Working Hard, Eating Well

 We have so much basil this year that we are trying to incorporate it into every meal. Last night we had caprese salad and pasta. The salad is one of my favorite summer dishes. I love the combination of basil and fresh mozzarella.

On the weekend I had a made a big pot of spaghetti sauce, knowing it would come in handy for a quick meal during this busy week. Last night I boiled some tortellini and we tossed half with some pesto that I made last week and poured sauce over the rest. A half and half meal! I called dibs on our new Tom White bowl, acquired at the craftsmen's fair in New Hampshire last month. I love wide open bowls that can double as plates, and Jeff and I both really like Tom's pots.

and now back to pigs...

There may have been one piggy bank disaster in the kiln this week, but this order came out exactly right. I think I will add this blue and red combination to the repertoire. This guy is heading out to his new home today. He is a "china" first anniversary gift to a young man from his wife. How cute is that?

evolving

 This week I took my carved bowls in a new direction. I threw a whole mess of bowls and couple of platters, with wide, thick rims, and then slipped and carved them.

As I worked on these today, I was thinking about glazing. My first thought was shino interior with gloss green rim and exterior... which means a lot of careful waxing and perhaps stressful glazing maneuvers. After contemplating that a bit, I have considered glazing them completely with the gloss green.

Would that make them boring?
Opinions encouraged and welcomed.

little by little...

It seems we are picking away at getting this kiln unloaded. Typically I am, "Let me at it, I want to see EVERYTHING right away and while it's still hot".

Jeff took a few photos this afternoon so that I would have something to share here on the blog

I am quite happy with how these plates came out. They are deep and will make nice pasta dishes. It was a pain to glaze the rim and underside shino and the center green. I glazed the shino first (because shino, being the prima dona that she is, always comes first or nasty things happen). When the glaze was dry I waxed over it then poured the green glaze. Tedious, but worth it in the end.

Jeff calls this his "Chorus of Mugs"

I played with this design on a couple of plates and a vase... I have decided to name it "Danielle" after my daughter. It's a girly design and reminds me of her. I'll get a photo of the vase this evening.

This has absolutely nothing to do with the firing...

Tacos on a Kate Goetz, 2004 Watershed Salad Days Plate. This was dinner last night. It looked so pretty and the photo set up was all ready so I set it down and snapped a pic before eating. Jeff and I put a lot of thought into choosing the right dish to dine from each night... one of the joys of owning a great collection of handmade pots.

back to work

I was ready for work yesterday after the break on Wednesday. I had a bunch of pasta bowls and one large bowl that were slipped and ready to carve. It was about 50 degrees outside, therefore easy to keep the studio at a good working temperature.

I enjoy carving designs through slip but it can get tedious when you have a dozen bowls and as many tumblers to carve. I broke the work up by finishing the tumblers on Tuesday before our day off. Yesterday I worked on the bowls for about 7 hours straight, until 8:00 pm. I think I have three left to finish today.
When I went to bed last night, I spent the first few hours dreaming those monotonous, repetitive, go nowhere dreams, about carving bowls. Those darn bowls wouldn't leave my head!!! When they finally left I had a strange dream that involved working for a corrupt circus... something about you weren't aloud to perform unless you had an X tattooed on your back... and one of the female trapeze artists performed without the X and she was now in grave danger... I woke up before anything bad happened.
I think I will finish those last few bowls EARLY today and get them out of my head before bedtime.

the last few pots of 2011

Last year we were in NH for the week between Christmas and New Years so we didn't know what to expect for gallery traffic or sales this week. We have been pleasantly surprised and have enjoyed meeting new people and making a few good sales. We have enjoyed the week with a healthy balance of slacking off and working. Jeff has been making mugs by the dozens and getting his tools organized around his wheel. In between cooking (and eating!) good food, I have finished some carved vases...

I have about a dozen finished and played around a little with the designs. I have sold quite a few of these in the last few weeks.

When the last vase was carved, I got busy throwing some shallow pasta bowls. These will also be slipped and carved. You may recall that the last round of these ended up full of shards from a re-fire explosion in the kiln. Only one survived and it has already found a new home. Today I will throw a few more. I am trying really hard to stick to working in a larger series rather than jumping around to every new idea that comes into my head. Perhaps this is my New Years resolution!

On a final note... I am paying closer attention to my Etsy shop. Between Thanksgiving and Christmas I was listing items everyday, my sales increased as did my traffic. I use Google analytics to track my page views. When I list items my traffic is anywhere from 24 to 60 hits a day. I didn't list anything this week until yesterday and my traffic had dropped steadily to only 8 visitors. After yesterday's listing I was back up to 24. If I want to increase my sales this year I know I have to stay on top of it.

I think that may be resolution #2.