hanging out with the neighbors

Last night we invited our potter friend and neighbor, Phil Pollet (Old Gap Pottery), to join us for dinner. Jeff and I worked together in the kitchen to make a tasty dish of tofu and stir fried veggies, served over udon noodles. We broke opened a bottle of sake and had an enjoyable evening of smart conversation and good food.
We stayed up way too late and slept in. I couldn't resist take a picture of our cup selection washed and drying on the kitchen island this morning...

Starting in the back from left to right, clockwise: Tokkuri (sake server) by Jeff, faceted cup by Jack Troy, shino cup by John Zentner, Pedestal sake cup by Jeff Brown, sake cup by me, sake cup by Phil Rogers, and sort of in the center faceted cup by Jeff.
The flowers are in a hexagonal wood fired fired vase that Jeff made. It was the first pot the I purchased from him nearly ten years ago. It's still one of my favorites.

Evenings like this one really make me feel fortunate to be living in Seagrove.

As for today... we partially unloaded a kiln and I can't wait to share pictures of Jeff's Korean teabowls (chasabal). Hopefully I will have pictures tomorrow.

don't forget the plastic wrap...

I think that I hadn't thrown pots in nearly two weeks. We have been in a firing cycle so my days were spent loading kilns and glazing. Late yesterday, after loading the back stack of the gas kiln I decided I needed to get my hands in some wet clay.
I threw the parts to make six oval bakers and my intention was that they would be wavy ovals. In order for them to be wavy, I needed to go out to the studio before bed and throw some plastic over them. At 8:00 am I woke up to that "oh no" feeling, remembering that I never went back out to cover my cylinders.
I ran out to the studio in my pajamas to check on them. Some rims were a little dry... darn. I sprayed them with water and wrapped them in plastic. A short time later they were ready to alter. Only a couple of them could be made wavy. I knew if I pushed my luck with the others the rims would crack.

I finished all six by this evening and they are covered in plastic so they can dry slowly.

Yesterday, while I threw these pots, I was listening to an interview on NPR with the President of High Point University, Dr. Nido Qubein. He was inspiring to listen to. Lately so much of the news is doom and gloom about many things and mostly the economy. I truly believe in positive thinking and that negativity breeds negative outcomes. I heard Dr. Qubein say something and I was compelled to write it down. It's not an exact quote, but enough to get the point across...
When asked what he learned since becoming the President of the University he had a long list of answers, but this one stood out, "I have learned that there is a recession, but it doesn't mean you need to participate."
I like how that ties in to my other favorite quotes from other intelligent and creative people.

Just Work

Follow Your Bliss

I am feeling really good about 2012, I know Jeff and I are off to a great start. Be well friends, and have a good night.

Let's talk about Jeff today.

Jeff's been making tea bowls. He has been invited to apply for a tea bowl competition in Korea.
This beauty came out of our last firing...

Ash glaze over shino

This one is wood fired... I can't remember whose kiln it came out of...

luscious!

He has these listed in his Etsy shop... click on the middle picture to take you there! We are firing again next week and he will have a few more completed.

7 things you may NOT want to know about me

It's awards month everywhere... the Grammy's, the Oscars and the Versatile Bloggers... and I have been awarded this honor by Linda Starr. Thank you Linda! This award comes with strings attached... I need to tell readers 7 things that you may not know about me.

1. I grew up in a French speaking home and I don't speak French! I was the "baby" of the family and I was irritated that we lived in the U.S. and everyone was talking in French. Of course now I wish I could speak it...

2. As I said in #1 I am the "baby" of the Lemieux (how's that for a French name?) family of 4 kids. The oldest is Paul, then Anita (who now teaches French in a middle school), then Roger. When Anita turned 4 on October 27, 1961, she got the BEST birthday present...a baby sister, ME! Yep, we share a birthday.

1964?

3. I was married and had my daughter when I was 17. We stayed married for 26 years. I think it lasted that long because I wanted to prove to everyone that I could make it work. Once my daughter was grown and gone, I realized we didn't have too much in common. It was a difficult decision to end the marriage. My ex still lives in the house that we owned together... he started dating his stepsister shortly after we separated, she lives there too. That took some time to wrap my head around... just seems a little creepy.

1982... I loved that Gunne Saxe dress I was wearing!

4. I worked as an early childhood educator for 19 years. I went to school at night to get my ECE certification. I specialized in birth to 3 years. I love kids and wanted to have two (husband didn't) so I spent many years helping to raise other people's children.  I worked in a community based center that served mostly low income and non-english speaking families. Some children were in foster care or transitioning back to their families.

5. My most favorite job of ALL time was a receptionist position that I took when I gave up the kid career. I worked the front desk for an independent real estate company. It was so much fun. Everyone in the office was like a family. It was this job that led to me getting my real estate license. I stayed with the same company and transitioned into mostly onsite sales for new construction. My sales partner Mark and I won top office sales many months. Then we all know what happened to the market!

6. My favorite food is pizza. If you have read my blog for any length of time, you know that already. I like to make it myself, but I am also okay with take-out. There is no take-out in Seagrove so for the past two years I have spent perfecting my technique!

7. I am obsessed with flossing my teeth. I rarely leave the house without dental floss.

and I forgot to say anything about clay... during #5 I started taking ceramics classes at the NH Institute of Art. I had done some clay in High School as well as an evening class one winter in the 90's. In 2002 I became a clay addict and have no plans for rehab.

someday's i am a slacker...

It's been nearly two years since I made the decision to make pots full time. I have lots of days where I feel like I was a slacker all day.
Today was one of them.
I really need to get over the notion that if I am not making pots, loading kilns, or glazing, that I am  not being productive. Tonight I decided to make a list of how I spent my day:

1. Packed Etsy orders (yay!)
2. Sort of balanced checkbook and did some paperwork
3. Took deposit to the bank then a trip to the post office to get 4 Etsy orders shipped.
4. Checked inventory at the Co-op
5. Jeff and I stacked nearly a cord of wood to heat home & studio
6. Played Angry Birds for 1/2 hour (yep... addicted)
7. Packed pots for the Co-op
8. Made cone packs for next firing
9. Emptied 5 gallons of slaked clay for recycling
10. Photographed bowls for Etsy
11. Listed a bowl on Etsy

In between all this a load of laundry & dishes got done and dinner was cooked.

Not too shabby for a slacker.

Wood fired, extruded, textured vase by Jeff Brown... I love having fresh flowers in the house.

a southern snowfall

We woke up to a light dusting of snow covering the ground. I am sure it will be melted in the next few hours.

Yesterday Jeff and I were looking at Etsy listings and came across a shop selling PDF's of online selling tips. They were selling for around $28 and they had lots of sales. I suggested that we create PDF's of our glaze recipes and start selling them!

Lo and behold, when I checked my e-mail this morning I had a message from a fellow Etsyan. He loved the glaze on a small dish and if he purchased the  dish could he have the glaze recipe with it?
The power of positive thinking! I will gladly share the recipe along with the dish.

I pulled out Jz's glaze recipe notebook, to look it up and this postcard fell out...

I love finding these little treasures that have been tucked away in books and notebooks that belonged to John. This was from a show at a gallery in Frederick, MD on March 24th... unfortunately no year.
Last week would have been John's 61st birthday... I am happy to report that I am handling these milestones better each year. When I come across little things like this I think it's him stopping by to say hello.

back from a short bloggy break

We unloaded the kiln on Friday and everything was looking good. Jeff wants to back off on the glaze reduction next time, a few of the greens were a little muddy but acceptable.

Our mug order came out great and we delivered it on Friday night. If you are ever in Greensboro stop in Sessions at 1820 Spring Garden Street. Enjoy a cup of coffee or a cappuccino in one of our mugs. They also have a fabulous beer selection and a really cool atmosphere.

Here a couple of pictures from last week's firing.

 

I love this pig with the shino/ash glaze combo...

and the infamous sponge holders...

Both are available in my etsy shop. The sponge holders are a limited edition so get them while you can, I don't plan to make anymore (unless they fly off the shelves at the speed of lightning).

As for my blogger frustration... I have decided that for now I will resize all of the photos I want to use on the blog and keep them in a separate folder... when I get the time I will figure out how to get a larger header again... I want my pretty blue mailbox back for spring!

blogger frustration

This blog has been around since 2007, and I knew this would happen eventually...

I reached my photo storage limit in blogger :-(

I can only add new photos that are small unless I pay for extra storage on picasa. I made this discovery when I changed my header (see puny picture above). Now I can't get my old winter scene header back.
There must be a way I can find the other photo in picasa and put it back but in the layout editing. Blogger wants me to put in a web address for the photo but I can't locate it in picasa... at least not yet.

Evidently I can host my photos on Jeff's website OR resize everything before uploading,  but that means another step in the process. I prefer to keep it simple because I do need to get other stuff done throughout the day!
I knew there was a storage limit and stupidly thought I would be prepared with the gypsy potters blogspot BUT, I did a DUMB thing. I didn't open a totally new account associated with a new e-mail address and picasa account.

My other thought was that this might be a good time to switch to a new format and ditch blogger all together. I am just not sure I have time for that right now.
If anyone has any insight or suggestions, I would appreciate hearing from you.

On the bright side... the firing was done by 10:00 pm last night. Here is a pic (a resized version of course) of the door with flames licking out of it...

at this point it's always a good idea to push the door back in... but it's fun to see that fire!!!

2012 - Firing #3

back stack...

front stack...

Burners lit at 9:00 am (early for us).

memories of Valentine's long ago...

When I was a kid I loved celebrating Valentine's Day at school. We made a mailbox for our desk and decorated them with lots of glitter, construction paper hearts and paper doilies. Everyone brought those cute little cards and dropped them in your mail box during the week leading up to the "big" day. On Valentine's day we celebrated after lunch with cupcakes, conversation hearts and opening up all of our cards in those special mail boxes. A simple celebration that I am not sure is still done in schools today.

Every few years I have bought a box of those little cards... I have slipped them into the mailboxes of all the real estate agents in my office and tucked them into surprise hiding places for family or friends to find. Having not done that in a few years I decided to buy some this year. I carefully chose Peanuts cards because I just love Snoopy... when I opened the box to my horror they are now made of thin paper! Not card stock, just printed paper... and here is the kicker: they no longer come with ENVELOPES! What is a card without an envelope???

There were some stickers in the box along with flimsy cards...

and a poster...

but I would have much preferred card stock and envelopes. I sent my daughter an early 60's vintage necklace and bracelet set that belonged to my grandmother and I tucked some of the cards in the box and addressed them to her, Jason and all the pets. Next year I will have to make my own Valentines... and maybe a mailbox too.

Pass the cupcakes please.

Produce & Pottery

Why is there any need to package a pepper in a cellophane bag? I am not happy that I purchased a pepper packaged this way but I really needed it for dinner last night... it also cost me $2.50!! Over packaging products is my pet peeve. I would have rather paid less than paid for someone to package the darn thing.

Enough about produce and on to studio news...

We have been busy getting ready for a Bridal Show this Saturday. Yep, you heard right, a bridal show. It's local, only four hours long and relatively inexpensive to do. It won't be much of a selling day, but hopefully will lead to some orders. Jeff and I have done custom wedding plates/platters for weddings as well as vases for table centerpieces. Perhaps we can get some bridal registries as well. This was a last minute decision for us so we have been scrambling to get samples made.

The other day I had some fun and made a few of child sized mugs...

I know they have nothing to do with bridal show stuff but I sort of have a hard time sticking to one task! I like the way these have turned out so far, chubby little mugs for chubby little hands.

I hope this cold snap ends soon... we have been spoiled. I don't want to load the gas kiln in the cold and we need to fire either tomorrow or Wednesday!
Stay warm everyone.

workin' at the co-op...

of Seagrove Potters.
Today is one of my three co-op days for this month. I decided I would take some pottery work to do while I am here. For some strange reason I decided to make kitchen sponge holders. I have never made them before and I am beginning to think I won't be making them again. I threw them the other day and brought them with me to cut and and stamp.

I didn't have my "real" camera with me but my MacBook has the photo booth application so I snapped a pic of work in progress. Not sure these are doing anything for me. I only made about 8-10. I will fire them and see what I think when they are glazed. I am not sure if I can sell them for a price that reflects the amount of time put into them.
On a good note... I was happy to see when I arrived at the Co-op this morning, that Jeff and I have sold quite a few mugs here this month. Some nice salt glazed maple leaf ones that I made this fall are gone... and I was just beginning to think that maybe $30 was a little high.
Pricing work, it's the ongoing struggle for me and I am sure many other craftsmen out their.

Kitty Crock

Our good friend Roni sent Jeff this picture today... one of her new kitties hiding inside a Jeff Brown pot!

50/50

Have any of you seen this movie? I was hesitant to watch it because the subject matter deals with cancer and I try to avoid those kinds of movies. Even before going through it with Jz, I didn't care to see depressing movies about illness and death. I chose to rent this from Netflix after listening to an interview on NPR with the writer, whose real life story this is based on. It's a comedy... yes, a comedy about cancer. It's not slapstick and there is a serious side. I am happy to report that I laughed more than I cried. 

Jz and I tried our best to keep our humor throughout his diagnosis and treatment. We even managed to find humor in his need for a feeding tube... it took two of us to figure out how to make it work and not before making a big mess with it. Laughing and trying to get liquids into a feeding tube don't go well together. Humor was the only way to keep our sanity! 

For what it's worth, that's my movie recommendation of the day, 50/50. Now available on Netflix (and probably from the red box vending machine thing at your local grocer).

and now back to pottery...

It took me way longer than it should have to finish this round of bowls. I think after a few going into the scrap bucket I only ended up with a total of nine. I decorated them late yesterday. I thought it would go quickly and I sat at the short stool in front of my wheel to do the carving. BIG mistake. My hip was aching last night and I think it was from sitting in one position for too long. Usually when I decorate I sit on a higher stool and stand for awhile too. Lessoned learned. Thank goodness for ibuprofen.

vase finder

Jeff and I both have pots in the Vase Finder show again this year. It is a totally on line show run by Charles Blim in Nevada. There are no entry fees and it's an invitational show. Either Charlie invites you or he asks you to invite someone. John was in the show the last year he was working. After John died, Charles invited me and asked me to invite someone... of course I invited Jeff.
Charles Blim is passionate about ceramics and maintains a wonderful site dedicated to it. We have never met but when John died he immediately called from Nevada to offer his condolences.

This year John Glick was the juror. Samantha Henneke of Bulldog Pottery, here in Seagrove, won an honorable mention in the show. Her vase is stunning. A link to the show is here.

To the left of Jeff's pot, in the show, is our League of NH Craftsmen colleague, David Orser. Quite a few Orser pots live comfortably in our home.

My vase in this year's show came from our first Seagrove wood firing. It was sold a few months ago to a collector.

The studio is calling... I have some bowls that need decorating. Happy Tuesday to all!

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Here it is another Monday already. Lately the weeks have been flying by. Nothing too exciting happening in the studio this weekend. My mug order is drying and I got started on some large for me size bowls. Actually there was a little excitement here in Seagrove this weekend...
Saturday was the Potters Palette fundraiser for the NC Pottery Center. You may remember that potters throughout NC were asked to paint a canvas to be auctioned off. The event was well attended and raised a good chunk of change for the pottery center. My painting has a new home in Pennsylvania. It didn't go for much money but at least someone bid on it! I was afraid I was going to have to purchase it myself.
I didn't bring my camera, so no pics of the event. Instead I will leave you with a picture of my favorite functional pot...

I bought this from Jeff many years ago, when I was his student at the NH Institute of Art. I stopped at his studio for something and he had recently unloaded the kiln. When I saw this little carafe I new I had to have it. I use it for olive oil, it is a thing of beauty that gets everyday use. I think that Jeff is happy to have it in his home now too.

if you are wondering about the title to this post, i couldn't think of one... so if you are familiar with the original cast of Sesame Street album (on vinyl) you know how to sing it like Big Bird. For some strange reason I have had songs from this record stuck in my head all week.... J Jump Joyful, Jumble around, Jack in a box Jumping all over town...

happy people

Jeff''s large vessel sinks went to their new home yesterday...

Ash glaze over shino

They are going to sit on a granite countertop. The new owner said he would send some pictures once they are installed.

Just Work

Yesterday I mentioned the Brother Thomas quote "Just Work". In the comments I wrote that John had posted it in our NH studio to remind him to keep moving forward. Today his sister Nancy e-mailed a picture she had taken of that very quote...

Thank you Nancy for sharing... the good memories come flooding in!

I finally unloaded the rest of kiln late yesterday afternoon. I decided to get some photographs taken and start listing the pots on Etsy.

A small hand built dish. Shino glaze and dusted with wood ash. It fits in the palm of your hand. The interior texture was created with seashell.

The "Danielle" vase in blue. See yesterdays post if you care for an explanation.

Sugar jar

Two carved vases... so hard to reduce the glare in these shiny glazes.

I will be sure to get photographs of Jeff's large vessel sinks before they get picked up this week. They really turned out beautiful. We are thankful to have a few good orders this winter, since it's very slow for walk-in traffic during the winter months. Jeff and I have both been consistently working on Etsy sales and it is starting to gain momentum. Last night Jeff had a really sweet order from someone who is obviously a collector. A return buyer who bought a tea bowl awhile back... this time they purchased a number of things including a sake bottle and a couple of cups. 

Jeff and I are true believers that positive thinking and a good plan helps propel us forward. In the words of Brother Thomas - "Just Work".

and never forget to "Follow your bliss" - Joseph Campbell.