Gnome Sweet Gnome

Last weekend I went home to visit my mom for her birthday. I hadn't been home in almost a year so I figured I was way over due. Home for me is Moses Lake, Washington, a small rural town in eastern WA or as I like to refer to as the pit stop between Seattle and Spokane. A lot has changed since I moved away from there almost 14 years ago. Bunch of new housing developments, home improvement chain stores are coming in, and sadly the only real place to go for anything anymore is Walmart for your basic everyday needs. Don't worry though, I believe there are 3 Starbucks locations in a town of less than 20,000 so lack of caffeine is not a problem in this rural farm town.

Despite all these changes that make Moses Lake home for me it is fun to see the new mom and pop shops that open up from time to time in the downtown area. Usually I don't venture in to town too often while I'm there because I'm hanging out with mom or catching up with old friends, but this time mom thought it would be fun to do something for her birthday. We went to Art Garden Pottery, looked around their cute gift shop and did some ceramic painting. Mom chose a plate and I a gnome.

Here he is all fresh and white. You can see mom's plate in the background.

Started him off with a nice red coat. Mom was using a stencil on her plate.

Gave him some blue pants, black belt and some detail to his beard.

Painted his hands and face a flesh color, green hat and yellow boots.

 

 

 

 

Then finished him off with some polka dots on his hat and boots and a bit of rouge on his cheeks.

Once he gets fired all of the colors will be vibrant. She had samples there of all the colors and what they looked like after firing so you knew how they were going to look. I was glad she had the samples otherwise I would have been really disappointed.

Don't have him back yet as she said it would take a week or so. I told my mom when she went to go pick them up she needed to take a picture of him and send it to me so I could see how he turned out. I'm very excited to see the colors come to life! My plan is to stick him outside on my patio to keep watch of those slimy slugs and snails that keep eating my plants! Grumble, grumble, grumble. I will post the finished product as soon as I can.

If you are in the area I encourage you to stop by and check them  out. Have a girls day painting some pottery or buy one of their cute little garden creatures. They also have various art classes available. You can find them online at http://www.artgardenpottery.com/.