A Few New Things

A stamped pedestal bowl, hand built and altered on the wheel.

Steamboat Rocking Bottle with Wave Pattern, hand built

Skully Mugs, wheel thrown with applique

Chicken Coop Construction!

This slide show chronicles our chicken coop construction. The coop was built using recycled, upcycled, and salvaged materials and still looks great!

Because of the nature of upcycling, we had to spot engineer through most of the project. If anyone is interested, we will upload our initial plans and materials list. Essentially, we purchased fasteners, 4x4 posts, 2 sheets of plywood, and a handful of 2x4s. The rest of the wood was salvaged from pallets, a demoed pergola, and our old kitchen cabinets. The windows were pulled from the dump. The tin roof was taken from our old, giant doghouse, the body of which was recycled to become our compost bin.

Extruded Vases

It's been a long time since we posted to our blog, but we promise we have been busy!

We've been making a large number of extruded vases lately. Square or round tubes are formed with our extruder. Then, we stamp the clay with hand-carved roulettes, or rolling stamps. For the square ones, we have cut some pieces of oak that just fit the interior contour so we can stamp them without altering their shape.

The finished vases hover between casual and elegant.
We keep them a bit loose as that suits our personalities.

We are hoping to complete a large number of these in the coming weeks to supply a couple of retailers and to prepare for an upcoming show.

Pen Cushions Complete

Pen Cushions

I started off the day thinking about Ikebana in a pillow form. I wanted the form to be multi-functional so folks could decide whether to use them for flowers, pens, toothbrushes, or paint brushes.


Once I finished a couple of forms, I realized there was no way to get a pin frog into them. Duh! I did manage to put little divots in the inside, but there is no way to know how they will work for flowers until they are glazed and fired.


So, in my mind I went from ikebana to pen-kebana. Yeah, the term leaves a lot to be desired. As I worked on different shapes, they became more pillow-like and hence, pen cushions they are! This last one really illustrates my love of puns.


When the tufting didn't meet on the bottom, I created a seam. Hopefully I didn't take the pun too far!

Carving Clay Stamps Tutorial

We frequently use stamps in our work. There are many commercial stamps available to buy that are okay to use in your work. There are also quite a few that are not, so be sure to carefully check each maker's angel policies and copyright information. We personally feel that the only way to preserve our personal style is to create stamps ourselves or trade one-offs with other artists.

To make stamps, you'll need some scrap clay, not too wet. All sorts of tools can be used to carve and mark the clay. A set of small loop tools will come in handy. Our favorites include a dull pencil, a scrap of steel, needle tools, a double ball stylus, and a knife of some sort. The final tool is some canned air. This is not a must, but it is a lot better than blowing away bits of clay until you are dizzy!

We start with a ball of scrap clay. We shape the ball into a cylinder, cube, or mushroom shape. We create quite a few stamp cubes with designs on 6 sides. This helps to keep our collection compact.

After the base shape is created, we clean up the sides with a fettling knife. Cubes tend to have an indention in the center of each side, so it helps to shave off the high edges. Now leave your base alone until it is leather hard.

So now that your base is leather hard, it is time to create a pattern for your stamp. Of course, you can carve directly into the block without a sketch. If you are nervous, you can draw onto a small piece of paper with a washable marker. Then place your sketch face down on the clay and rub gently with your finger. When you pull the paper away, your design will be transferred to the clay!

You may also use your computer and ink jet printer to create your designs. We find the computer to be exceptionally helpful for complex designs or lettering. Use the same method to transfer your image to the block. Just remember, with both methods, your image will be reversed on your block, but then stamp true to your original.

Now it is time to begin carving. There are no rules here. Use whatever works the best for your design. Just make sure your clay is leather hard. If it is too soft, the base will warp as you try to carve and your design will not stamp well. You will also find the bits of clay you are carving away will stick themselves back to the stamp.

The canned air comes in handy now to blow away the bits of clay that have been carved away. The deeper the carving, the better the stamps will work. Just be sure not to undercut your design or it will hang up in your clay when you are using it.

If you are working on a cube, go ahead and carve the remaining 5 sides. Carve around a cylinder to create a roulette (a rolling stamp), or carve each end to make circular stamps. Carve the top of a mushroom shaped base to create an ergonomic stamp that will work particularly well in bowls. Once you have finished carving, gently test your stamps in soft clay. Do this only once or twice or the stamp may alter.

In a short time, you can carve quite a few stamps. Often, simple and even ugly stamps create patterns that are very appealing. Don't rule out a design until you have tested it. Once you have completed all of your stamps, allow them to dry completely. This may take weeks for cubes. We test for dryness by touching items to our lips. If they are still cool to the touch, they are not completely dry. When they are completely dry, bisque fire them. Now they are ready to help you create amazing works of art!

Speak Out Against CPSIA

As of yesterday, millions of perfectly safe toys, books, and articles of clothing were removed from store shelves and sent to the landfill. The Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act is a piece of landmark legislation that was crafted after last year's influx of tainted toys from China.

So, whose interests does this law REALLY protect? I would expect to see that consumer advocate groups were on the forefront of lobbying for this bill. Well, they are not. It turns out that this bill was written in part by big toymakers. Mattel, whose tainted toys kicked off this issue, helped to write this bill and increased their lobbying budget by 442% in order to push this bill through. Hasbro, who had never even hired a lobbyist before, spent over $500,000 lobbying on behalf of this bill. http://www.dcexaminer.com/opinion/columns/TimothyCarney/Washington-toy-story-shows-why-regulation-helps-the-big-guys38690727.html

So why would these big toymakers take an interest in requiring costly testing of their own products? Simply, because they can afford to test their products while smaller companies and artisan toymakers cannot.

So, who is this law hurting? Your kids. My kids. Libraries. The environment. And the list goes on.

In spite of the fact that no child has ever been injured by licking the pages of a book, this law is declaring that all books printed before 1985 are considered unsafe. If you cannot afford to put vintage books through testing, it is legally safer to throw them away then test them. Even libraries are not exempt. Libraries could be forced to destroy a huge part of their collections as of February 10, 2009. Yes, as of yesterday. http://angiemedia.com/?p=925

Thrift and consignment shops have also been put in a compromising position. Initially, they were believed to be exempt, but this law is so broad, that they have now been swept into the fray. Any articles of clothing that have zippers, snaps, or plastic buttons are suspect. Also suspect are board games that contain ANY metal or plastic components. Add jigsaw puzzles printed before 1985 to the list. Of course, this law prohibits the reselling of bikes, trikes, backpacks, strollers, car seats, and anything else containing any metal or plastic that have not been individually tested.

The penalties for selling untested items are as high as $100,000 fine and jail time even if an item has not been deemed unsafe! The same toys that were perfectly safe and legal last week and now contraband.

http://overlawyered.com/2009/02/cpsia-what-will-be-enforced/

While the CPSA has declared it will not require testing for one year, other government agencies could step in and enforce this law. Please, call your representatives and let them know that this law hurts children more than it protects them. Soon we will have no choice in who to buy our children's clothing and toys from. The only ones who will be able to stay in business will be the biggest corporations. No wonder they lobbying so hard for this law. They were only interested in protecting themselves.

Waiting is so Hard

The hardest part about making pots is waiting for the kiln to cool. The last 500˚ seem to take forever and the two year old inside just screams, "I want to see NOW!!"


We agonizingly check over and over and watch the number drop slowly - usually about one degree per minute. Finally, we get below 150˚ and open it up to find things like this and it is all worth it.

I'm almost Embarrassed!

Seriously. It has been a long time since I added to this blog. I do have a good excuse, though. This year, the holidays season kicked our rumps and bled us dry! We are so grateful to all of our customers, but when New Years rolled around, we collapsed in two heaps.

We are just now recovered from the mass shippings and rushed custom orders. Did I say how grateful we are? Before we get back to REAL WORK (not that doing what you love to make a living is ever REAL WORK), we decided to revisit some old haunts.


Ten years ago, I did a series of rocking bottles. I only stopped because my exploration of them was interrupted by a wedding (ours), a house buying, moving, and shop opening. This year, we decided we really needed to go back and explore this form again while we have the time. The first in the series has come out of the kiln and we are in love. There are many more to follow - the next glaze firing is being loaded as I type!

If you love this, please give it a vote at the Etsy Mud Team Sweetheart Challenge. Please look at all the wonderful entries!