Small steps at a time...

just keep working...just keep working...

Making something...

Warming up.

Making progress...

Here's a very gritty picture of the studio space that Adam and I carved out of our garage this Sunday! We had a great day working together! I love working with Adam - somehow we don't usually get in each others way, we cooperate well and share work - there isn't a huge amount of discussion even - we often think the same thing at the same time... so - great weekend - a bit of beer, some public radio in the background, and a bunch of stuff got moved around.

I'm still not sure if I want to switch the position of the table and shelf ... but it will work to begin with. The empty space on the left will house our wheel. We bought some more of STARworks White cone 10 clay last week, and we'll be ready to rock'n'roll this week... I think.

After last post here, I took a thermometer to the garage, to see just HOW cold it is there, and it's been steadily around 40 - 45 F. On sunny days we can open up the garage and it will help greatly in warming the space. Right now a tiny but efficient electric heater will have to do. SO - I'm about to eat my words, and start working in the 40's F...

Oh, boy. An update is long overdue. It's that time of the year when Adam is spending most of his time containing leaks in our old building at STARworks, and I'm trying to plan out the next growing season etc. I find that I'm spending most of my time these days communicating and trying to connect all the different sources of communication. Like linking up blogs with FB and trying to put FB links up on blogs... We really are living in communication age - whether this type of communication is deep enough to sustain us - is yet to be seen.

So, what's been going on here at WhatNot Pottery recently?

Some snow sculpture making...

Some spinning...

Some more spinning...

and MORE spinning...

and, oh, did I say I've been spinning?

Sorry to bombard you with all those haunting images of yarn - can you tell where my interests are these days?

There's been a bit of knitting also - this scarf - spun the yarn myself - is my first lace knitting, and will be shipped to my mom soon!

And Adam - SURPRISE! - has been making more sock people. I think they are adorable. They went on a little frolicking out in the snow yesterday and I quickly took a few pix. Didn't get them all (believe me, they are taking over the house!) as I got my toes wet and cold chasing them in the yard...

This guy has a brother. He's hiding behind the tree.
Rastaman!
These guys are brothers too. Looking hopefully into the future...

I did make a quick round in the studio at work today, and realized we're out of clay, so I guess we HAVE BEEN making SOME things here and there... shelves are full of plates, cups and platters that need to be fired... oh I wish I had a little bourry box wood salt kiln!

But mostly it's been too cold at work and in the garage at home. I read other potters blogs occasionally (the list is extensive, so takes longer to go through it these days) like Gary Rith's and Sophia's Dad's blog - and those guys - talking about their studio temps being in the 40's and they're working in there?! Screw that I say. I once used to do that... Now I just opt to spin in the comfort of my living room while waiting for the cold to get the heck out of here, so I can open the garage door and let some light and air in there! Why is that the people from north become such vussies about cold after moving to south? I don't get it. But it's happened.

back from the dead

today's blogfinds.

Poppytalk

Claudia Pearson Illustration

enjoy

'tis the season

Adam's mushroom find (see kriipseldus.blogspot.com) prompted me to take a walk in the woods after I got home today. I love the woods in the fall/winter - it's more inviting - everything opens up, there are hardly any spider webs, no bugs... you can walk in peace, see far and breathe the crisp air... well, today the air was hardly crisp. We're having another warm spell. SO. Look what I found! Lions Mane - Hericium erinaceus by it's Latin name.

I've never been lucky to find one of those before!

This one looks slightly bit old, or maybe just soggy from all the crazy rain we had last night.

Anyways - since we're already going to have a mushroom orgy tonight I've got my mind set to sauteing this baby up with some butter and onions for the first tasting. I made a mental note about it's whereabouts in the woods, so during this winter there will be more excursions into the wilderness - to harness the power of 'mother earth'.

As a kid we gleaned the woods every fall for wild mushrooms - mmmh, -can still recall the different tastes of different types of shrooms... anyways, since I don't roam the woods quite as frequently as I did in childhood, I'd forgotten, how sometimes the woods are friendly, eager to offer the goods... but more often you need to earn it's trust. It takes at least 30 minutes of slow quiet walking, pausing often to look, hear and breathe, before you start SEEING. And sometimes nothing happens. You come out as blind as you walked in.

Well, this time I had just decided to stop looking, and walk back to the house, when I noticed something small glowing on a dead wood... that's right. Oyster mushroom. A small cluster of shrooms that must have just popped out the log. And down on the forest floor on a different log there were some light gray ones- probably a different strand... Picked them all. Yep. Took these pix with my I-phone. Yep. looked at the compass on my I-phone to remember the direction of the gold mine. Yep. Did I tell you I thought that thing (I-phone) was a stupid fad and it took Adam at least 2 years to convince me to give up my stone age bare bones Nokia and replace it with this "small-world-in-the-palm-of-your- hand" thingie? I was afraid it would overwhelm me and take over my world... I dont "LOVE" mine as some people seem to. But I do find it to be a convenient tool that helps minimize the amount of gadgets I used to haul around (phone, watch, camera, battery recharger, different cables for everything jada jada jada)

Allright. Got off the topic here. Oh, the beauty of exploring the wilderness with the help of modern gadgets... ("yes I love technology... but not as much as you - you see... but still I love technology" - to you, the Napoleon Dynamite fans out there)

After picking those pearls of mushrooms I thought myself lucky and humbly decided it was enough, I was not gonna push it any more (Adam had already picked a mega -load at I'm-not- telling-you-where).

But whaddayaknow. Looking back to where I had come from - was that beauty!

Seriously. those things look like porcelain... only they're soft and fragrant and firm and squishy and so perfect no man/woman can ever make something so perfect!!! Oh, I am going to eat those beautiful things tonight!

Falling into winter...

This blog has been sort of quiet lately... even though Adam and I have both been sharing the garage/studio with the visiting(over-wintering) mice more than usual. Adam finished painting monster plates that Trace-man made earlier in the summer, and I have revisited some old ideas, for lack of new ones... I really need to have my hands in the material at all times to keep the work moving forward. So... - I guess, the times are reflective. Another year is about to end. Sometimes I wish we did not have calendars and the time would just move like a river, without the days being numbered...

It's been a while since I checked out Vicky Grima's blog, but pop over and check it out. At least other people are doing some cool work. I also reconnected with an old friend, Edita Rydhag, from Sweden, who's work I have always admired, and who I've missed talking to! She is a little woman with an incredible strength. And she makes some pretty big work:)