A few years ago I bought some lemon trees. Every year I get so many blooms and then end up with 1-2 lemons. Not this year. This year I had an abundance of lemons. I should have taken a picture of the trees before I picked them, but I did not. Lemons like most citrus are a winter fruit. They also take months to get to a point when they are ripe.

I live in zone 7 so I keep my trees in pots. When the weather is above freezing the pots are outside. They usually bloom in the summer. I've learned not to get too excited because the little baby lemons often don't survive. It's not until they get to about the size of a walnut that I start to get excited and attached to the lemons. In the fall when it gets close to freezing I bring the pots inside and put the trees near a window where they will get ample light.




These lemons were so juicy. So much juicier than you get at the store.




I ended up with enough juice from these lemons to make the lemon curd recipe I had 7 times! I was not detered, the lemon curd will not go to waste!




I don't know why lemon curd isn't more popular in the US. It's a staple in the UK, but it can actually be hard to find in the US. Citrus preserves in general are hard to find which is sad because it's so yummy. This GIANT bowl of lemon curd is made from a recipe by Cookies and Cups. It worked up really quick an I can't wait to start having it on toast, pancakes, dutch babies, or just eaten with a spoon. Having licked the spoon clean after I got it into the bowl to cool I can tell you it's delicious.

This is a very simple wrap that works up pretty quick. This could be made using any yarn and sized up or down. This particular yarn is from Miss Babs and was the colorway for the Sheep and Wool Festival for 2022. It is their Caroline yarn which is fingering weight and each skein is 400 yards. This pattern uses 2 skeins and a 3.5 mm hook.






Stitches:

ch - chain
dc - double crochet
bobble - yarn over twice, pull up, yarn over, pull up, yarn over, pull up, yarn over, pull up, yarn over, pull up, pull through (11 on the hook)
sk st - skip stitch






Cast on 201. Put a marker at stitch 100
Row 1: dc in the 3rd stitch from the hook, *sk st, dc. Repeat from * to where your stitch marker is. dc, ch 2, dc (all in the same stitch). *sk st, dc. Repeat from * to end.
Row 2: ch 2, *sk st, dc. Repeat from * to the stitch marker. dc in the dc below, ch, bobble in the chain space, ch, dc into the dc. *sk st, dc. Repeat from * to the end.
Row 3: ch 2, dc in the first chain space, 2 dc in each chain space to the stitch marker. dc in the dc below, ch 2, dc in the dc below. 2 dc in each chain space to the stitch marker.

Repeat row 2 and 3 until you reach your desired width.






Edging row - around the whole thing: bobble in the chain space, *ch 3, sk st, bobble. Repeat to stitch marker. Bobble in the dc below, bobble in the ch, bobble in the dc below. *ch 3, sk st, bobble. When you get to the corners do 3 bobbles in the same stitch. When you get all the way around 2 bobbles and then a slip stitch to join to the first bobble.

The tea set is even better than it was in my head. I was a little worried when I first picked up the pot and the lid wouldn't come off, but I went around the rim and gently tugged and it popped right off after a few tugs. I will sand the lid a bit to make it a little smoother to go on and off. I'm hoping that people at the Cloisters Tea Show like it (and it sells!).

I love both of the mermaid platters too. I thought I would like the one with the blue on top better, but actually I think the one where it looks like the tail on the sand just really pops.

I tried out a few of the new Mayco stoneware glazes and I'm really happy with how they look in person. I made some test tiles so I could test out the rest.

The bunnies are also tests. I made them a while ago and missed Easter. Normally I'd do bright fun colors for bunnies, but I really wanted to try out these glazes. In retrospect I probably should have swapped these two with the Mayco glazes as these would have looked better on the spoon rests and I think those colors would have been better for the bunnies. Oh well.

I'm still working on my commission platter. I like the colors of these sunflowers than my last tests, but am not at all happy with the blue background. It came out really streaky. Going to have to think of another way to do the blue background.

Laguna 60 KY Mudworks Ocean Mist x2 Aragonite	Laguna 60 KY Mudworks Ocean Mist x2 Aragonite
Laguna 60 Midnight Ceramics Sexy Mermaid x2 on the mermaid tail. KY Mudworks Aragonite x1 all over	Laguna 60 Midnight Ceramics Sexy Mermaid x2 on the mermaid tail. KY Mudworks Seaside x2 all over
Laguna 60 KY Mudworks Hydra x2 Mayco Light Flux on the rim	Laguna 60 KY Mudworks Seaside x2 Mayco Light Flux on the rim of the one on the right
Left: Laguna 60 KY Mudworks Hydra x2 Mayco Light Flux on the rim Middle: Laguna 60 KY Mudworks Morning Glory x2 Right: Laguna 60 KY Mudworks Seaside x2	Laguna 60 Mayco Black UG wiped back. Mayco Hot Tamale, Jack o Lantern, Sunkissed, Just Froggy, Fruit of the Vine done as water colors 2167 clear all over
Laguna 60 Coyote Pam's Green x2	Laguna 60 KY Mudworks Hydra x2 Mayco Light Flux on the rim
Left: Spectrum Twilight x2 Right: Spectrum Nori Green x2	Left: Mayco Passion Flower x2 Right: Mayco Amaryllis x2
Left: Mayco Sand Dollar x2 Right: Mayco Rose Quartz x2	Left: Mayco Underglazes King's Blue, Bright yellow, Harvest Gold, Chocolate Right: Mayco Underglazes King's Blue, Bright yellow, Squash yellow, Chocolate, Leaf green, Apple green on the sunflowers Mayco Sunkissed, Teal Next Time, Jaded on the lemons 2167 Clear on top
Mayco Underglazes King's Blue, Pansy Purple, Orange, Chocolate, Leaf Green 2167 Clear on top

This weekend was all about glazing. I wanted to make sure that my tea set was ready for my next show at The Cloisters Spring Tea and Bazaar on April 29 and 30th. I spent a lot of time deciding on what color to make the tea set and if you look in the back corner I think it came out pretty awesome. I'm also loving how the mermaid platter came out.

The leaf vases are darker than I intended, I'm guessing I didn't do the stroke and coat dark enough. I still like them though.

I've got at least one more kiln to glaze before the show, maybe two.

Last week I shared my plan to do glaze chips from near empty bottles of glaze. That was only part of the plan. The other part of the plan was to put some of my dipping glazes into jars to brush on. I know that not all of them will work as brush on glazes, but I rarely dip. I know that dipping would speed up the glazing process, but I never want to make enough things in the same color at the same time that makes sense. So we'll see which of these work as brush on because I really do like a lot of the colors of these glazes.




My bag o chips.

Last year at Michael Harbridge's workshop we made marbled clay with a white and a red clay. The pot that I made came out awesome and I've been meaning to make one with brown bear and b-mix for a while.


Making the marbled clay takes a bit of time, but isn't hard. I started by rolling out 6 coils about the width of a pencil in each of the two clay bodies. Then I took 2 brown bear and 2 b-mix and held them together. Then I twisted them until they wouldn't twist any more without breaking. Next I rolled that back into a fat coil, folded in half, and twisted again.




When I felt like the clay was mixed together to to the right amount of consistency I rolled a fat coil that was probable about 3/4 of an inch. I cut coins from the coil a little thicker than a quarter and then rolled them with a pony roller to make them thinner and wider. I used the clay puzzling molds the same way I would with any clay.




I love the marbled agate look. One of the coolest things about these is that no two pots will ever be exactly the same.