I am so excited to publish this new website! I have worked so hard to get here. After taking 35-years off from making pottery, this is a dream come true! I loved being a potter when I was young, but due to two major car accidents and a lot of injuries, I had to give it up for a long period of time. I have had a pretty unusual life throughout these years, though. My husband, Randy, and I have been teaching wilderness survival and climbing/rescue courses since 1978.
We live in southwest Colorado in the wonderful little town of Montrose. We came here in 1978 to start this crazy business because the Western Slope of Colorado would be the perfect place to do it. Montrose is a hub for even smaller towns, and it is centered in the middle of extremely diverse terrain. To the south are the San Juan Mountains with majestic 11,000-14,000 ft. peaks. To the west is the Uncompahgre Plateau, a sprawling mesa filled with sage, pinion pines, juniper trees and aspens. The Plateau rises from 4,600 feet (1,400 m) at Gateway to over 10,300 feet (3,100 m) at the top of Horsefly Peak. To the east is the dramatic Black Canyon of the Gunnison (River). One of the deepest canyons in the U.S., it reaches a depth of 3,280 feet (1,000 meters). The Painted Wall is the highest cliff in Colorado. From river to rim it stands 2250 feet (685 meters). To the north is the Grand Mesa. With an elevation of 11,332 ft., the Grand Mesa is a large mesa in western Colorado. It is the largest flat-topped mountain in the world. It has an area of about 500 square miles.
I’ll write a lot more about all of this later, but we are still teaching these courses. We went from sort of an OUTWARD BOUND-type format to, now, doing mostly contract work with industry. Our company is Enviro-Tech International, or ETI.
I have also been a substitute teacher at Montrose High School, Columbine Middle School and Centennial Middle School for 15 years. I absolutely LOVE subbing! Lots to write about later. It was while subbing for Ceramics classes, in December of 2017, that I thought I would just give it a try. I sat down on that wheel and proved to myself that “I still had it” and I decided that I needed to dive back into throwing pots again, and I haven’t taken a break since!
I will add many recipes and give information on baking and cooking healthy food, in the RECIPES AND TIPS part of this website. Stay tuned…