Choices

We'll be going to our first summer art fair this coming weekend. We'll start off close to home with the Rhinebeck Crafts Fair at the Dutchess County Fairgrounds just across the Hudson River from us. Since it is a two day show with setup on Friday, we'll pack pots on Thursday and load up the van Friday morning before going over to set up.
But what pots go and what pots don't?? That's the question.

mountain laurels

The mountain laurels are in full bloom now. Here are a couple of photos and the small floral piece I am offering this year that they inspired. It was difficult to do them justice...

Kiln firing 6/7/09

We have had two firings in the last week. Most of the space in the firings has been used for tiles for our floor. We are refiring some that didn't meet our standards, so we can finish laying the major part of the floor. By spraying a little more glaze onto the surface of the tiles, the glaze on most evened out. So the firings have been mostly tile and a few pots. We have two electric kilns which we use for either the first, lower bisque firing or the second, higher glaze firing. The first firing is done to facilitate handling the pots while glazing them. Since the pots are quite fragile before the bisque firing, we usually try to at least complete that part of the process asap. Then they can sit on our studio shelves until we are ready to do a couple of glaze firings. If we are working towards completing some special or many pieces before a certain date, we might just bisque pots as soon as we have enough to fill a kiln and continue making pots, accumulating them for a while. Then we will set aside a week to glaze and fire a lot of pots at once.

Tiling the Living Room Floor

We will be traveling a lot from the end of June through August to our retail shows. If we were to start tiling our living room this year, it had to be started now. We've been making the tile for several years, fitting it in between our making pots. It isn't our focus so we are not set up for production of tiles. However, we thought we could try to do the edging on the living room floor since we had to redo the floor anyway. When we had professionals put in the hardwood floor several years ago, we decided to leave an L shape around the wood stove and the east windows unfinished for our tile. It is impossible to have orchids by the windows which need spraying every morning and a wood floor. Here are a few snapshots of Steve laying the tile. They have our Arts & Crafts green glaze on them. It will probably take us all summer into fall off and on to complete this project including making special shaped tiles to fit a lot of areas and the grouting and sealing. Hopefully we will finish before our frost date in October when the plants come back inside! In the meantime, the interior of the house will be topsy turvy for a while.

Kiln firing 5/25/09

We just unloaded a kiln firing and wanted to share some photos.

Here's Steve glazing some pots before they are fired and then unloading the finished pieces. Glazing usually takes us two sometimes three days, depending on the detail of the pieces.

The firing is done overnight. Steve usually gets up 3-4 times during the night to check on its progress even though it is in a programmable kiln.

Most of the pots in the kiln were for our upcoming retail shows but a few were orders.

Steve's Small Geometrics

Continuing our description of new work, here are some of Steve's small geometrics in different glazes.

This first one has two glazes with a pod like design.

The second one features our new glaze with a woven design.

The third design is almost floral and is glazed in our usual matt arts & crafts green glaze.

And the final is using a riot of color but still very arts & crafts.

May in the Catskills

Welcome!
Here in the Catskill Mtns. of New York, Steve and I are enjoying a lovely spring. Everyday we discover a new form as nature unfolds her beauty. I made a series of small floral pots this year. Some of you saw them at the Baltimore ACC show.

Here are a few photos:

Dogwood & Trout Lily

Bleeding Hearts
















We are very fortunate to have a native Lady Slipper in our woods.
This is the piece I made of it.