We set up some of the show yesterday, there is going to be some huge stock of pots here, honestly I think it needs to be seen to be believed. My pots were shipped over so  because if the logistics I have a smaller quantity than many of the potters here. However I am really pleased with the pots that I do have, of which there is a great display. Bob is hosting eight potters at his place and he is one of seven studios on the trail, between the seven the work of fifty potters is on display.

Who is in the area? Can any of you come to see us? It would be fabulous to meet you if you get the chance to come and introduce yourself. If you can’t get here do please feel free to share the website address and this blog post and retweet and Twitterings that I send about the show. The more the merrier.

www.minnesotapotters.com

Today I am hoping that we will get a chance to do a bit of visiting to some of the other studios while trying not to harass them during set up. I’m a big fan of Michael Hunt and Naomi Dalgleish’s work and I am looking forward to hopefully meeting Linda Christianson.

This platter above is Jean Nicholas’ (image courtesy of Goldmark), how beautiful? It’s like nothing I could ever make, a way of working that I just cannot do but that I really really love in other people’s pots.

I’ve sent all my pots off across the pond for the Minnesota show on their merry and hopefully safe way. If you know anyone that might be interested in the event, please do pass on the details.

So the frantic flapping has been ongoing this week, getting pieces finished for stocking up a couple of shops before I go, a days printing course with Lisa Hooper, a day out with my sis and the wee nephew when I delivered the finished cradle.

There is still a lot of wet slip around at the workshop being flung about and trailed and resisted and enjoyed. I want to get all the pots that are currently under plastic finished before I go. I might be pushing that a bit now.

I delivered another commemorative pot to a baby today, well the courier did actually, a harvest jug, sgraffito decorated, made from the same weight of clay as the baby weighed when he was born.

So, time for an exhausted Hannah to sleep and try to build up the umphh to take on tomorrow’s lists that are forever growing and never seem to shrink. Night night all.

This last while has been a flurry of finishing pots, drying them, bisquing, glazing and the utter chaos of a bubble wrap and box filled workshop. I think it is just about under control again now. The kiln has been fired, cooled, unpacked and packed again straight away solidly for the last three weeks or so.  Fingers crossed I have done everything as needed doing for the Minnesota show.

Here is a selection of new pots for you, most that will be winging their way across the pond very shortly…

4lb fat jugs, these are all heading away. I really enjoyed making these, wish I had time to keep going on the making front just now as it is all making sense suddenly.

I’m really pleased with how these thick tiles came out, some lovely surfaces. These two that are pictured here were supposed to be going to Minnesota but I couldn’t part with them so soon so I have kept a hold of them for a while.

This just is a commission for the husband of a print maker friend of mine. It came out for richer and more appealing to me than I had thought it might. Just a shame I haven’t the time to get a proper photograph of it done. Always the way.

Where is the time going to? As per always I feel I am just getting into my stride and what happens? Yes I’m at the end of the opportunity to make any more for this event and have to concentrate and trying to get it all fired in time and packed and away.

I have been really enjoying this new to me bird shape. I have fat birds, thin birds, long necked birds, fancy feathered birds. I just rather like birds.

This week I have sent work off to the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists for their exhibition ‘Woodlands’ which starts next week.

This weekend I hope it will be sunny so that a) I can ride my bike and b) I can get some more pots dried out in the sunshine and c) I can get all the towels that I have just washed on the line to dry. Fingers crossed.

Today I have unpacked the first glaze kiln in a long long time. It’s been a weird old year so far, my creative brain seems to have been hibernating or just not even present at times. Anyway I think it’s back and I am trying to make the most of it while I can. I have made lots of pots in the last few weeks and been getting really excited about them too. It’s so good to feel that rush again. Suddenly there are more ideas for pots and plans for decoration than there is time to make them. Wonderful!

There’s always that nagging thought though of, well if I can make these pots in this short space of time just imagine what I could have accomplished if I had been working more solidly. Never flipping satisfied am I? I know, it’s a pain and I’m too hard on myself but it’s the way I am.

I am rather pleased with these ghostly mugs here with white slip and white slip and some bleeding under the paper templates.

The smallest of the three tygs. The second and third are in the kiln for a bisque as we speak, fingers crossed the crazy wild weather we are having doesn’t knock the power off. Tomorrow I’ll be back at it making some fat bellied bigger jugs and hopefully handling some puzzle jugs. It’s all go go go at the workshop and it’s good good good.

Last Friday I did something very very important with Gregor, my nephew. I felt that as he had reached the grand old age of eleven weeks he was at exactly the right point to begin to be introduced to my friends the dragons. You know the ones that pop in for tea and cake with me. It’s a gentle introduction and needs to happen over a period of time. The Galloway dragons are as you will know, a very small breed, mainly residing in the gaps in the stone dykes, or of course in the rocky outcrops around and about here.

Being so small the dragons are easily frightened. I know, I do feel for them, they have a reputation for fierceness and yet this breed are so gentle, timid even, it’s taken me years to get them to trust me. So this first part of the introduction process is to begin to tell Gregor all about them. He needs to get used to the idea of them before he can meet them so as nothing about them surprises him which would make him make them surprised and then we’d be in a pickle. Here he is listening intently and taking it all in.

I have been of course telling my dragon pals about Gregor so they know all about him and are I think looking forward to meeting him in due course.

I think he’ll be a good friend and ally to the dragons when the time comes.

I saw a link to this last week and the flipping thing is stuck in my head now. It is a genius piece of work (I don’t know whether that is gramatically correct). Whether ornot you make pots and whether or not you have seen Adele’s video for the song have a watch and enjoy. It’s rather disturbing in a way but very very clever.

This is the centre of a 16″ charger, I started counting the white slip trailed dots as I was going around the edge of the tree but when I got to 1352. What do you think drawing so many dots says about a person?

‘One generation plants a tree and another gets the shade’.

A couple more baluster jugs. I have enjoyed decorating these though this shape is so much more of a challenge than a fat bellied pot.

It’s been a stunningly beautiful day today, proper warmth in the air and the birds have been singing their hearts out. Maybe that’s why there are so many birdies being drawn here at the moment.

Slips sieved, trailers cleaned, plates ready, on your marks, get set, GO……..

Busy busy day. I am sitting here yawning away, I’m not long off my bed I don’t think.

It’s slip-tastic at the workshop at the moment. I suddenly have lotts of trailing to be done and you know what it’s like, it’s so much more fluid when you have a lot of things to do and you can really get into the swing and the feel of it.

I have used the same bird motif a few times across this set of plates but tried to give him different tail feathers and different borders. I could get really carried away with these plates, they are about 16cm diameter and just a lovely lovely size to work with.

The white on white slips again. There is something very appealing to me about this combination.

The owl is out again. I haven’t drawn him for a while, must revisit him.

Finally the first of a group of tiles. These are I think about 22cm across now that they have started to shrink a little. They are pretty thick, almost 2cm or there abouts. I have carved out the backs and so I am hoping that they will stay flat and straight and in one piece. I don’t really have much experience with that sort of piece so it’s a bit of an experiment really. Satisfyingly substantial they are.

I love lettering on pots and I am always looking for new phrases and meaningful sayings to add to my work. The one on the tyg below reads ‘Work for a cause not for applause, Live life to express not to impress’.

A detail of the slipware cradle. I can’t show you the whole thing as it’s recipient will have their surprise spoiled. I don’t make much in the way of slab built work so I am rather nervous about firing this as you can imagine.

This week involves more little plates, I am just so satisfied by the proportions of those, just a pound and a half of clay, small really but lovely to decorate. I want to have a good selection of them for Minnesota. Also some slightly larger baluster jugs, I hope to throw them tomorrow and I have a bundle of tiles to decorate and a couple of commissioned chargers to slip. Lets hope the sun keeps shining and encourages the work to happen and the slip to flow in smooth unlumpy beauty.