We're having a heat wave.....

a tropical heat wave.......

Here are a few photos of what we are up to:

Return from a successful show

We have returned from the Des Moines show where we were very well received much to our surprise and delight. In our book, it was a four box show. That means we came back with four empty boxes!!!! (That's good.)
Here are the Cliff Notes:
The schedule was grueling; the weather unbearably hot. As we told many customers, we forgot what Iowa summers were like....super hot and humid.
When we arrived to setup on Friday, there was another artist set up in our space. (That was a first but she was able to relocate in her correct space.)
The Des Moines Register honored us with a short article in the Saturday edition which helped immensely. It focused on our Iowa connections: Steve's being raised in Winterset, Iowa not far from Des Moines, both of us attending Coe College in Cedar Rapids and our first studio being in Lone Tree close to Iowa City.
The funny thing was that so many people from Winterset came to greet Steve at the show.
It was so sweet! and then we had our fair share of college acquaintances show up as well. What a riot!
After the show, we drove up to Marshalltown, Iowa to stay a day with our friends Dennis and Liz. Steve grew up with Dennis. The next day we drove over to Iowa City and got to visit Russell, our woodworker friend, eat a dinner made by Doreen and stay over at Barb and Jane's. All were our friends when we had our studio there in 1975-83. Lots of socializing for two country potters like us.
We thoroughly enjoyed it all.

I didn't, however, take photos.... nor did we post an entry on this blog or Facebook. If I regret taking any photos it would be of the Big Sky of the Mid West. Once past Cleveland, the trees were reduced to a tenth of the image out of our windshield. Ah! we could breathe again........ beautiful.

and then when we returned home to the Catskills today, it was Ah! what lovely woods, streams and mountains!

We feel so grateful to live in such a beautiful and bountiful country. Happy fourth of July to you all!

Two more kilnloads

The last couple of days have been spent firing and packing. We fired two more kilns, packed the MET order into the first boxes (we double box), packed and sent more gallery orders and packed for the Des Moines Arts Festival this coming weekend. Whew! I'm looking forward to sitting in the car for a while!
This was a beauty!

By the way, if you are anywhere close to Des Moines, Iowa, we will be in space #LN15C on Locust close to 13th. The 2010 Des Moines Arts Festival in located on Locust & Grand between 16th and 10th St. around the John & Mary Pappajohn Sculpture Park. The show hours are June 25 Friday from 4pm to 10 pm, June 26 Saturday from 10am to 10pm and June 27 Sunday from 10am to 6pm. We'd love to see you there!

Firing 6/19

We are firing, glazing and firing steadily right now to finish up some more orders and get ready for a couple of retail shows.

Above is one of the bisque firings. We did two before starting to glaze this time. Below both of us are glazing and waxing pots.

Here's last night's firing and more to fire tonight....

Orders sent

This first photo is a group of pots sent to Sroka Design in Bethesda, MD. Skip Sroka is a designer rather than a gallery owner.

The second photo is an order is for The Turtle Gallery in Deer Isle, Maine which is where Haystack School of Crafts is located. Steve attended Haystack in the summer of 1973 (ouch!) and I went in 1974 (ouch ouch!) 

 The pots to the left are a few that the Douglas Albert Gallery in State College, PA had to wait for us to finish and send. Doug has a very interesting gallery in McAllister Alley...
you'd spend a lot of time looking through it.
















 and finally, here are a few individual orders we've recently sent out.

306 and counting!

After a week of glazing and firing, we now have a total of 306 little #110 minis completed. They have not been inspected and approved for shipment yet but here they are filling our living room! We still have another 30 or so as backups to replace any that don't meet our standards. The order for the Metropolitan Museum of Art catalog is for 300.

Now we'll turn our attention to other orders and our upcoming fair in Des Moines, Iowa June 25-27.

Firing, Firing, Firing

Now for the results of all our work. Steve has been glazing, glazing & glazing then firing, firing & firing.
I've been helping on those and continuing to make our Baltimore orders. With the fair season just about to begin, we are anxious to make some more pieces for retail as well. Our schedule right now is full and most likely will remain that way until August.