We took our annual trip up to Chaumont during the winter this weekend. At first I thought we weren't going to get any snow because it had been so warm there last week, but they got a little bit of snow on Friday so we were able to see just a bit.

There were a ton of geese on the water, more than we've ever seen. They were up and down the river as far as we could see.


The gazebo is holding up through the winter. We took a chance not taking the screens down, but all is well. There was a dusting of snow inside that the puppies were eating for a quick drink.




The wind must have blown over the canoe at some point. It was too heavy for us to flip back over. It didn't seem like the ice was breaking the hull so hopefully it survives until spring.




When we came back on Sunday there were 4 swans on the river. We've never seen swans up there before! Of course the geese proceeded to be jerks and scared them away after a couple of minutes.




After much running and chasing the pups passed out at the hotel.

I have a friend who wanted to do a commissioned piece for his sister. The parameters were completely wide open. She came back and said she wanted a large platter with sunflowers and lemons that has a blue background. First thing I had to get my head around was combining lemons and sunflowers on the same plate. I did some sketches to figure out what the design would look like.

The next I had to think through is how I would have a blue background with the sunflowers and lemons. In normal life when you mix blue and yellow you get green. In pottery you could get any color, but it's also very likely that you'll get running.

I needed a way for there to be a bit of a barrier between the two colors. I came up with two primary options. The first was that I could use designer liner around the lemons and the sunflowers as a sort of barrier between the glazes. The second was to put the blue down as an underglaze and carve the sunflowers and lemons out.

Rather than start with a giant platter and cross my fingers, I decided to start with smaller items to give it a go.


I can pick the definition of the leaves of the sunflower back up when I glaze. I decided to carve the different areas with different textures so that it's clear what is petal and what is center.




Once I got the sunflowers down I decided to try lemons and add in some leaves as well. I'm not as happy with the sunflower leaves as I am with the lemon leaves. I think I can pull that back in when I add the glaze though.




This last one I was just having fun and decided to try some conflowers. This was already an experiement with a block of wood I found at the craft store. It dried too fast so instead of a shallow plate it has become a cheese board. I need to find a way that I can carve while sitting, or at least not hunch as much, but the actual act of carving was really soothing.

Spring is coming! I have been watching the crocus bloom in my front yard the last week and the daffodils just starting to come up. I was in the mood for flowers and decided to make some butterfly feeders. These will get mounted onto sticks after the firing that can go out in the garden. They're pretty, but also they gather just a bit of water for butterflies and bids.

One of my two large vases did not make it out of the bisque. There is a J crack that starts at the seam, goes down to the bottom, and then comes up on the other side. I noticed it when I was showing a few people at the chocolate party. They had asked - can't you just glaze fire it and hope it doesn't get bigger? My answer is a solid no. Let's say it does get bigger - and not just bigger but that side piece falls off in some way. Now you have this giant vase with one corner missing and then it falls into other pieces destroying them, falls onto the sidewall of the kiln causing a mess there, or BOTH! So yeah while it is a very pretty vase otherwise it is now garbage and I can make another one.




This vase is the bmix one, but the other one I did in laguna 60 has no cracks. My guess is that it originates on the seam and I didn't compress enough. Next one I make with bmix I'll make sure to compress better.




From a foot back you can't even see it! I didn't even notice when I first took it out of the bisque kiln.

This past week has been a whirlwind. On Saturday I had my first Chocolate Party since before the pandemic. The Chocolate Party is something I started in like 2002 and was an annual tradition. It is a whole party devoted to chocolate. It was great to be able to have everyone over. I managed to not take a single picture, but we had a great time. I was so wiped that Sunday I barely left the couch except to clean up the house.

This kiln happened in the whirlwind of preparing for the party. I love everything that came out of it.

Kentucky Mudworks Hydra x3 Light flux on the rim	Kentucky Mudworks Triton x3 Light flux on the rim
Kentucky Mudworks Brown Bear Various Stroke and Coats Laguna Power Turquoise x3 Mayco Night Moth x2	Kentucky Mudworks Brown Bear Various Stroke and Coats Mayco Frosted Lemon x3 Mayco Night Moth x2
Kentucky Mudworks Brown Bear Various Stroke and Coats Mayco Frosted Lemon x3 Mayco Night Moth x2	Kentucky Mudworks Brown Bear Various Stroke and Coats Laguna Power Turquoise x3 Mayco Night Moth x2
Kentucky Mudworks Brown Bear Various Stroke and Coats Mayco Frosted Lemon x3 Mayco Night Moth x2	Kentucky Mudworks Brown Bear Various Stroke and Coats Laguna Power Turquoise x3 Mayco Night Moth x2
Top Left: Amaco Lavender x3 Top Right: Amaco Weeping Plum x3 Bottom Left: Amaco Storm x3 Bottom Right: Amaco Aqua x3	Top Left: Amaco Storm x3 Top Right: Amaco Lavender x3 Bottom Left: Amaco Smoke x3 Bottom Right: Amaco Aqua x3
Left: Amaco Storm x3 Right: Amaco Weeping Plum c3	Both Coyote Pam's Blue x3
Left: Laguna 60 Amaco Blue Midnight x3 Right: Amaco Storm x3	Amaco Aqua x3
Spectrum Autumn Purple x2	Left: Kentucky Mudworks Triton x3 Right: Amaco Weeping Plum x3
Kentucky Mudworks Brown Bear Kentucky Mudworks Tortuga x3	Kentucky Mudworks Brown Bear Kentucky Mudworks Jade Moss x3
Left: Amaco Storm x3 Middle: Amaco Aqua x3 Right: Kentucky Mudworks Triton x3	Row 1: Amaco Lavender x3 Row 2: Amaco Storm x3 Row 3: Amaco Aqua x3 Row 4: Amaco Weeping Plum x3
Coyote Pam's Blue x3	This is many of the other glazes that are listed. I cleaned my brush on this. Not sure if I like how it turned out
Top Left: Kentucky Mudworks Hydra x3 Top Right: Kentucky Mudworks Hydra x3 Bottom Left: Amaco Aqua x3 Bottom Right: Mayco Hot Tamale Amaco Storm x3	Left: Hat Amaco Aqua x3, Body Amaco Smoke x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Left Middle: Hat KY Mudworks Jade Moss x3, Body Amaco Smoke x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right Middle: Hat Amaco Lavender x3 Mayco Muddy Waters x2, Body KY Mudworks Hydra x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral, Hair Mayco Dandelion x2 Right: Hat Mayco Frosted Lemon x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Amaco Storm x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral, Hair Mayco Dandelion x2
Left: Hat Amaco Storm x3, Body Amaco Smoke x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Left Middle: Hat KY Mudworks Hydra x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Amaco Lavender x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right Middle: Hat Laguna Power Turquoise x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Amaco Weeping Plum x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right: Hat KY Mudworks Hydra x3, Body Amaco Aqua x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral	Left: Hat Laguna Power Turquoise x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Amaco Aqua x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Left Middle: Hat Mayco Lavender Mist x3 Mayco Muddy Waters x2, Body Mayco Hot Tamale x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right Middle: Hat Mayco Sour Apple x3, Body Amaco Lavender x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right: Hat Coyote Pam's Blue x3, Body Amaco Storm x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral
Left: Hat KY Mudworks Triton x3, Body Amaco Smoke x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Left Middle: Hat Mayco Frosted Lemon x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Amaco Storm x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right Middle: Hat Laguna Power Turquoise x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Amaco Weeping Plum x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right: Hat KY Mudworks Jade Moss x3, Body Amaco Smoke x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral	Left: Hat Mayco Frosted Lemon x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Amaco Weeping Plum x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Left Middle: Hat Mayco Frosted Lemon x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Mayco Sour Apple x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Middle: Hat Mayco Lavender Mist x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Coyote Pam's Blue x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right Middle: Hat Mayco Hot Tamale x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Mayco Frosted Lemon x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral Right: Hat KY Mudworks Hydra x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Mayco Sour Apple x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral
Hat Laguna Power Turquoise x3 Mayco Night Moth x2, Body Mayco Hot Tamale x3, Nose Mayco Cutie Pie Coral	Red: Mayco Hot Tamale x3 Green: Mayco Sour Apple x3 Blue: Mayco Carrabein Blue x3 White Dots Mayco Cotton Tail - thick dots
Laguna 60 Red: Mayco Hot Tamale x3 Green: Mayco Sour Apple x3 Blue: Mayco Carrabein Blue x3 White Dots Mayco Cotton Tail - thick dots	These were a custom order that came out awesome on KY Mudworks Brown Bear Clay Left: Coyote Oasis x3 Amaco Seaweed x2, 4 wheeler Mayco Hot tamale x3 Right: Mayco Lavender Mist x3 Mayco Muddy Waters x2, 4 wheeler Mayco Sunkissed x3

Let me tell you about standing up all those mushrooms. There was one that I knew from glazing that didn't stand up. I was convinced it was one of the red ones. So I'm standing them up and I go to put this blue one up and it rolls off the shelf and down the side. Ugh. The entire kiln was full. There was nothing to do but start unloading. When I got to the last few shelves I remembered a pair of long thin tweezers that I have in the kitchen. I used them to pick up the mushroom from the very bottom of the kiln. Saved me some time and heavy lifting.

Loving these bowls on top. I love blue-green colors.