mental breakdowns

my life is overloaded right now. many questions need to be answered, choices to be made...

as for life in WhatNot Pottery - Hitomi and Takuro were gracious to put a few of my cups in their last firing, even tho I showed up when they were bricking up the door... Thank's guys! they turned out sweet... and I packed them up this morning to attempt a first sale in a LOOOOOOONG time... but not much more to say about that now, other than I didn't take any pictures...

these are some of the latest cups with line drawings. I'm stuck on the cup format. and drawing scribble scrabble...

this weekend we're helping David fire his big ol' kiln. it may be the last firing for that mama. I think Chad and David are loading it as I write this.

Life's hard to manage - especially for those of us who are control freaks. chaos ensues.

Some'o'my shapes

SO, the beautiful weather has kept me outside most of the days. Planting.

But we did move the wheel in to the workspace (somehow "studio" just doesn't ring right to my ears...) it took over a week to pull together the courage to slam some clay on it and give it a spin... There too - baby steps... the same old shapes and sizes are still in the hands...

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