Do you Neti?

My first introduction to Neti was while spending a weekend at our cabin with friends a few years ago. In the morning, Brandon and Misty strolled into the kitchen with matching little teapot looking things and started pouring salt water up their noses. We were shocked and a little grossed out. I mean, we always knew they were a little weird...

Fast forward three years. My mom, who suffers from all sorts of sinus issues, started telling me I needed to do a regular sinus cleansing. Uh-uh. No way. I mean, it hurts so bad to get water up your nose at the pool, right? But this year, in the midst of the Christmas rush, I began to come down with a cold. I could not afford to get sick. We work seven days a week beginning after Thanksgiving and keep going until Christmas Eve.

"Sinus cleansing," Mom said on the phone. Fine. I went to the store and got an ugly plastic bottle that shoots water up my nose. So what happened? I didn't get sick and it didn't hurt. Maybe Misty and Brandon aren't weird, but geniuses! If I had listened three years ago, my winters may have been very different.


Fast forward to two days ago. In the Etsy forums there was a discussion on sinus cleansing. Someone said, "Why to Neti pots have to be so ugly? A good potter could fix this." I smelled a challenge and got started right away. So I made three prototype neti cleansing pots. Of course, I expect them to become even more beautiful after a glaze firing. For now, they look like awkward tea pots that are missing lids.

As for Neti, it originates as the Ayurvedic practice of Jala Neti - a ritual nasal cleansing. It uses a saline solution that closely matches the make up of your tears which is why it doesn't burn. There are many reputed benefits including a reduction of allergy problems, more effective tears, reducing cough and post nasal drip, and more.

Pottery Squared

We are starting off the new year with new work. While I have always loved hand building, we have concentrated on wheel thrown work. At least partly, this is because hand built work can be so time consuming and I tend to think people won't pay what the labor requires.

I am trying to let go of preconceived notions and realize that what we believe is true is not always actually so. So, on that note, we are exploring new ideas and allowing ourselves some time to stray from the bread and butter of wheel thrown work.

Our first wanderings are a line of square dishes. These are not as time consuming as other hand built work and should be reasonably priced. We are using slabs of clay and slumping those slabs into molds. When they are not quite leather hard, we are stamping the rims with our hand carved stamps. I had fun figuring out if Alex's cylindrical wave stamp could make the turn on the rim of a square bowl. It worked out so perfectly you might think I was confident it would work. After the pieces are leather hard, we are adding rather tall feet.


Also coming - perhaps photos tomorrow - are a line of Neti Pottery. If you are not familiar, they are used for the Hindu practice of sinus cleansing. I have recently begun this practice and I am a huge believer... Alex is not so enthusiastic. Our journey into sinus cleansing pots began because another enthusiast remarked, "Why can't Neti Pots look nice? A good potter should work on this." I took it as a challenge and went straight to the wheel.