This is one of those mornings when I wished I drank coffee; I’m thinking all three would be filled up today.  The mug on the left, I believe, was thrown out of porcelain clay  by local artist Dee Smart Burdick. The piece in the middle is a wood fired brown stoneware by Tom Thumb pottery in Lebanon, Maine.  I bought that piece years and years ago for $12 because I fell in love with the glaze; it was the only colorful piece surrounded by lots of terracotta pieces.   This was light years before I knew I’d someday have my own kiln to play with.  The piece on the far right, made from a red stoneware, is one that my mother picked up for me for $2 in a thrift shop in Prince Edward Island.  I think it might also have some been dipped in slip as well because of the variety in the glaze.  It’s a second due to a whomping dent in the bottom of the mug.  That handle is surprisingly comfortable.

My goal is to fill our cupboard with all pottery mugs by the end of the year; hopefully I will have made most of them.  I’m itching to play with that pottery wheel and get it mastered, but first I have to wade my way through tax returns, and then it needs to warm up down in the unheated garage.  Even hubby wants to take a spin with it which amuses me to no end.

When we moved into the house, it was just the two of us with two spare bedrooms.  Pete got one room for his tools and computer (this was pre-garage), and I got the larger of the two (very small) bedrooms as a craft room.  And then Isaac came along.  It made sense to give him the larger room, so all my stuff got shifted.  And not well, I might add.  2 1/2 years later, I can’t find a flippin thing in this house.  Once Isaac became “active” the spare room became the dumping ground for all the stuff we didn’t want him to get into.  See???

The room is 8’9″ x 9’2″ (in theory , and yes, I am aware what a total embarrassment it is.  (and this is after one whole contractor bag went out the door).  Here’s the game plan: that great big plywood bookcase?  Gone.  It’s way too deep for my needs, so it will be carted down to the garage.  In its place will be a bookcase from my shop, wide, adjustable shelving, and only about 10″ deep.  Much better.  The table in the lower left hand corner will be going over in front of the window so I can work with some natural lighting.  I have great shelving in the closet, so once I can get to it I’ll be able to stash stuff behind the door.  The walls will be sort of a coral color, or at least the window wall.  Pete will put a phone jack in there so that when our DSL is finally straightened out (HELLO FAIRPOINT!!!  ARE YOU READING THIS?  WE’RE GOING ON TWO MONTHS NOW!!!) the compter and the printer will be in there.    I have lots of cottage style boxes and other storage goodies to use, and I’m determined that I will spend NO money on this.  I have plenty of crap already

Why have I finally come to this decision?  I have an ad coming out in Creative Jewelry this summer, and I need a real workspace to get orders done.  Not that I don’t just love having to pick everything up when Isaac gets up from his naps.  I need to get serious if I want to  build a business.

Why am I posting this?  Good old accountablitiy. I’m hoping to make some major progress over the next week, so come on back and kick me in the pants if you don’t see any.  OK?  Deal?

Now I’m off to schlepp a bunch of sports equipment down to manland.

The birdhouse from the last post is on the corner of the deck in this picture.  Can you find it?  I think it’s still there…

There’s a grill in this picture:

Planning on a bisque firing tomorrow, if I can get into the garage.  If not, then a lot of the add-on presents are not getting done. 

Are we having fun yet??? 

We still don’t have power.  We lost it early friday morning at 2:30, and I don’t anticipate getting it back for another day or so.  The line workers have been busting their butts to get stuff up and running (17 hours on, 7 hours off, plus crews from New Brunswick, Michigan, and elsewhere), so I’m definitely not complaining.  Our generator powers up pretty much the whole house on very little gas (yay it’s 1.71 right now and not 4.50)–we just don’t run the washer or dryer.  Yes, I am running out of clothes.  Notice the ice buildup on the birdhouse.  About 1″.  And how about the view from our deck, overlooking the garage.  There is but one light burning on that mountain at night. 

It was so gorgeous when the sun came out on Friday.  And when I got up late at night to tend the generator, I didn’t even have to use a flashlight, since the full moon was so bright.  It looked like special effects, it was so gorgeous.  Anyway, here are some pictures.

But I did manage to get a present made the other day.  This necklace has carnelian beads, cultured pearls, and small metallic seed beads, besides the ceramic pendant.  The toggle clasp is copper. I’ve been holding onto those pearls for months, and I had an epiphany the other day as to what I wanted to do with them.  This is one of my victorian round pendants that I have available in my etsy shop, Winchell Clayworks. 

Keep your fingers crossed that we get power soon.  No power=no kiln.  I have a slew of stuff to fire for my shop and wanted to list for last minute shoppers, but I fear that I’ve now missed the boat.  So much for momentum.

 I wish it did.  I was wishing pretty hard when the box of greenware pendants that I was going to work on today at the shop went flying off the stack, down the steps, to the ground.  D0-over.  I also had a bisque football helmet that I was going to glaze up in Patriots colors for Isaac.  Crack.  I guess it was technically a fumble, and no, I did not recover.

So tonight, I’ll be cutting pendants like mad, praying that I can get them fired.  But on the plus side, the open house that I thought was scheduled for Sat is actually on Sun, so I do get an extra day.  Whoopee!

And I found my rolling pin (after I bought another one, of course).  It was at the shop, where I left it last Wed when I was cutting pendants.  Uh huh.

See, he’s made me stupid.

I spent last night flipping back and forth between Home Shopping Network and QVC.  Jewelry nights on both.  On HSN there were some gorgeous picture jasper pendants and earrings.  I can’t really remember what I saw on QVC (it was late and I was enjoying my Benedryl).   The night before Tori Spelling had some attractive pieces on HSN as well.  I never used to watch those stations until I started making jewelry; now sometimes I set the timer on the tv.

Yellow gold is big again.  And is it just me, or are there an awful lot of crosses being created?

http://mothtoflame.com/etsy_blogs.html

 I just uploaded quite a few pictures onto Indiepublic today.  I really need to get to work….