faux bois

In mid April, while trolling pinterest, I found this tutorial on making faux bois.  I'd seen one eons ago on the old martha stewart show about using a faux finishing woodgrain paddle on a slab and throwing it on a wedging table to stretch it out (I believe Jeff Bridges was demonstrating? who knew the Dude was a pottery person?  And completely aside, I have a lot of respect for his humanitarian work- he really makes a difference).  I was in a slump and needed to do something to spark my creativity (and to get back to work), so I shook up my bottle of cobalt wash, rolled out a thick slab, and went to work.  Here are the results:

The platter in the foreground is very rough/rustic.  It was the first slab and I didn't trim it at all, just laid it into a mold*.  I think I'm going to use it outside on my porch.  The second slab became the four dessert plates to the right.  In the background is the last slab I made, and I cut it to fit an oval platter form I have.  I took the leftover bits of clay and rewedged them to throw with.  I hope that there will be some cobalt marbling in the finished piece, but I didn't see anything as it dried.  We'll see!

I'm going to try this with my Mississippi River clay slip, as well, and see how that works.  I'm not sure this is something that I'll make a lot of, but it was a fun diversion.

Tomorrow I'll be back here with pitchers!

*speaking of molds, all of my molds are platters, plates, trays that I've found in thrift stores, antique/junk shops, and occasionally I'll splurge on the melamine trays they bring out at target every spring.  They have some great shapes that I haven't seen elsewhere, but I'd admit that my favorites are the small ceramic pieces I pick up at thrift stores for a song.

two dogs

I made this urn for Birdy the day after we knew it was time.  I was glad to be able to do it and glad to find a small family-run company to help me.  She came back to me last Monday.

I will be making more of these in the future; I just need to get the sizing down before I offer them in my shop*.  Having her with me is special.  I wasn't financially able to keep Pete with me when we put him down in 2007 and I've regretted it ever since.  But Birdy was my first baby, and I knew that I needed to keep her with me.

(*ETA, yes, I'll have cat sizes as well)

And here's Ajax.  He is almost 12 weeks now.  Sweet, crazy (only sometimes), calm (mostly), loving, eager to please.  Already has sit and come down pat.  Stay, not so much.  But we've got time for that.  Very interested in the chickens, and the bees, unfortunately, think he's a bear.  He's learning to stay away from them.  He doesn't look like a bear to you, does he? I just can't wait until he's big enough to start running with me (3 more months for his bones to be strong enough for running)


Thank you, friends, for your enthusiastic response to my cup project for my friend's children.  I am just bowled over.  Right now I have 30+ orders to fill and the amount headed to the kids is approaching $400.  I could have never done that on my own, and I am so grateful to you.

Later this week, two more pitchers.  Or maybe later this weekend, 4 of them.  depending on if I can get them glazed or not.  Life is moving fast and I'm working on figuring out what goes where and when.  Balance.

loss, grief, doing something about it, joy

My family has faced tremendous losses over the last six months or so.  A dear friend of my husband's succumbed to cancer after a long, vigilant battle.  I lost my closest friend to suicide, have seen another sweet friend's marriage fall apart, job loss and the associated struggles, we watched our dear pet decline, and discovered that a family in our church community was struggling with emotional and physical abuse, much much too late to help.  This week the authorities found the mother's body and her husband was arrested.  She leaves two children that I know well.  One is my son's age, and the other was in my sunday school class for four years.  I have fought with how to deal with her senseless death, how to help her children, how to help other women in her position.

When I began making these cups in 2012, they were intended to help bring hope to a friend.  I want to continue that mission.  For the next month, 30% of the sale of each cup will go into a fund for my friend's children.  After that, a percentage will go to my local domestic abuse shelter.  I can't do a lot, but this I can do, and it gives my heart solace and joy to be able to make some sort of difference through my work.

The day we found out about my friend's death, we brought joy back into our household in a big way.  We brought home an 11 week old chocolate lab puppy.  His name is Ajax and he has really lifted our hearts.  He is curious and sweet and everything you want a puppy to be.  And he reminds me to be present and not dwell in the past, but to notice and take each day on its own, finding the joy in the small things.

11, 12, 13

it occurred to me that I forgot to share the last batch of pitchers.
eleven- pencil stamped hexagons, stoneware, thrown and altered, glazed in yellow.

my yellow glaze had been behaving very badly and I was afraid to try it, so I thinned it a lot and did a test glaze on a cracked cup the kilnload prior to this one and it surprised me by being just fine.

twelve- thrown cylinder, handbuilt spout and base.  I used newspaper stencils and underglaze here

I really like this technique and how clean and crisp the stencils turned out.  These are the same birds from pitcher five.

13- I am really excited about this piece.  It is heavily influenced by contemporary Japanese surface design and I repeated the idea on some

The cobalt wash was way more than I intended - I wanted this to be as white as the plates, but I'll tinker with it and try again in another pitcher.  You'll see this again, a LOT, but the project that it's intended for is still top-secret.

Pitchers 14 and 15 have just been bisque fired, and 16 is awaiting more work.  It is now week 17 and I'm ready to make it today.  I'm excited to see how these pitchers have progressed and stretching both my potting and surface design skills.

first batch

My first spring batch of berry bowls will go up in my shop at 9am CST tomorrow, Monday April 15.  I'll have another batch up in May.  I'm planning to do a listing of these once a month, no reserves, so that I don't get completely overwhelmed with making them as I have in years past.

Also, think good thoughts for my family this week.  We're putting our beloved pup Birdy down midweek.  She is 14 and has been steadily declining in health and in what she'll consent to eat since last fall.  I got her when she was 6 weeks old.  I was 24, in graduate school, trying to figure everything out.  She's been a faithful friend to me and my whole family will miss her deeply.

Thanks for reading.

spring

Today was the really nice day we've had in Memphis in a good long time.  I spent quite a lot of it outside in my garden- checking the bees (new brood!)- chicken-proofing the back garden (mostly successful)

 Edna got over, but no one else did, and after I popped her out of the garden, she didn't try it again.  I planted some onion sets and some strawberries, which leads me to these:

 

It is ALMOST time for berry bowls.  I'm going to have them in my shop, 10-20 at a time, as I make them, in quarts (these are quarts) and pints.  Saucers will be in a separate listing, for those of you that want them.  In the past I've let these take over all of my making time, which I'm resisting this year.  So no special orders or special colors, just what I feel like making when I make them and when they're gone, they're gone.  I am very grateful for the widespread enthusiasm that these bowls generate, and I'm even more grateful that I figured out how to keep them from cracking the last go-round.

I'll post here and on twitter when I list them, probably later this coming week.

Happy Spring, Friends!

chickens! and breakfast

This winter I worked on making new drawings of my chickens for my pottery.  Also because I just really like my chickens.  See?
Several weeks ago a friend, who is the editor of Edible Memphis asked me about people I knew who had chickens, cool coops, and might be willing to show off their chickens in the spring issue.  Well, besides me?  There are a number of us who are obsessed with our birds and are happy to share the love.   Edible is by far my favorite local publication and I look for its sister publications whenever we travel.

But back to the chickens.  All winter I watched the girls roam and forage and run (there is nothing funnier than a chicken running at full tilt), taking pictures of them and making sketches.  One of my retailers asked about carrying the chicken cups after she'd snagged a pair at an auction and asked me to make some, with little plates to match, for her shop.  Here is the result:

 

I delivered several sets of these to Diane's this morning and put the rest of these little tumblers, plates, and egg cups in my shop this afternoon.  I'm trying to do a better job of keeping the shop stocked this year and am adding pieces as they're ready.  I'm also building inventory for a May home sale and a small local summer event or two.  And I have a BIG project on the horizon that won't roll out until fall and into 2014.  I'm staring down a pottery elephant, trying to figure out which bite to take first.

Thanks for coming along with me.