going to the beach

Going to the beach today... someday I'll finish mixing my glazes and get a glaze firing going.

things take sooooo much longer to do now. I have been mixing 1 glaze for 5 days now. Each day I get to measure out 1 dry ingredient.

Oh well. Slow and steady....

plate(s)

plates are really fun. holy cow I love a big surface. (i may feel differently after glazing)






and my little swimmer

go hunter!

Man this consistent nap time is getting to be so nice.

I decided to make some plates today, I'm pretty excited about decorating a large surface. I haven't made a plate in... forever.



and some test tiles. Love me some test tiles.. now to get the organization and time to mix glazes.



I made this bowl yesterday and I hope it turns out like I want it to. I'm really enjoying my new to me combination of techniques.

exterior


interior


and I have a few non carved into porcelain cups left over so I decided to have some underglaze fun.



and here is Hunter in a bounceroo thing. His awake playtimes are getting so much more active. Laying in one spot staring at the ceiling isn't cutting it anymore. :)

wednesday naptime fun

It's naptime! Well not for me, but little man. I just finished up some deco on a few cups, cleaned my wheel for the first time in months, organized some stuff, took some pictures and now I get to read blogs and blog.

1. I'm in love with Jen Mecca's blog and work. I need to pick her brain on doing the mom thing and having time for ceramics.

2. Carole Epp had an interesting post about things I have been thinking about in regards to decoration vs content. I like where in ended in sometimes you just need to make something that makes you happy.

3.I wish I lived in NC so I could go to Ron Philbeck's pottery sale! Well.. I'd probably be super broke, so maybe it is better this way. ;)



Here are some cups in progress


the lamb mobile


and my favorite, hopefully glazing goes well.


The cassette tape image comes from something Jake has been working on. My husband, Jake, made this incredible website www.dirtyhippieradio.com which features so many great indie/jamband/semi unsigned bands. The White Buffalo and Iguanamen de Galapagos are certainly worth a listen.


and finally for the cuteness

content vs decoration

There are many reasons why I love my husband but one of them is that he keeps me in check and pushes me to do better.

The last firing was my first time back to clay and everything was a bit scattered. I was trying a few new to me things and slowly feeling my way back. I had my cups all lined up in a row and Jake looks at me and says "great now what?". I looked at him like what do you mean. He started explaining that my cups lack content.

so we had a decent discussion about content vs decoration. Some of my drawings, okay all of them, just felt forced and didn't have much thought behind them. I sat down with my sketch book and realized that the common thread between the drawings I liked was hunter.



I'm around him 24hrs a day (give or take 2)and why wouldn't my inspiration come from him and the objects around him. So I gave in and realized that he is what interests me and makes most sense in my world and then the drawings finally made sense.



I get to throw while little man naps and I love love love my video monitor.

we have action, well sort of

After an 11 month hiatus I have 13 cups. lol. Man everything takes so much longer when I'm running back in to check up on Hunter.

So many things change. I thought I was happy where I left off making work that looked like this



but upon coming back to clay I decided to play around a bit, no rush in going back into "production" mode. (nothing is ever a rush anymore)

So I joined a clay class so I could get out of the house for 2hrs a week, but that didn't last long before I started feeling guilty. I have a studio set up in the garage so I tried to sneak in time during daytime naps... lo and behold Hunter doesn't like to nap during the day unless he is attached to me.

But with the small amount of time I had this is what I played around with and ended up using the studio glazes and underglazes. I really wanted to do some glaze testing but it is nearly impossible to do such things 10 minutes at a time. :)

adjustments

Hunter is now 11 weeks old and I have been back in the studio for 5 weeks. You would think that in 5 weeks I would have gotten back on the horse.. but not so much. I have made 15 cups and a bunch of test tiles. I only get 30 minutes at a time and somedays don't get anytime at all.

Our nap schedule is erratic and I'm on the worlds shortest leash. He doesn't seem to sleep more than 30 minutes at a time if I'm not in the room. If i'm next to him he will snooze for 2hrs at a time. Now I just need to figure out how to get him to nap next to the wheel ;)

because of my new time restraints I have found it really difficult to work with porcelain. I was rocking the Highwater helios at cone 9 before pregnancy. Now that doesn't seem to be the best option. I'd like to find a cone 6 body/glazes.

I got a few different samples and am working on test tiles and new glazes. I'll let you know how this goes next year when I finally get to finish something. (Hopefully Hunter will start to nap without me soon) So I have some highwater ellen buff, brownstone, speckled brownstone little loafers and standards dark brown (266) porcelain (213)

little loafers and 213 dry way to quickly for my new way of life and i'm not that attentive anymore to ways of covering up and controlling the dry time.

I love the way the 266 feels/thros, I hope I can get some good results with it.

So I'm still adjusting to new life and trying to figure it all out. Hunter is adjusting well, he is trying to find his thumb and gets pissed when he loses it. Otherwise I couldn't have asked for a happier baby.






no babies or balls were hurt during this picure