Broke in Tiny Pieces

Leaf Panel

2009-10-18T17:37:00.001-07:00

80th Birthday Present for Dad

Got back from Serbia with just enough time to put this panel together for my father's 80th birthday. Made to go over his bed. It's a combination of handmade ceramic leaves, with ceramic tile and sici tiles on the border. Panel is four feet long. Framed at Mission Gallery in San Juan Bautista.

Flower Pot for Andrea

2009-02-13T21:52:00.000-08:00

Flower pot: Terra Cotta pot made by glazing rim in kiln and then outfitting with lots of colorful handmade ceramic tiles and bits and pieces. Ungrouted in these photos. Donnated to Andrea Currie to be used as an award for artists participating on the design challenge posed by her web site www. We The Paper.com

As Summer Winds Down

2008-08-16T07:57:00.000-07:00

Ramon and I returned from Spanish Market in Santa Fe at the end of July, with a few new pieces of Spanish Colonial Art to add to our collection.I got up at 5am, grabbed a cup of coffee and stood outside in the rain until the 8am opening of Spanish Market in order to be the first one one in line to purchase Nick Otero's prize winning retablo. The large retablo and the small altar box, both of which won first prize in their categories, now reside in the Nunez home. We were concerned that we might be competing against a museum for these pieces, as last year while we were in Spain, and unbeknownst to us, Nick's work swept the market awards.

We brought home a small retablo by Catherine Robles Shaw, whose work we like to collect

and Laurie Garcia. This is Santo Nino de Atocha, one of Ramon's Mom's favorite saints. And then something new for us. Ramon fell in love with this chest, which won second place in the traditional furniture division. The curator of the Mexican Cultural Museum in Albuquerque later told us that she had wanted to purchase this piece for the museum. Felt bad for the artist, because it would have been better for him to have his piece with the museum, but I'm thrilled it will be living with us.The chest is a magnificent piece, all hand carved. The blacksmith who did the hinges and lock is an award winning ironsmith at Spanish Market whose work we have always admired. The end of the key that fits into this chest is formed of his initials. As this was something we couldn't exactly take home on the plane, it is being shipped to us and should arrive sometime next week.
Back home, we spent the first week in August tearing out all our carpet, and moving furniture--getting a little old for this kind of work!

Then Ramon totally demolished and painted our master bedroom closet. We were never too fond of its layout. Lots of trips to the Goodwill and the dump in this process! Look mom, our closet is really clean now!In mid July, the wood for our new floors was delivered in order to aclimatize to the house environment. So we have had piles of wood sitting around in all the rooms for the past four weeks. Just before the wood delivery, I re-painted the walls in this room terra cotta, to better go with the new fireplace tiles, but missed the turquoise walls that I'd originally fauxed there. So....I decided to paint our study turquoise, which at the moment, looks like the Bahama room as it is just flat paint color and still needs to be fauxed to look old. Took me two days to paint this room by myself while Ramon was on a business trip. That's my massive treadmill in the up position.I'm beginning to miss my playtime down at the studio, as it would appear that I am back to my temporary incarnation as a professional painter---who did I get this from???? As if painting the studio weren't enough, I then decided to faux Marisa's old bedroom before they started the floors. No problem, I said to myself. I can do that room in a couple of days also. Which is either outrageous self-esteem or simply delusions of grandeur, depending on how you look at it. Six full days of rubbing three colors on the wall with cheese cloth in order to make the walls look like suede. Ugh! Who else is crazy enough to spend nearly a week of their life painting a bedroom?????? Michaelangelita. I hate faux painting, unfortunately, I love the end result. Thank goodness for audio books that's all I have to say.

And so the big moment we've been waiting for. Ta Da!! The floors are starting to go down, and most likely will be a good 3-4 weeks to complete. We are using hickory which has be hand scraped and distressed to look very old. Boards are 3/4" X 7" wide and some are up to 12 feet in length. Heavy! All solid wood, but prefinished, so only touch up will be neccesary at the end. Makes the house look so much richer. We will need a few more area rugs when all is finished. Ramon is suggesting another trip to India to bring back more rugs, but I think that's rather unlikely for this unfrequent flyer. ha ha

And last, but not least, Marisa gave up playing poodle beautician and took Lola to the groomers, to get Lola's ears dyed really red. She needs to do her tail the next time for symetry. Looking at this dog is pretty hysterical, so I just had to share.

Project Frida

2008-07-15T20:16:00.000-07:00

Goal project for this year-- a large Frida retablo for my bathroom. (Don't laugh, I've had some sort of Frida shrine in a bathroom of one house or another for more than 15 years--much to the distress of my kids, who used to be embarrassed when people came out wondering why I had the weird pictures of that woman and the collection of the little skeletons in a glass case over the toilet. My oldest son thought this shrine must be somewhat disquieting to visitors. (well....yes...) The only good thing about my dusty little collection of Frida "cochinadas" nowadays is that I no longer have to explain to people who that woman with the weird eyebrows is. Kinda sad actually. I liked it when I felt she was my secret, now she's the world's. Ah well... She's still my girl and I'm excited about updating the glass case in my bathroom with something that shows off a little of both of us.

So this is what my Frida retablo looks like at the moment. Sitting on my half of one of our studio desks.. and I actually cleaned it up a bit for this photo. Looks messy I know, but I'm thinking creative chaos. Things are obviously stewing here. A slow simmer for months and months. The basic wood retablo is cut (although not exactly obvious in construction here. Looks like one long rectangle, but it really has two levels and an arched top. And this is where everything "Frida" gets thrown at the moment, with the exception of the many photos I want to incorporate...they are safe in my drawer. OOps, the little froggie tile on the right bottom corner won't be on this piece. Frida preferred monkeys, cats and parrots....will have to see how good I am at sculpting one of those? Played around with making a flat tile inspired by one of her pictures called, "The Broken Column." But seems kind of boring. Besides this baby needs to be vibrantly colored!

Did a 3D version of that picture including the nails (this piece is yet to be glazed...or might use oxides??)

Lots of little handmade tiles both glass and ceramic (thinking about how Laurie Mika's puts together her work here-- but forget the plastic looking polymer clay. I'm a ceramic girl.) A page from Frida's journal I will put under glass. Want to use lots of text throughout this piece--words in clay, words in beads, words under glass. Her words...commentary about her work. Commentary about Frida's commercialization/ iconization.

Here's a beaded pin someone made, and I just had to buy. Love multimedia.! This artist's work will now become part of mine.

And this is the top of the retablo. In classic form, only made from ceramic instead of carved in wood. Ceramics here are in bisqued state. Sacred Heart has a banner that reads "Viva La Vida" the last words Frida painted on one of her last still lifes before she died. Long Live Life! Now just need to get brave and commit to colors, then glaze and refire them.

Love the tiny Mexican lottery cards pertinent to Frida like the deer (bottom right corner, and the corazon and the skeleton made and under glass. How to put this baby together and call it art? That's the delicious (scary) part. Had wanted to wait until I got to go to see the Frida's exhibit at the San Franciso MOMA before I started on this adventure. Saw it last Friday..amazing....finishing my sculpture class at UC Berkeley next week, time to get to work.

June Projects

2008-06-08T18:09:00.000-07:00

Hurray! Ramon finished the new cabinets for the studio over the weekend I was in Fort Collins. He decided to forego hiring our carpenter and invest the money doing so would have cost him in purchasing a new set of tools and doing the job himself. This proved to be a smart decision. His shelves are everybit as well constructed and he is now the proud owner of a fine new skill saw and nail gun. It took a few coats of paint, but at last the job is done and all the goodies laying around on other surfaces of the studio can be brought back and put into some sort of organization on the shelves. Still need to refinish the concrete floor and put in the moldings. But that is a job for another day.

Marisa has left for a week's vacation with family in Southern California, wish I could say she took her crazy dog, Lola with her, but I'm babysitting. (Personally, I think Lola is Schizophrenic, she makes my childhood dog, Muffin, look like Lassie in comparison.) As you can see in the above photo, last month Lola had fading green colored ears. This month, she has her ears dyed red. (Evan says Lola now looks like one of the "Fraggle Rock" puppets from the childhood program the kids used to watch. I believe he's on to something here.) Is Marisa practicing to become a hairdresser to the dogs? She keeps threatening to dye Ripley's ears. Heaven forbid! Anyhow, while the mouse is away, I am busy trying to pique-assiette an early birthday present--a head board for her queensize bed. The frame is another creation by hubby, who is enjoying using his new toys, I mean tools. I have been collecting china for the past month to complete this project, in addition to a few ceramic pieces I made in the kiln. Still in the process of buying and putting together all the "shabby-chic" linens for the bedding-- going for that cottage look. Here's a peek at the main comforter.
Ramon took Marisa's chest of drawers, and bedside tables outside, sanded and primed them, and then used the paint sprayer to refinish them in the same white I've painted the bed frame. A considerable project for a Sunday. Decided to start with a pink and white heart in the middle. The pink ceramic arch says, "Paths are made by dreaming," which is a line from a poem I like. Finished the heart on Friday. (Took yesterday off to make 27 half-pints and 10 whole pints of my infamous pluot jam. This took a good 15 pounds of sugar and most all of the day to accomplish!) Here's the heart finished before I surrounded it with glass beads and miliflori. In the lower right corner it says, "To My Darling Daughter 2008," using alphabet beads.
As of Sunday evening, I've got a portion of it filled in, but still a long, long way to go. Thank goodness for books on tape. (Marisa gets back in a week and I need to have everything done and put together so that when she walks in her room, Voila! Instant makeover. I'm a nice mommie for doing her bedroom, but I'm going to deserve some kind of serious award for taking care of her neurotic dog!!!

Grouted with Teacups and all.Finshed product.Happy daughter!

Florists for a Day

2008-05-18T08:06:00.000-07:00

It's Saturday morning and we've turned the kitchen into a floral shop to make the flower arrangements for Katiana's graduation party this evening. Jan's arrived bearing Starbucks coffee and our favorite scones for breakfast. It's another scorcher of a day and we're out harvesting roses before the serious heat kicks in. Jan dropped by our local farmers market to pick up pink larkspur and hydrangea, stawflowers, white and pink sweet peas, tiny mauve edged calla lilies, and greenery. A stunning combination with the roses. And so we spend the first half of the day, listening to music and happily playing florist with flowers strewn everywhere. (God bless Ramon who was the one man clean-up brigade.) Brent came over with the Surbuban and Jan, Ramon and I piled in to transport the finished centerpieces to the party destination--not an easy task to keep the vases from spilling on the drive down our hill and up our neighbor's steeper hill where the party was held. In total we made four large focal-point arrangements, five medium sized ones for individual tables, filled a dozen of Jan's tiny mini-vases full of rosebuds, sweet peas, and love-in-a mist, and completed some twelve nosegays to lay here and there on tables. Looked like we were staging a wedding--of course, I am of the opinion that all the big events we've done flowers for in the past several years are just practice sessions for our daughter's future weddings. A few more big parties and we ought to be real professionals by then!

Turkey Mornings

2008-05-16T05:54:00.000-07:00

Mid May and the mating season for wild turkeys is in full swing. Their gobbles reverberate in the early morning air while I'm out watering. Like most of the animals around here, they seem to be creatures of habit, every morning they come down from the hills and strut across our road to put on their show of tease and pursue. I took wonderful shots of the males fighting yesterday, but unfortunately, my skill behind the digital camera is not the best when it comes to live action shots, and the photos came out blurred. We are in the middle of a record breaking heat spell for May. It's been in the high ninety's for the past two days which reeks havoc on the garden. My icebergs are melting! On days such as these, I am out for a good two hours hand watering the landscape, in addition to the water the drip system normally provides, just to keep all my pretties from burning up. Tomorrow, Jan and I have plans to harvest armfuls of roses to use in arrangements at her daughter's graduation party in the evening, so the heatwave has come at an an inopportune time. Still, I think we will manage to come up with enough roses for a few bouquets. Here's my hedge of iceburg roses under the living room window and down the garden path.

Looking down that path in the opposite direction, you will notice the pluot tree ( a 75% plum and 25% apricot hybrid) is bending like an umbrella. I've thinned it twice and it's still hanging heavy with green globes of fruit. What a harvest of pluots, plums, apricots and apriums we will have this year! A branch on the pluot tree, ripening its way to becoming the best homemade preserves in the world.

Ready for Auction

2008-05-08T15:27:00.000-07:00

Grouted and planted with Gerber Daisies. Ready for Saturday's Mother's day Dinner and silent auction. (Update: flower pot sold for $100 at silent auction. Yipee!)

Pi Kappa Alpha Mother's Day Auction

2008-05-04T17:27:00.001-07:00

Next weekend we are off to California Polytechnic University in San Luis Obispo, to see Austin and attend his fraternity's Mother's Day Dinner. Every May the PIKE fraternity throws a dinner party for us moms and holds a silent auction to raise money. Families are asked to donate an item to the auction. This will be the second year I bring a mosaic, which for some reason doesn't do as well as the sports tickets, or the lifetime supply of golf balls. Those manly items that speak to all the fraternal testosterone in the room. No doubt, it will be the second year I buy my own piece back--well, I might as well buy something I like. Fortunately, I've gotten smarter this year. I'm making something much less time consuming: The old standard Italian terra-cotta pot from Home Depot.

A few brightly colored tiles, glazed and ready

for firing in the kiln.

Twenty-four hours later, out of the oven, fresh baked: Calla lillies. Some of the larger flowers I've made for the 3-D mural I'm working on in the atrium. (This photo looks fancy because it's for the studio blog... )

and these little gems.

The pot perks up a bit after a glaze is put on the rim, and it too is fired in the kiln.

Then the fun part begins. I put on the tiles and fill in with little bits and pieces of colorful tesserae.

And when I'm finished gluing everything on in a couple of hours...

Tomorrow is grout day, and I'm off to the nursery to buy some pretties to plant inside.

And no Mom, you can't bid on it because I can't mail a potted plant with flowers to Colorado. Not your colors anyway.

A Little Tour Through My Garden

2008-04-30T11:24:00.000-07:00

There are many lovely places in the world, but no where quite as lovely to put down roots than this hillside in Northern California. Ten years ago, Ramon and I began creating this garden which started with clearing and terracing a good acre of hillside. Every plant, every tree, every sprinkler, and most all of the hardscape is the work of our hands. You could say we are connected to the land in a deep way--our souls are planted here.

George Bernard Shaw once said, "The best place to seek God is in the garden." I have found this is to be true. I have sat in many magnificient churches throughout the world, and relished the religious iconography within them, but I find these places serve more as reminders. They point to the face of God and seek to instill within us a sense of the sacred.

But a garden is the living, breathing handiwork of the Creator. A reflection of that glorious first garden. Eden. The home in which God placed man and walked with him among the trees. His essence lingers...

I've been tending one garden or other almost all of my adult life. This one has been under my care the longest, which no doubt makes me partial. Especially come spring time when everything is green and glorious over abundance. Sadly, few of the people I love, and long to share it with live close enough to see it in April, at it's jubilant peak. Were I inclined to joining social organizations, I could be a real show-off. A stellar member of the local rose association. There's a good one hundred and twenty of those large, thorny bushes out back that I'm going to be dead-heading real soon. As it is, I rather like it being a secret garden. Just me and the Great I Am--and the dogs, and the cats, and the chickens.

I could share little peak...

Outside the kitchen door sits Miss Knock Out, not a great rose for cutting, but nothing less than floriferous. She will look this dazzling well into December.

So will "Betty Boop" just down the walkway. She is in the fore-ground of my view from the kitchen sink. That's why I planted her there. Full time entertainment while doing dishes.

Out front, the very first sign of spring, a purple leaf, artifcial plum tree bursts into bloom...

Followed by the crab apples in white and pink, and the field of daisies which have naturalized down the slopes...

The first rose to bloom in the spring is an old China tea rose on the trellis next to...

the magnificiently perfumed wisteria.
A Bridal Wreath Spirea walks down the isle....
"Buff Beauty" and...

"Raspberries and Cream" look delicious draped over the fence of the dog-run.

And one of these days, I'm going to figure out Clematis classifications

so I can prune them correctly.

Altissimo bears five inch wide, single petals of Chinese laquer red

and has clumps of orange and cherry Watsonia nestled at her feet.

Mr. Graham Thomas, a well known David Austin rose...

looks stately in front of the green house.

The wickedly, prickly Pride of Madera over looks the sheep pasture below.

And everwhere in the garden, more clumps of Watsonia--bulbs that multiply so fast, I divide them year after year in little groupings and tuck them here and there for special effect.

Orange poppies and purple Ceanothus--a striking color combination on the slope. More daisies naturalized in the background. A mess to clean up after their lovely, short-lived show.

Dreamweaver on the trellis, next to the green house appears a little sparse this year.

Brown iris under a brown leafed crabapple tree, my favorite.

And up and down a walkway, one of many ruffled ladies...

And what would any garden be without Peace (Chicago) and creamy colored foxgloves...

or Golden wings?

Shot Silk is a rare treat...

And somewhere in the jungle, there's a monsterous African Honey bush in bloom. Obtained this plant as a teeny specimen one year at the San Francisco Flower and Garden show.

Here's Miss Flutterbye, a saucy little red-tipped bud when first in bloom...

which opens to a single petal yellow rose, paling softly over time.

And Miss Brunner. Cecile is the sweetest, tiniest little rose, with a delicate, peppery smell. She graces us only once a year with her presence, but her appearance is always memorable.

Here she is with her fluffy buds open in the morning sun...

And there in the background, next to her friend on the left, the gorgeously droopy, Victorian rose, Eden, who makes incredible bouquets, lasting a good week in a vase.

But you really must see all ten feet high and wide of Cecile spilling over the chain link fence to truly appreciate her. I'm fond of this rose called, Living Easy...

she sits next to a similar beauty, whose name, for the life of me, I can't remember.

And all of my orange roses grow under a small Gage plum tree, so full of tiny fruit at the moment, the birds are going to have an easy feast in a few weeks.

"Robusta" aptly named for a rapidly growing Rugosa rose. Mom gave me one of the specimens I have for Mothers Day, the other two were easily propagated by runners.

Aloe Vera-- If ever a plant hailed from outer space, this one does.

Looking down on one of the terraces in the back of the house...

And over the front driveway, with one of it's massive western Poplar trees...

At the end of April, the grasses on the hills are beginning to turn golden, but the pond is still full and visited by all manner of wild creatures. And goodness knows, I have lots of weeds to pull!

Mosaics Around Mirasol Ranch

2008-04-16T07:48:00.001-07:00

Mosaic garden bench using sandstone in front of house.

Lizard mosaic to side of bench.

Some early mosaic efforts when my pallette was limited to the few tiles I could purchase at home depot. Little did I know where this would lead me years later...a large art studio with ceramic and glass kilns. Difficult today to see so many large architectural pieces around the ranch representing my Freshman efforts, but then, I'm always enthusiastic about whatever I'm undertaking regardless the stage of my development.

Pillar to side of goat pen.

Mailbox

Address marker

Mirasol Monument fountain at summit of our long driveway.

Patio Table

Mosaicing the Curtains

2008-04-04T07:34:00.000-07:00

Paint the walls a golden color.

Fill the house with Spanish Colonial art from your yearly trip to Spanish Market in Santa Fe-- santos, retablos, ex votos.

Splash the radiant colors of Mexico around the room.

Toss out the old curtains in the music room.

And mosaic new ones
over windows...

over sliding glass doors...

over a valance in the bedroom...

Learning the Hard Way

2008-04-01T08:57:00.001-07:00

I have a tendency to dive into things headfirst with extremes of enthusiasm. No dangling a toe in the water to test the temperature first. This often means learning the hard way and making mistakes that could have been avoided had I a bit more method to my madness--like taking time for more thorough, up-front research. Normally, I am a real P.I. when the need to know presents itself. No, my problem typically arises from a joyous desire, buoyed by self-delusional confidence (how hard can it be?), to leap first and figure out exactly where I'm landing later. My garden bench, which by shear luck was built on the appropriate substrate with the right adhesive, should be part of the landscape long after I'm gone, when the house has decayed, and the weeds reclaimed the land. My attempt to add a bit of color to my Dream Weaver rose trellis didn't fair as well. About the time I finished the bench, I got it into my mind that the trellis could use some sprucing up. So, one fine summer day, I got out the thinset, piled my goodies on the ground, sat down, and went to work laying tesserae directly on the surface of the wood. Pleased with the end result, it wasn't until months later, after accumulating more mosaic books and subsequent knowledge, that I realized I was likely in for disaster.

Mosaicing to a wood substrate meant for outside use or display, even when properly primed with Kilnz or bonderizer, is asking for trouble. Amazingly enough, for several years, both sides of the trellis looked lovely in our garden. I got to thinking perhaps I was going to be lucky, maybe even beat the odds, but seasons passed and tiny cracks began forming. Then one winter day, after a particularly rare stretch of freezing nights, I walked outside to discover the tragic crash. All those hours of work back to pieces on the ground.

A stepping stone I made for my mother's Colorado garden suffered a similar fate thanks to the elements. The cement stone was a good surface choice, but the Mastic adhesive I decided to try (never appropriate for outdoor applications), deteriorated from the moisture and cold, and the tiles have popped off over the years.

Substrate preparation is critical to any mosaic's longevity. First and foremost rule for mosaics in the garden--adhere tesserae to a cement surface using cement based adhesives, thinset or mortar. Do it differently, and be prepared for tears when time and temperature teach you a lesson the hard way.

Evolving Passions

2008-03-30T12:46:00.000-07:00

Where do passions begin?

I am a gardener. As far as I can tell, this is a genetic proclivity on the maternal side of my family tree. A line of women who take pleasure in planting and tending and witnessing the miracle of nature unfold. That magic captured me as a child, watching my mother in the garden. Who else would take fourteen tiny sticks, plop them in the brown dirt every three feet apart on either side of the long walkway to our front door and say, "Voila! Roses!" Almost laughable to begin with, but the resulting transformation... that incredible "before and after picture," imprinted on my childhood imagination. Those roses and I grew up together. While I'd roller skate on the sidewalks around our neighborhood, skating up and down that walkway with my best friend Kari, pretending we were Olympic figure skaters, those pitiful-looking "pencils with thorns" were becoming huge magnificent rose bushes with big velvety blossoms. Eye candy with a heavenly fragrance that colored my childhood.

For someone who enjoys having her hands in the warm body of Mother earth, and has the fingernails to prove it, I've been lucky to create a number of different gardens over twenty-five years of married life. Certainly, it wasn't the fact that we ever out-grew a house that played into Ramon and I moving so often. More likely, it was the realization that shortly after we had our small postage-stamp-sized California yard landscaped and grown to young adulthood, we found our "project oriented" selves hankering for more land or "re-modeling" what we'd already created.

In 1996, we solved our "running out of space to garden" problem permanently. Today our corner of Eden sits on the sun-soaked eastern foothills of Morgan Hill: twenty six acres of rolling hillside dotted with California oaks, overlooking a valley that was once noted for its miles and miles of fruit orchards. For years after building this house, my artistic energies were focused on raising my three adolescent children and transforming the wild hillside into an abundance of gardens with my favorite flowers and trees. I was passionate collector of plants until my burgeoning creation started demanding so much time in maintenance and upkeep, I found myself having to consciously decide whether or not that one more gorgeous rose I coveted, was worth adding the the hundred or so I already had to cut back in the late fall. Curtailing my trips to the nursery, I found myself beginning to decorate the garden with the usual objects d'arte -- little bird houses, Victorian glazing balls, tiny colorful ceramic mushrooms tucked underneath the roses here and there. Then fairies started appearing, as fairies are prone to do once friends and family are aware you have a "thing" about fairies. And while there's always a danger of the environment becoming overly kitschy--one doesn't want Tinkerbell to detract from the delphiniums after all--our garden is filled with the little creatures, both real and man-made variety.

About six years ago, influenced by the growing number of mosaic pieces I was seeing in garden centers and nurseries, I decided to try my hand at making a small birdbath using a large terra cotta saucer and pot turned upside down as a base. Off to the big boy's toy store for a few necessities: tiles, adhesive and grout. Days later, hammer in hand, I was pleased with my completed project and pondering about what I might do for the next. Not one to start small, or practice a bit more first, I commissioned my husband to build a bench out of cinder block and hardibacker under the old oak tree beside our bedroom. Being the hardscape specialist in the family, Ramon readily assumed the task and wedged the whole thing quite neatly between two large boulders, even sloped to put a drain in the corner so that rainwater wouldn't pool on top of the bench in the winter.

Collecting tiles and collecting plants must stimulate the same pleasure centers in the brain. Back then, Fireclay Tile in San Jose used to let you go into their over runs and extra yard and purchase small boxes of broken or crazed tile for $15.00 a box. This was helpful, but left me limited in color palette so I twisted my husband's arm and made an investment in a delicious variety of colorful tiles through the local the tile store. As with so many of my projects, I figured I would have that old bench whipped out in no time.

Well...not when your only tool is a hammer and you're trying to use it to meticulously crack tiles in shards that will fit together like perfect puzzle pieces. I'm embarassed to admit a good deal of this bench was done in the hammer only method, and I hate to think how many hours of my life this involved. Fortunately, by the time I got to the flowers on the seat, I had discovered a wide variety of tile nippers and was delighted to finally have control of the shapes I wanted to create. How many months I worked to finish this bench? Bench? Really? More like the stair step to a rabbit hole I fell down and oh, the adventures I've been on since...