13 years and counting

Joey and I celebrated out 10th anniversary this weekend. We had a wonderful weekend just the two of us eating great food, enjoying the city, taking in a low-budget play and just being with each other with no computers, clay demands, kid issues or house chores anywhere around us for about 24 hours.

Joey and I dated for 3 years before we were married. In fact, when I got back from my concentration at Penland, Joey said to me, "I think we should get married". I guess absence does make the heart grow fonder and we went looking for a ring and set the date.

One evening when I was at that concentration a man by the name of Paulus Berensohn ,who has a long history at Penland, came and read some poems to the students. I can't say that I have ever really cared for poetry but one poem he read caught my attention and I found myself tracking him down those weeks to see if he would make me a copy of it. I guess at the time I was missing Joey and this poem just reminded me of him. Incidentally, Paulus has a wonderful book called Finding One's Way with Clay and it is a great book about pinch pots and how to give those vessels back to the earth after you have created them.

Joey and I used the poem on the last page of our wedding program and I keep this copy that Paulus wrote for me in the back of our wedding album.

Tomorrow I'll be back in my clay studio. I'm trying some new porcelain! Exciting stuff.......

Friday

Thanks everyone for all your great comments about that topic I put up earlier this week. It was also nice to see some new folks check in with some comments! The blog is such a wonderful way to get some great feedback and discussions going on topics we can all relate to. Food for thought this morning as I eat my oatmeal and have a good cup of coffee to get me moving.

I'm heading into Charlotte today to drop off some pots and then back around to Gastonia to put up the kids and head to a violin lessons.

I hope everyone has a good Friday.

Reflecting

When you've been making and selling pots for awhile you never get past the point of over thinking what your doing right or wrong. Maybe this is just true of art in general. Those of us who make things or create internalize so much of the process that at times, it sort of take a lot out of us. I use to think it was just me who encountered this but after being in the business for several years, I think most of us feel this way. Its no wonder when your in art school and you have a critique that some take the criticism with no emotion and others get super defensive. Selling things you create is sort of the ultimate critique just with no words said. Funny....would we rather have a professor tell us that our pots just didn't meet the standard expected or would we just like for customers to quietly pass us by?

I thought I'd bring up these questions not because I had a bad sale last weekend - I did sell pots. Its just that you never know what will be a hit and what will not be a hit. You can think that maybe you've found your niche with folks and then other times you may think that your not speaking to the masses as well as you could.

I've gone back and forth several times with these thought and all I can conclude is that...well, I'm just an artist who is sensitive to what I make. I guess this will never change and after every sale I just have to sit back, re-group, clean-up my studio and start again on making the best work I can. I always like to tell myself that the time in my studio with my quite thoughts is so important. This time I have is so limited with balancing all the other things/people in my life. I tend to forget this when I have a deadline and with multi-tasking , I should really be focusing and not rushing through the creative process. Details are a hard thing for someone with ADD to focus on!

Last night I worked on some butter dishes that needed to be finished. I had several pots that did not make it into the kiln last week so I will slowly load my kiln this week. The majority of my time will be spent on my Art101 class...midterm is fast approaching so I need to give that area of my life some attention.

I hope everyone has had a good start to October. It is my favorite month!

Saturday's show

Saturday's weather was perfect once again for our fall Circle of Eight sale. Many folks came out to say Hi and give lots of support to our little community of potters. I enjoyed seeing some former students from Clayworks along with familiar customers. I think everyone had some really good kilns come out for the show. We all at times think that our work may not turn out the way we planned but in the end, only we as the artists can see this.

Below is Amy Sanders work. That wonderful vase with the flowers in it now belongs to me! I think Amy sometimes thinks a lot like I do about form and making her pieces look like little creatures. I told her Saturday that this form reminded me of the caterpillar in Alice in Wonderland. After that thought, I knew I had to have this piece!

Here is Julie Wiggins next to her "Flower Cake". Very cool interpretation of a flower block. Julie looked so cute with her little hat on, I had to take this photo.
Ronan Peterson was our quest this fall. Ronan also has such a wonderful, creative flare to his work. His forms are just...well so cool! He is always fun to talk to and super nice about sharing glaze recipes and techniques. We were all very happy to have him join us yesterday and I think the crowd really enjoyed seeing and purchasing his work as well.

It is 11pm here in York and it has pretty much taken me until now to lift the fog from my head that I always have after a show. Today was a good day of sleeping late, decorating the house for Halloween and unpacking my pots from the show.

I enjoyed a wonderful documentary on Jimmy Carter this evening which was very inspiring to me. My favorite part was knowing that former President Carter always fly's couch when he travels. It showed him getting on an airplane and anyone who wanted to say hello to him while he boarded could do so. He just always takes a seat in the back of the plane with the group that travels with him and he just..takes a nap. I wish more folks who where public servants did such humble things like this.

Monday is a new start. Time to take a deep breath, reflect on my pots and the show and move forward. My next big project is a multi-tile wall piece for the CDC show coming up in November.

Hope everyone had a wonderful start to October this weekend!

Friday before show

So far I've had really good kilns this week. Today will be my last one and hopefully my luck will keep going.

Here are a few more shots of some items for the kiln. I'm looking forward to some good crisp October weather and visiting with folks I haven't seen for a while. Hope everyone in the area who reads my blog will come out to say Hello this weekend!

Below are my grouping of "families". I really enjoy making these bottle forms, which I'm sort of surprised to say because I think I use to find tradition forms sort of boring to make. I of course have put my own spin on these so I find them enjoyable. You'll see a new "snowflake" color glaze to your left. Just something new I wanted to try with the aqua's and colored clay combination.This group are pots I'm going to keep. I am in a big need for new professional photo's made of my work. I sort of got a little angry at myself this week thinking that lately I just make stuff to fill orders and shows. Stuff gets made and goes right back out my door. I told myself that perhaps my display won't be the most filled but I need to keep what I feel like is my best work and get some photo's made. That internal voice sometimes just won't leave you alone!Here is a huge group of bowls.

Off to pack and clean!

Only 3 more days till sale

As always things here are busy with glazing and getting things fired. I had a great kiln come out today. Here are a few photo's of things that have been drying and my glaze load today. I saw on the weather channel today that we may have rain in the morning so keep your fingers crossed for the 6 of us at the sale.

This is my favorite little piece that came out of the kiln today.
Here is the kiln cooling.
Here is look down in the bottom of the kiln.

These are some really big covered pots. I'm not sure they will be dry enough for the show but maybe....

And last are candle sticks.

I love to wrap!

( That's not rap...yes it is wrap!)
I have devoted most of my time these last few days to my studio. Things are rolling along. Today was my last wet day and I have pots that are ready to glaze in the morning. We all had a very nice weekend. Joey got to work a bit on the house and relax. ( Well I think he relaxed..better ask him about that.) I had some former students from Clayworks come out to visit my studio and show me the stuff they had been working on. It was really nice to have visitors and talk pots with these folks. The kids attended yet another birthday bash. I think we have at least one every other weekend! I like to send them to all these events because they have a chance to see all their school friends that tend to live far away from us and also I have to admit, I have a little bit of an addiction to wrapping paper. This love of highly decorated wrap started very young.

I use to LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Christmas time because neither my father nor my mother enjoyed wrapping gifts so I got to wrap EVERYONES gifts for years. (All but my own.) The bows, the tape the paper the tags, I just loved it all and I still do! I am a big believer that no gift bags will come into my house unless given to someone in my household. I never buy them because it takes all the fun out a giving a gift!
I was wrapping the gifts that the girls had to take with them this weekend and I thought what a great source for all the funky florals I like to put on my pieces. Soon I think my studio is going to be covered in strips of wrapping paper.

Rollin'

Mugs! Kiln about loaded.

Cake plates drying ready for sprigs and other goodies!

Various stuff like cream and sugars, the start of butter dishes a few dipping dishes to fill in the gaps.

Off to school and then to girls scouts and than to class....YE-HA! Tomorrow is Friday, could it get any better than that?

Around, Around, Around........

I'm working away on stuff. Just got my cake plates together this evening. Big accomplishment! We have finally gotten into our routine with all activities I keep going around here. We have boy scouts, girl scouts, violin lessons and dance this year. Three kids, each with an activity plus the drive back and forth to school each day. ( Not to mention Mom's evening classes at Winthrop!) Below is a song by none other than Grover on Sesame Street. My girls love this song and I of course remember it from my childhood. I was thinking today that this song sort of illustrates how I feel some days with all my running around. I think lots of Mom's and stay at home Dad's feel this way. Give a listen....he's pretty funny. You have got to love the mind of Jim Henson.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKu3NE7Omkw&feature=related
I'll get some photo's of work up in the morning.

Show Coming Up

Our upcoming fall sale for Circle of Eight will be taking place in a few weeks. If you are from the Charlotte area or somewhere near by we hope you can come say hello! Charlotte is a wonderful city to visit with lots of great restaurants and museums to see if you want to make a day trip out of the event. For this show our featured guest is Ronan Peterson. If you follow my blog you know I own several of his bowls. I love Ronan's work because it is colorful and fun, alot like my own pieces. He's a really nice guy and we all look forward to spending the day with him.

Cedar Creek Gallery is gearing up for their 42nd annual Fall kiln opening. Boy...42 times they have had a kiln opening is pretty amazing to me! Since I was involved in at least...I think about 10 of these while I was working there, I have to say they are also a lot of fun to attend. This year they have a box show going on during the kiln opening which I am also a part of. If you are from the triangle area and have not yet gotten out to visit Cedar Creek, here a great fall activities for the whole family.

I'm working, working, working on stuff. Hopefully I'll get some new photo's up in the next day or so. Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Around the time I get to work

I like the way the light comes in around 7 o'clock in my studio. I enjoy working at this time also especially if we have had an early dinner, the kids are all bathed and cleaned, happy and getting ready for bed. Weekends in the early fall are great for this!
Here are some large bowls. Lunch size plates.

And tall Lillie vases.

I'm moving forward towards some smaller things for fill-ins and I need to start on some cake plates and more elaborate things. I like to start these on the weekend and doing the finishing work on the week days. When I usually get done with the pieces that take more time towards the end of the week I make things that I can throw super fast and don't need as much attention. ( Not that ALL pots don't need attention!) Sometimes my girls friends stop by to talk and I enjoy having them visit, but while I'm engaged in chatting, throwing mugs and cups come easily.

Off to work.

Comforting sounds and words....

Today as you all may have heard the Mary Travers died from Peter, Paul and Mary. Very sad news for me to hear. My mom loved and I'm sure still does Peter, Paul and Mary and when I was a kid one of my favorite albums to sing my heart out to was Peter, Paul and Mommy.

I still have this CD and I was thinking today that when 9-11 happened I had to listen to a song by them called " Day is Done". Quaid was 6 months old when that happened and the two of us where on our way to a Mommy and Me at the local library when the planes hit the Twin Towers. I remember feeling so horrible and all sorts of thoughts went through my head as I'm sure did everyone else's. All I could think about was protecting my little boy from whatever was out there and this song seemed to say it all to me at the time.

Here is clip of Puff the Magic Dragon. You need to watch it because before they start singing they make fun of how people spread rumors that this song was about smoking pot and other things. Very funny!!! I love when a singer starts a song in this way- shows they have a keen sense of humor about what ridiculous notions people can come up with.

Rest in Peace Mary!

A Package? For Me!

I ordered some mugs a few weeks ago from fellow blogger Gary Rith. He's the guy that lives in the purple house in a small town near where I grew up! He does an amazing job of keeping up with his blog every day. There is always something new on there if you haven't checked it out. He's pretty funny and takes what he does for a living in what seems like an effortless, upbeat and fun loving way. One day when I was checking out his many post I saw a photo of some mugs he was working on that had little skulls on the handles and thought that they looked like something my 8 year old son would love. So...I emailed Gary and asked if I could get one and while he was at it, could he make a turtle mug and guinea pig mug also for my girls. Well...it wasn't but a week and he sent me a photo of all three! Wow...that was quick!
Yesterday on my door step was my order and here are some photo's from my wonderful box full of mugs that I'm going to stash away for Christmas this year. Mugs!

Today I worked on some new sprigs molds. Here they are below drying.

Here are some tops to tall Lillie vases.

Here is one of the bottoms under plastic.

Photo's from Weekend

Here are more photo's of the boxes in different stages. Below are the tops with an added flange and than I wait for them to dry a bit before "tweaking" the tops to fit the bottom. Here is one with the foot being cut.

Below is a finished box where I started thinking about the house idea I had attempted a while back. I didn't really want to add windows or if I did, they would have to be just representational. Haven't gotten to the point yet. I'm still sort of struggling with how to use the terra sig on my surface. (One more step in my decorating process.) Perhaps I need to also investigate another kind of drawing tool because I'm not sure I care for what I'm using on this. This all could change after they come out the bisque and I add some stain. Each stage offers new information for me.

These are some different finials than I normally put on the top of things. When I see these at this stage the terra sig looks sloppy to me. Its hard for me to see past this to the final fired product. I guess I need for these to get bisque before I scratch this surface idea. Time also to consult my "pottery crew" for constructive criticism!

This weekend we spent Saturday night with our group of York friends. All our children have grown up together because a group of us women use to rotate keeping each others kids at a mother morning out group. This was a great way when I was new mom to meet other mothers and get some free studio/work time. Its a great feeling to have known all these children and watch them grow and change over the last 9 years. These women have also been wonderful friends to me and we have helped each other out with various life "situations". It sort of like being in a family because we all have different interests and beliefs but we still we one big thing in common, motherhood and family and trying to do it all the best we can.

I like the fact that when we get together I'm able to see all the pots I've given to them over the years. They have bought some of my work but I've given a lot as gifts and they also reminded me of times I've just shown up with a second and said "oh, you can keep that bowl, its a second". Good times!

Did I also mention all my mom friends are also really good cooks! Look at that corn in one of my old platters! ( Need to make more of those...)

...off to continue loading a bisque kiln today and then to class this evening.

Lunch break

I'm happily working along in my studio today! Now I'm on my lunch break and I just popped on the computer to check my email and do alittle post. Bad news is I cant get the images I took to transfer from my camera to the memory card ( and don't ask about the cable....) I know all you tec people are saying "READ THE MANUAL"! Well...I can't find in the manual where that is and nor do I have time to search. I HAVE POTS TO MAKE and kids to pick-up and students to check on. ( Did I mention my dirty house?)

So...have no fear my tec man will be around this evening to help with all this and I'll have some good photo's to share.

I guess I'll finish up my salad, throw some more cloths in the washer and get back to figuring out some surface idea's for my small boxes.

Mondays can be a good thing!

Another stage...

( Lots some images in the download) Anyways......what I have done here from the last set of box photo's is squared off the sides , cut through the closed form and cut feet on the bottom half. This evening I will be adding a lip on the inside of the box and then the decorating part will begin. A year or so ago I made these into little houses. I'd like to sort of do that again but I guess I feel like I need to be careful not to make them to representational or contrived. I think that is hard to do for me. Some people do it really well but I seem to always teeter on that edge or to girly but not girly enough. ( It that makes sense!) Isn't it funny how we are always our worse critic! I also want to use the terra sig a bit more on these.
Check back for updates!

Here is Charlotte this weekend is the big Annual Potters Invitational , at the Mint Museum. Boy I would love to be in this show but I'm not a NC potter and I'm not sure I COULD get in. Anyways, I'll be running around to birthday parties, enjoying having my husband home ( since he's been away this week) and working on my own pots this weekend. If you are from this area and want something fun to do...go check this show out!

Start of boxes

I just boxed some up some boxes for a show that I will be participating in at Cedar Creek Gallery in a month orso. I love to make boxes and since I haven't in a few months, they where back on my list this week. Here is the start of some for everyone to see. Hopefully as the days go on I can keep track of my progress to share with you all.


Here are bigger versions of my spoon rests.These will be fun to carve into! Big cup-cake images...I can't wait!

Always more tiles fill in the holes around plates and other small items in the kiln. This Thanksgiving at the Carolina Designer Craftsmen show I'm planning on doing a big 25 piece tile/wall hanging for the show. I'll be working on the paper version soon and I'll talk more about that.

Its so nice to get back into the swing of things. This weekend hopefully I'll get some new shelving up in my studio...something I've needed and have been putting off while the house transformation has been underway!

Hope everyone has a good "HUMP" day!

Monday night..check in!

If anyone out there remembers the film "Bull Durham", well...yes the bull really does blow smoke and the eye's really do light up! Here is proof!

We took a little trip to Raleigh/Triangle area and the NC coast this weekend. One of our adventures was to go to a Durham Bulls game with my sister and her family. We were lucky because one of the ball players hit one out of the park so the bull did his trick. The kids where thrilled!

Our real reason for the trip was to take one of our twin girls who is crazy about turtles to the NC Turtle Hospital in Topsail Island. We had to wait in a line for about 1 1/2 hours to get in and learn about this wonderful place but it was well worth the wait. Aydan was so trilled to see and hear about all the sea turtles they save and meet these great creatures face to face.

We were also lucky to see this guy below named NOAH get a sonar device put on him the day of our visit. He was being released this week so this tracking device was put on his shell so they can see where he travels too! Many of these turtles they save do come back to the NC coast, which I think is very cool. If your interested in supporting theri cause, you can go to the website above and make a donation.

Today I did get back into the studio and accomplished some things. In the morning the workmen only have a few more things to finish up and hopefully by Wed. I'll be back to peace and quite so I can concentrate on my up coming shows.

Hope everyone had a great holiday!

Labor Day..yah or nah?

Things that make you go Hmmmmmmmmm...things that make you go hmmmmmmmmmmm.
http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2Dtfi3VkiU

So, we got back from our wonderful vacation this summer and I said to myself
"Self..you need to do this more often"!

So for Labor Day this year instead of staying at home and worrying and working, we are going to have some fun!

No work for me this labor day. Just being a mom! ( Well..yes..that's work but its kind of like being the President..its always there.)

I'll check back in a few days. Have a Happy weekend everyone!
Jen

Bottle families

I'm trying to keep things organized in my work ( as I've said before). Here's one small step for me. Keeping the bottles in little family groups .Doing it this way gives me some constant designs and different sizes to choose from. I know for some of you this seems like a no brainer but for me,( someone who still at times just gets a lump of clay and starts to throw and gets an idea from that)....its a big organization step in my brain.

In the far right, you'll see some "singletons" waiting for some siblings.

My Laundry/office area is looking spectacular. Believe me, what a change from the old laundry room. The dust, noise, stuff in my studio and the little interruption to my quiet but busy days will be worth it!