Energy Xchange and Spring cometh

Here are some crafts-people at work, some cows doing what they do best, and some flowers and buds saying it's spring at different elevations here in Western NC.

Ian Kessler-Gowell gave us senior visitors a great demo of glass blowing...

Including the full process from beginning to breaking...unfortunately. It was a nice piece until he clipped it from the "stick that you blow through" which must have a name...and it tilted and he was actually juggling it but made sure not to use his hands, just his tools...and then it didn't bounce when it hit the concrete...and some of the shards hit one of the women's suede boots which started to smoke...but she shook them off!

In the pottery studio... are some of the pottery pieces by Ross Edwards, who wasn't there last Fri. when we toured. He uses plaster molds to make similar shaped pieces. The glass furnaces and the glaze kiln are run totally on the methane recovered from the 9 acre landfill near Burnsville...a great model of using the unrecovered gas that exists abundantly in all our landfills!

This is the early spring look that I have around my home...just the beginning of red maples giving a little color last week.

And our local forsythia was just beginning to blossom at the elevation where I live.

On Hwy 80 north leaving Burnsville, we found some lovely white cows, which apparently are special to someone! They seemed pretty placid!

Here Lindsay Rogers (no relation that I know of) is making handles for some mugs in her studio area. There are other potters and another glass blower in the 2 studios.

I ran out of juice in my camera batteries, so didn't get pics of the fish and aquaculture gardens, nor the little gallery.

In Burnsville there was a dogwood (I think) just about to burst.

This daffodil lives by Lake Tomahawk in Black Mountain, where the warm water and the sun have pushed spring to already be there.

While in my yard, I think these little guys may be some mini-daffodils. They may never open, since we've had some freezing nights lately.

We were glad to eat inside rather than on the patio at the Garden Deli in Burnsville. The bright sun didn't quite warm up the cold mountain air.

These lovely quilt squares hang in various areas throughout Burnsville.

And this lovely trump l'oeil mural is right on the square in the middle of town. We all admired it... "We" being the 15 folks who visited Burnsville and the Energy Xchange with the Black Mountain recreaction deptartment "van clan". Thanks for doing the driving, Renee!

We drove around the square, seeing the court house, some offices and shops, and the lovely historic hotel "New Wray" for which I still have trouble remembering the name.

Today (Sat) I went with some other women from my church to join the women of the UU Church of Asheville for a lovely breakfast/brunch. I met a nice woman who works with International Link and I volunteered to help teach some people English as a second language. So I'll be going to a mini-training for their programs in a week or so. It was great to finally get to see the Asheville church, and meet some of the women from it. I have been somewhat shy of walking into such a big church, after becoming so comfortable with the little one here in Black Mountain. But now I won't feel so lost.

The other big event this week was receiving a picture from my sister of herself and her new kitten. I was so glad that she felt like sending it, but I must say I thought she was clinging to what she looked like in her 30's...rather than growing into her age gracefully. But it was just one picture. Maybe she doesn't wear all that makeup every day. For me, comfort takes the first choice in my looks.

comments are welcome! If you can't post them here, write me at goddessinclay@gmail.com.