Just when we figured warm weather was a thing of the past, the sun came out this afternoon and the big city warmed up. Edmonton is the Festival City and this weekend two are underway. "The Fringe" began this weekend with food and frolic in the streets and plays featuring professional actors, amateur actors, wannabe actors, and "can’t" actors . It is also day two for the Blues Festival and if yesterday’s opening is any indication a good time will have been had by all by 10 o’clock tonight.
We spent some time in the studio this morning, waxing fish platters, sanding some pots, then glazing the load. As most of the pieces are double dipped we started the fans running and left the pots to dry for awhile until we can handle the glazes without them coming off on our hands. Biggest job glazing was the fish platters. They are 22 inches long and 8 inches across so don’t fit in your average garbage can/dip bucket very easily. This is where our new 44 gallon cans come in handy. With Cindy leaning the bucket over and 20 gallons or so of glaze, I am able to grab the platter with the big tongs and dip it in one fell swoop.
We came home, spent a little family time then returned to the studio a little before six and loaded the 16 cubic foot kiln for a glaze firing. We are giving it a really slow ramp up to 190 degrees (20 an hour) then holding it for 4 hours before ramping on up. This slow "candling" allows all the moisture to leave the glaze without blowing any off (in theory). We won’t know for sure how it went until sometime Monday.
Tomorrow we have a bisque kiln and another glaze load to get ready. Probably six hours or so in the studio.
Tonight I’ve been working on a new page for the How to Make Pottery Website. It is "How We Made our Display Booth for Showing Pottery". 
I am styling it the same as the "making pottery" and "packing pottery" pages. I took a lot of pictures as we were tearing down the booth at Rexall Place after the Gift Show, so it should work out good.
But, right now it’s getting late so…….
nite
Well the kids bus did come in early this morning, although not as early as scheduled. We got up at a quarter to 5 and headed downtown. Had just turned the corner when Kaileigh phoned to say an unruly passenger had delayed the bue for an hour and a bit so they weren’t going to arrive until 6:30. So…we went home and waited patiently, yeah right! Picked up the kids finally, came home, did breakfast and then everyone crashed for awhile. We went in and took care of the rice bowls. Put them in the drying racks and covered them with plastic.
Took the afternoon and unloaded the van and stored the booth in the garage. Put the seats back in the van.
This afternoon we took a little "R and R" and attended the opening of the Edmonton Blues Festival. The closing act was Koko Taylor, the Queen of the Blues.
Tonight we touched the hand of the Queen. After that there is nothing more to add.
nite