Juggling work and moving

I spent part of this week making pots for wood firing. Since we will be leaving this Japanese Maple tree very soon, I decided I should make pots with the leaves while I still can.

 I also revisited an old form.

The clay is StarWorks "Seagrove Clay". I am really not crazy about throwing with it, but it looks great wood fired and can really take the heat. I scrapped a couple of forms because I thought they were too heavy. There is something about the grogginess of this clay that gives me poor judgement as to wall thickness. I also threw some mugs and tumblers with my favorite Laguna B-mix for wood. I really love the buttery look of B-mix when wood fired. I didn't bother with photos of them. They are simple pots that the wood kiln will kiss with it's magic (hopefully).

The bisque kiln was loaded on Friday and fired slowly on Saturday. I am really excited about the large shallow bowl at the top! I threw a few large bowls, and carved them before the New Hampshire trip. I didn't get to really look at them until I returned home. I won't take a chance with them in the wood kiln. I am probably going to spray them with ash glaze and fire them in our own gas kiln.

In between the work, we do a little packing each day. Jeff and his brother are installing new doors in the basement today. Things are slowly taking shape.

Kitchen Facelift

Jeff had one day to recover from jet lag and then it was back to house renovations. The kitchen is our top priority before we move in completely. First order was to remove all the cabinet doors. No easy task, since all of the hinges had been painted over. It was a chore to get them off and when we paint and replace them, they will get all new hinges... never to be painted again.

 The interiors of the cabinets are three different colors, pink, green, and off-white. They are absolutely disgusting, inside and out. We made the decision to replace the countertop, sink, and cooktop. Last month we bought a dishwasher on sale, and that has already been delivered, just not installed. The countertop will be something inexpensive that will coordinate with the island. It's not financially possible for us to do it all right now. At this point we are just looking for clean and neat.

This house has a large living room and a good size den. We only had a chair for the den which was going to make it a rather sparsely furnished room. A neighbor potter is moving and she had a sofa for sale at a great price, so we snatched it up!

It's a sofa-bed and was a b!tch to move! It had to come down a short flight of stairs at her house. Thankfully at our house it only had to be moved through the carport and into the first room. A few new pillows from IKEA and the sofa looks great. This is the room with the lovely wagon wheel light...

That light really has to go. I am just not into the wild west decor.