But hearing that made my day get much better :) Rebecca and I also rejoiced in hanging out together, both being native English speakers!

My evening has been fairly uneventful... I finally took the shower that I meant to take this morning, went to Tempo (the grocery), ate some leftover pasta, watched bad TV and then hung out with Rosanne and Yenni and caught up on what we each did this weekend. Rosanne is thinking about moving to an apartment on the other side of Orrefors! I know Orrefors isn't that big... but it will be a lot farther when it starts to snow!!! I want her to be happy but I want her to stay close.  It is so nice to be able to just walk up stairs and hangout with her whenever.  Oh well, she hasn't decided yet.  We will see.

OH! I almost forgot to show you all the bottles I made on Friday!!!

 COLORSSSSSSSSSS!!!

 This is going to be my size reference for a while until I find a normal size match box... This is huge I know.

 This is with the coarse green pieces and then the one on the right has green and yellow powder color.

 Here is coarse blue, white and green on a round bottle and then pink power on the square bottle.

 Here is the teal that matched my shirt and then one of my favorite bottle so far with the coarse green, blue and white.  I like that the colors made it all the way to the bottom of the bottle.

Here is more coarse green.  My Sweet Briar bottle with green and pink and then the other one on the right is coarse yellow with specks of black/brown and some white.  

I need to find a normal matchbox... it really shouldn't be bigger then my bottles! Haha

OH! And I finished off the tops of some my very first bottles in the cold shop this afternoon:

 Now they all have smooth and shiny tops! I really like the tiny one still... 

  Some of them got angled tops because the bottle just felt like it should have that.  I stood around and tried to figure out the best way to hold it to pour with the shape and weight and I hope I got it right and it was a good idea... not just a lot more thought then was necessary.  I like them though :)