OK, a few changes

I love new things, don't you?
Even if they are recycled.  After all, that's when you realize something's usefulness has not really expired.
So I'm changing the format a bit here on the blog today.

I hope this is pleasing to you.  It is to me.

Oh, and here are wishes for a happy, prosperous, love-filled, peaceful and healthy 2017!

Quote for today:

Reverence the highest, have patience with the lowest. Let this day's performance of the meanest duty be thy religion. Are the stars too distant, pick up the pebble that lies at thy feet, and from it learn the all.

Margaret Fuller

Who's reading my blog?

Fun numbers...I have a Russian following apparently. And then French.
Finally a few folks from America.

These are the stats:

Russia  787

	France - 456 United States 341 China 28 United Kingdom 21 Ukraine 21 Canada 18 Poland 7 Portugal 6 Spain 5

Ha! After I wrote this draft, a few days later, France became my biggest "pageviewer" Wonder what in the world this is all about!

 If you're a blogger, you might check who's reading your blog these days. I sure as heck don't know a soul in Russia, or France.
 I even sent feedback to Blogger (whoever the Google Dungeon Master might be) And recently instead of the 56 followers I know of, I've had some blogs with 150 people looking at them within an hour. Not likely live people! I just don't have anything that interesting to say. So was I hacked? I keep changing my passwords frequently. And I don't really have access to any amount of riches. So what are they doing? Browsing just for the fun of it?

Any suggestions would be welcomed.

I don't know how to say that in Russian, or even French.  But I'm sure it's translatable.

Today's quote:

To be astonished is one of the surest ways of not growing old too quickly.

Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette
Quoted in Age Doesn't Matter Unless You're a Cheese, by Kathryn and Ross Petras

And to share another venue, here's a link to Open Culture, which I receive as a newsletter in email daily.  The other day they showed animations of poetry...which Garrison Keilor is instrumental in providing!

Chapter two - While they are closed

Another lovely teapot by a young adult clay student.

I keep saying adult students from the Clay Studio. because even at my age, I think of children when I hear the word student.  Many of these students have occupations (including attorneys, doctors, nurses, teachers etc.) and many are retired.

 Independent Student status means that some of us have enough knowledge to create on our own, without taking a scheduled class.  However, clay work is an ongoing learning experience, as any potter will acknowledge.

I'll share a few more pictures this week.  Don't forget to come see these beauties in person when the Black Mountain Center for the Arts opens again on Jan 3, 2017.
Got to practice typing 2017! 2017...

Today's quote:

I swear I will not dishonor my soul with hatred, but offer myself humbly as a guardian of nature, as a healer of misery, as a messenger of wonder, as an architect of peace. - Diane Ackerman

Let the light return!

Only 2 days since the Solstice, and I was thrilled to greet the dawn the other day!

Today's Quote:

Any human who feels that he or she is not "good enough" to cultivate peace and generosity is overlooking the wondrous gift of life. You live, therefore you are good enough.

Dhyani Ywahoo
Voices of Our Ancestors