the Clay Mural... 

TOGETHER WE ARE BETTER... is the school motto... 

and our beautiful mural was a reflection of these words...

... completed in July 2013

... and will be mounted on the school wall with an unveiling on....September 2013.... 

Clay Panels completed.... another long night for my husband, Jeff, and me... but so worth it giving our attention to all of the last of the details... these will do the school proud!  Did I mention that the school logo is "Together We Are Better" there will probably be a plaque beside the mural saying that and the year that it was created.. and almost every tile has a positive word or words... JOYFUL positive time working with these wonderful young people... they were, indeed, THE BEST... love love love :)

I usually work on group murals with high school students... it makes my job so much easier... but, the real pleasure for me this time was to be a part of students so young as they vibrated in anticipation of creating this mural.  I requested that the teachers ask their students to bring special things from home... so, other than the multitude of stamps that I provided, there were legos, hearts, and quite a few medals... so that there was a part of THEM embedded in this true masterpiece... oh... what extraordinary fun creating with clay along with 600 students!

The custodian, Gerry, walked in last night as my husband and I were finishing, and said that what he finds truly amazing is that he cannot tell the difference between Kindergarten students and Grade 7's.  Yes, they all took time to think about and then create THEIR perfect tile... I am just so pleased!

Final Look before all of the LUCKY 13 panels are placed on the wall of the school... They look amazing... but... there was not enough light in the dark of the evening to truly do them justice...

Spray Glaze and Grouting... My husband working with me in the evening.. he was having to find and then re-glue many tiles  that the young ones did not get completed... he then began the painstakingly tough task of grouting between a multitude of irregular little tiles.  I was at the time, intoxicating myself on the joys of spray glaze.... but out on the porch.  I was, however, able to take some amazing photographs of these fabulous tiles in the light of the setting sun.. simply beautiful depth of colour... click on them to enlarge and have a look! :)

Gotta LOVE this age group... they scrub everything up and smile while doing it... FABULOUS students that I was working with... just LOVE the whole school!!!!  Lucky ME!

Gluing next .... BIG job... attention to detail is so important ... and these wonderful young people really worked and tried...

We then gave ever tile individual loving attention ... giving each one a bit of colour... making sure that the positive words that we stamped into the clay could be clearly read.... this was time intensive... much work... a multitude of students and then countless hours of tweeking so that colours blended and words were clear... but.. well worth all of the attention to detail...

... and then we added the next layer.. copper ... but only on the top ... leaving the black stamped indentations alone... or... so we TRIED to do... lol