Sunday Snuggles

This is what Sundays are all about.  Hibernation!  This is my kitty, Tiger and she loves to burrow into the blankets. Can you tell by all the fur stuck to that one.  Never buy microfiber anything if you don't want fur stuck like glue all the time!  I've been playing with Picasa and Picnik tonight and having fun in the kitchen.

I made another version of my Thai tofu tonight.  I was inspired to make this after eating at our local Upper Crust Bakery where they serve this Spicy Thai Tofu so I had to google up some recipes.  The recipes are all fairly similar and call for ingredients like spicy red peppers, peanut butter, soy sauce, ginger, lime juice, cilantro, and a little brown sugar.  Tonight's version was pretty tasty but missing just a little zing.  I didn't have any cilantro or lime and I forgot the red pepper.  I also didn't have peanut butter so I substituted almond butter.  Then I used some lemon juice. It really wasn't quite right without the peanut flavor, but I still loved the crunch of my favorite water chestnuts.  One of these days I will actually record what I am putting into this and post a recipe.  Hmmm, haven't been to good with that in the past.  We shall see.

Wednesday was such a great day that the fun was bound to end somehow and how did it.  By evening there was emotional wreckage.  No one was upset at me personally but it is still hard not to react emotionally when someone else is very upset.  So that kind of threw me in a bad mood even though I tried my darnest  to go through my affirmations, positive self talk and deep breathing.  I thought I would wake up Thursday and feel a whole lot better but not so much so.  Today I decided all I would try to get done was get out in the sun.  So I went to upper park and took a short hike, relaxed on the benches in the sun and watched all the different kinds of birds.  There were lots of pretty woodpeckers in the dead trees and these other tiny birds I think that are called titmouse.  I might have saw a warbler with a pretty yellow chest of feathers and then a small bird of prey.  I better get a bird id book so I can figure them out next time.  I didn't feel like taking the camera and then, of course, I wished I had.

I also worked on uploading rewards and information for my Kickstarter Project.  I still need to make the video and put together some images also. I should have it ready to launch next week.  Tomorrow I am making my flight reservations for North Carolina. I'd be more excited right now but I am falling asleep while I am typing.

Here's a funny cup experiment idea I was working on.  Trying to make a non-funtional mug.  I like the way the green glaze breaks over the red clay. That's all she wrote.  I'm planning on making tomorrow a better day.

Celebrate Good Times!

I will preface this post by saying that I am a real person and I have lots of challenges.  Next Monday I need to go to Sacramento for a mediation conference with lawyers and claims adjusters and I am not looking forward to it.  It has the makings for an extremely stressful time.  That being said, I really do choose to try to focus on the positives. It is what keeps me going when the going gets tough.  I do a lot of deep breathing and affirmation exercises and then I rely on my friends to vent when I need to.  Dark chocolate really, really, I mean REALLY, helps too.

So now for the good stuff.  Drum roll, please.  This is the post about good and gooder, best and better, great and stupendous.  I got my last two grad school applications out in the mail today!  Yippie!  Happy dance!  Gonna have a party!

This tumbler made it into the Cups of Fire 2012 National Ceramics Competition, juried by ceramic artist, Susan Beiner.  She is a professor at Arizona State University and I absolutely love her work.  I got to see it in person at NCECA in Saint Petersburg, Florida last spring.  It is even more delicious than in pictures.  This exhibition is hosted by the Clay Gallery in Ann Arbor, Michigan.  They posted the juror's comments on their website which was really nice and I was delighted to read what she had to say about the work.  If you go to the home page of the website you can find a link to the gallery's Facebook page where they have posted images of the work that was accepted.  I am in some pretty good company in this show with the likes of Jim Connell, Justin Rothshank, Monica Ripley and tons more.

But wait...there's more!  The team at Kickstarter got back to me today to say that they had taken another look at my proposal.  They apologized for making a hasty previous decision and gave me an awesome compliment on some of the work on my blog.  Bottom line is I AM IN! Kickstarter, YOU ROCK!  I will be recommending you to every creative person I meet.  My proposal has been accepted so now I need to get on the ball, make a video proposal and get all the reward goodies in order. Once that's done I can make the official launch of my fundraiser, "Fly Me to Penland."  Giddy with elation does not quite describe the mood I am in right now!  And a little tired from burning the midnight oil on those applications.  Gonna take a little rest and then get to work, baby!

Oh Yeah!

The good news.  This mug!  I have been working hard to get this last kiln load out so I can finalize the images for my last two grad portfolios. When I saw this in the kiln I said "What the heck is that?"  Until I pulled it out and took a good look at it.  It is a complete accident.  I tried a different underglaze and the shino wasn't quite compatible.  Thankfully, I put the glaze on thin or I think it would have gotten sharp blisters all over it.  But, I hope I can repeat this as I am completely in love with it!  It is my absolute favorite of the whole kiln load.

The not so great news is that Kickstarter did not approve my initial proposal.  Hmmm...   I couldn't really figure out why but I think I may not have worded things correctly.  I asked them for feedback and am waiting a reply.  Perhaps I can give it another go.  We'll see.  Here are some more images of tonights kiln load.

Ok, gotta get these added to my portfolio and get some z's.

Kickstarter Fundraiser "Fly Me to Penland"

Some of you already know that I will be going to Penland School of Crafts in March for eight weeks to work and study with ceramic artist, Kathy King. The class is titled "Looking Over Your Shoulder" and will include lessons in ceramic history, various surface decoration techniques and firing at cone 6 in oxidation and soda firings.  I can't wait for the soda firings!  I feel very blessed to be able to go to this class.  I had no way to afford the class, even with a work-study scholarship so I applied for the studio assistantship position.  And lo and behold, I GOT it!  My end of the bargain is working for 24-40 hours a week in exchange for my tuition, room and board.

The only thing my award does not cover is my travel expenses, materials costs and firing fees.  I also expect I will want to ship home some of the work I make while I am there.  In order to get the funds together I am starting a Kickstarter fundraising campaign.  Kickstarter is the most amazing program to raise funds for all manner of creative projects for artists, designers, dancers, musicians, and more.  The way kickstarter works is that participants offer rewards in exchange for the funds being donated.  These could be copies of work, limited editions, fun experiences, etc.  Tonight, a couple of minutes ago actually, I submitted my initial proposal for my project.  As soon as it is approved I will launch it and let everyone know.  I've got some wonderful rewards that I am thinking about offering so keep on the look out and start thinking about whether you and your friends would be interested in supporting my project.  Have a great weekend and stay warm and dry where here in Northern California we are finally getting rain but we are getting it all at once!

The road leading up to the main campus.

Almost there!

Yes, it really is this gorgeous here!  This is a view of the clay studio and kiln yard (middle buildings) and printmaking( in the back on the left.)  The great thing about being here is the inspiration from the surrounding landscape and the other studios where we are encouraged to do some cross disciplinary investigations and collaborate with other artists.  There are studios for glass, blacksmithing, metals and jewelry, textiles, clay, sculpture, woodworking, letterpress, and photography.  Let's see, did I forget anything?  It is just amazing and like no where else on earth!

Hope you can help out:)

-Love

Making Molds While the Sun Still Shines

We haven't had rain since the early rain of October.  Let me tell you it is dry, dry, dry!  Now storms are on the horizon again and we are supposed to get a good amount of rain with a number of systems backed up to come in the next few days.  So today was run around and do stuff outside day.  The rabbit got her cage cleaned out and the last of the fall leaves got racked out of the yard.  Even with the hard freeze last night I was pretty warm with all the racking and cleaning.  I thought, why not pour those molds I've had prepped for two weeks.  It was nice working outside but I forgot how much time it takes to make these things and I was pretty cold by the time I was done working.

Now that I've had a warm bowl of roasted red pepper and tomato soup I'm ready to relax and paint up some more of these flat-rimmed plates.  Hand painting underglaze is kind of tedious.  These would have been great candidates for paper stencils but when I made them six months ago I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with them.  Now I want them to match the shino mugs and tumblers that I have been making.  I think these are going to look pretty nice when they are done.

Moon Over the Bay

Took my mom to UCSF Medical for an appointment today and tomorrow. After the appointment today I needed to find the closest post office so I could overnight a grad application.  While I was walking back to the car I discovered Peasant Pies.  So Yum!  I got the garbanzo with curry and it was spicy and delicious.
After a rest we got picked up by a friend and headed out to get an ice cream at Mitchell's.  This ice cream shop has been in San Francisco for 50 years and has some great flavors.  I got the cinnamon ginger snap.  Afterwords we headed up to Twin Peaks for a view of the bay.

Ho hum dee dum.

Recently another blogger (you know who you are) encouraged me to post more often.  So the past few days I have been thinking about what prevents me from posting on a more regular basis. What I notice is that I have a tendency to only post about positive things and I usually want to have a nice picture or two or three to go with my post.  Then the question becomes why do I only want to post about positive things when there is so much more that makes up my everyday life.  I'm not sure if it is because I want my readers to think that everything is perfect in my life or if it is because I am trying to paint a pretty picture for myself.  In general I really try to have a glass is half full type of outlook on life.  It takes so much energy to be frustrated, stressed, or angry at myself or others.  I would rather spend my energy being happy and productive with my creative endeavors.

However, with all these positive posts, I realize that I am not sharing the real me.  The me who gets stressed out and has problems just like everyone else.  Which brings me to today.  I am happy because I have a bisque load coming out but I am feeling quite melancholic.  I have been working to help a loved one take advantage of an opportunity and it just doesn't seem like that is going to come to fruition.  There are extenuating circumstances which are too personal to share, but suffice it to say that it is disappointing. It is hard to let go of things that maybe aren't meant to be or that the timing just isn't right for.  Even though it is not that important in the larger scheme this disappointment still feels like a loss.  I know I will get over this soon and life will get on and it probably will only take a few hours until I am back to my perky self.  For now, sorry, no cute pictures.  I just feel a little too ho hum.

Kickin' Back

We've been quite spoiled here in Northern California lately.  I'm not complaining!  I went up to the park today in capris and a short sleeve t-shirt to soak up some rays.  I can feel the days starting to get a teensy, weeny bit longer already and every little bit of light helps.  I do fear with all this gorgeous weather that if I doesn't rain sometime soon we may be in for a bit of a draught.  But knock on wood, winter has only just begin.  I think I need some more sun, though.  Check out those lily white winter legs!

I really, really wanted to hike down to the creek and sit on that little beach there.  Except for there being no leaves on the trees it looked deceptively like a beautiful summer day.  I could just imaging jumping into that refreshing water in late August.

But the path goes almost straight down and it was over wet, slippery rocks and I could just see myself falling and breaking a leg.  Maybe not the best way to start out the new year.  No, I think not.

So, instead I basked in front of this big basalt rock.  The sun was so bright it made my eyes tear up just trying to keep them open a split second to take this pic.  Love the shadow of me on the rock.

I'm lichen this rock. He he he!

This one looks like a mini mountain.  I love the cleft.

May you have a clear view in 2012.  Happy New Year!

Penland and Christmas and All That

I surprised my mom today with this fun hand built, textured, oval vase.  Surprising her with potter is pretty hard, she can sniff it out like a bloodhound.  Luckily, this was cooling in a kiln and just came out Friday morning and got wrapped up in box before none were the wiser.  Phew.  She was delighted as she hardly ever sees anything from me not built on the wheel.  I really had fun with this little experiment and want to work on some more.

I blame my absence from my blog to continued work on my grad school applications.  I have most of the apps submitted and some of the portfolio's done.  I should bite the bullet and submit the portfolios but I still have time to get a few more good pieces through the kiln.  If not, I have the images ordered and ready to upload and burn to disk.  I will breathe a deep sigh of relief when they are all done and then comes the waiting part.  Ugh!

Luckily I will be too busy working to worry.  I just found out that I have been awarded a studio assistantship at Penland School of Crafts.  This it for their spring eight week concentration with artist, Kathy King.  I was so excited when I found out that it took a couple of days to get down out of the clouds.  I really can't wait to go back to North Carolina.  I had such a wonderful time last June.

Here is another fun piece I gave my mom.  She saw me making it and just had to have it.  But I kept it over at the studio for the last month so it hasn't been on her mind.

About a week ago I was able to get these three mugs into a cone ten gas reduction firing and I am in love with them.  The one in the middle is my favorite.  I dipped the shino and next time I will try spraying for more control.  I want to get more of the orange color so I need to get the glaze on thinner.  I have some more of these mugs all ready to go plus some other forms to apply the paper resist and underglaze to.  Can't wait to see how they turn out.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Open House and New Work

If you happen to be in Chico, CA tomorrow come on by and say hello.  Our host, the illustrious, Pat Koszis, went to Penland School of Crafts last summer and had such a great time that we all decided we wanted to go.  In order to raise some funds to attend a workshop we decided to have this holiday sale.  So if you want to help us get to Penland next summer come on down!

Since I promised, oh so long ago, to upload some images of what I have been working on, ta dah!  Here they are.

I started playing around with paper resist and underglazes and am really learning a lot. I'm so used to firing cone 10 reduction that some of this has a bit of a learning curve now at cone 6.  I am loving the direction this is taking.  My mom and I are already fighting over the red plate above.  It is luscious and the satin was in the perfect spot to cool slowly.

I started this body of work with tumblers and then moved on to the mugs.  When I started everything looked like the mug in the flyer above but I felt like they just needed a little something so I started adding texture and staining them.  Love! Love! Love!

Boo Boo Kitty and other fun things.

My Little Leopard Dipping bowl up there to the left made it into this super fun treasury this morning on Etsy so I'm happy about that.  It is a gorgeous sunny day here in Northern California.  No fog which is awsome.  The wind is blowing and all of the fall leaves are racing through the air and getting kicked up by the car tires.  It is really beautiful.  However, I did have to chuckle a bit as the leaf blowers were trying to work around in the wind.  Seemed a bit counter productive.

I still haven't set up my little kiln yet but I did get a small slab roller.   Woo hoo, thanks, Kathleen.  It should be perfect and is just the right size for my little basement.  It is almost set up and soon I can get to experimenting.  I bought a couple of hand carved wood Indian block stamps from Amanda James on Etsy and as soon as they get here I am going to try them out on some slabs.  I can't wait, they are transit right now. One more thing, I'm also part of the Etsy Mud Team so I'm excited about that also.

I have quite a few new pieces out of the kiln and will get to posting some images after I get some of my grad school applications sent out.  Priorities, you know?  Have a delightful fall day wherever you are, or spring if you are on the other side of the world.

My Vegetarian Thanksgiving

Yesterday we cooked the traditional turkey and all the trimmings for the meat eaters.  However, I have recently decided to go vegetarian so I had to come up with something else for myself.  Who knew that tofu and brussel sprouts could be so delicious?  I got the inspiration for this dish from the blog 101 Cookbooks.  The recipe is called Carmelized Tofu.  I adjusted it to use sliced, roatsed almonds because I had no pecans and I also tossed in some dried cranberries and sesame seeds. Then I substituted maple syrup instead of brown suger.  I made the sauteed brussel sprouts and put it all on top of some nice, fluffy quinoa with a splash of Bragg's Liquid Aminos and a little sesame oil.  Oh my gosh, I was in heaven, and no turkey, mashed potato food coma!  Now if I could have stayed away from the pumpkin pie and vanilla ice cream that would have been another story altogether.

Other fun stuff going on includes my new (ahem, used) little kiln baby.  I drove out of town on Wednesday to snatch her up.  I can't wait to try her out.  We have the 220 outlet in the laundry room but the room is so tiny only the washer and dryer fit in there.  So, alas, I will have to get a small shed or run the proper electric out to the garage.  But, oh I am itching to try her out!

Last, but not least, my Black Friday/Cyber Monday Etsy sale is in full swing and is proving to be pretty successful so far.  Most of the work in the shop are one of a kind items, so if there is anything you would like to purchase you might want to head on over there and get it before it gets snapped up.

20% Off Sale in My Etsy Shop!

Shop homemade for the holidays on my fabulous handmade pottery Etsy store!  Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Winter Wonderland

My reindeer tea bowl made it into this lovely Etsy Treasury today! This treasury was curated by Kristin Gabriel of Trunk Couture.  Have a great Saturday everyone!

Constructing Elements

Lately I have been thinking about how to make some mixed media work so while I was working on photos for my website I decided to start playing around with compositions of different ceramic elements. 

For now I am just using the ceramic elements but I felt like a kid again playing with my building blocks.  It is rather freeing to allow oneself to play like a child.  Now my mind is thinking of what different kind of elements I can add or structures I can build to put these in or hang them on or any number of crazy and fun things.

I am suddenly feeling a trip to the scrap yard coming on and my hands are itching to get a saw into some wood and metal and start creating!

Maybe some yard sales if it doesn't rain tomorrow.  Hmmm...mind is racing.

Magic in the Park

I've been pretty busy lately.  I would like to say that I have been super, crazy busy but I don't think that I am being that efficient with my time.  Either that or I have unrealistic notions of just how much I can fit into each day.  Or it might be that I spend too much time surfing the internet.  Hmmm...   Anyway my grad school applications are coming along nicely and I have gotten the worst part of it out of the way.  I have been making work to add to my portfolio and I have been editing images so that I can update my website. Since I have been spending a lot of time in either a dark room in front of the computer or in my basement studio I decided that I absolutely HAD TO get out of the house and out from under the trees and get into some the wide open space with sunlight.  Of course I had to grab my camera just in case.

I headed up to Upper Bidwell Park which is one of my most favorite places to go.  It always holds some kind of magic for me no matter when I go.  But this time was a special treat.  I'm not sure that I have been there before when the leaves are changing.  It was absolutely gorgeous there this afternoon.  Everything had that special glow about it.  I really felt like I had entered into some kind of fantasy realm.  Everything was entrancing. I was only going for a short drive through the park but it ended being a three hour walking photo shoot.  It was very relaxing and inspiring and now I feel like I need to go back everyday, all day.  Sigh, too bad other things have to get done.  Maybe I'll bring some of these colors into my work?  I have to justify more research, you see.

Oh the enchantment of it all.  I'm kind of lazy when it comes to writing creatively although I do have my aspirations.  This makes me want to sit down and write poetry.  I love the images but they don't recreate the smells and sounds like the hawk talking or the owl hooting or the silent, delicate flight of the bats skimming over the lake.  I didn't want to leave but the sun was going down and it was getting dark and colder by the creek so I decided I would end my adventure and try to get back home and back to work.  But this is what I found when I got back to my car...  And that meant I had to stay for another hour.  Smile.

 

 Yes, a truly delightful day!