Present

Mark brought me a present home on Friday.(A very rare and unusual thing for him to do).It's such an odd and funny present as the bee sings a little fan wizzes away at the front. What could I say to such a gift- clearly every menopausal woman should have one!

I'm reading....

I've borrowed this book from the local library. The library is very small and only has restricted opening hours added to which they have no pottery books. However, they will get you any book you want! A wonderful service. This book is quite a hefty fella and has page after page of pictures of pots. It is just made to thrill and excite people like me. (The rest of my family just roll their eyes).
I'm particularly interested in the sgraffito ware but also it's informative to look at the shapes of pots. The jugs in particular. I think the next place on my growing list of places to visit must be the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge. I've never been there but that is where all these pots are resident.

Friday-Again!

This week has flown by. John over at Imagine gallery mentioned that he has invited me to contribute some work to his 'Alice' exhibition. So I started on Monday with throwing bowls. Tuesday they were slipped and Wednesday they were turned. So Thursday they were ready for decorating.
In the meantime I got a copy of Alice from Amazon (cost 1p plus postage!) I don't think I've actually read the book since I was a child. The new copy I've bought seems to have the same illustrations I remember from childhood by John Tenniel. Also I've had to work on drawings, something I enjoy doing. The first two bowls I've pictured here. They are very straight forward to get me into thinking about the theme.
Then this morning as I ran around the shops in Reigate I noticed this display in the optician's window. I found it quite amusing. Kitty Shepherd posted some window displays on her blog. Tim Burton's film has been in the news all week so it's 'Alice' all round.

Half-term

We've spent the first few days of half-term with my parents in Wales. They live quite close to the Botanical Gardens of Wales (that is as the crow flies). We once walked there but there is a dual carriage way between them and the gardens. My sons still have not forgotten the walk and the dash across the dual carriage way! Suffice to say these days we take the car and just walk around the gardens.
Much of the garden is housed in this giant glass dome. Ten years ago when the gardens were first opened it all looked very raw and barren. Now it all looks very lush and verdant.





On a visit to Carmarthen we popped into a gallery- Oriel Myrddin Gallery.
We were greeted by some wonderful glass. Unfortunately my picture does not do it justice as it sang out with the light passing through it. Check it out on Ammanda's blog.

Friday

Whew!! It's Friday.
A quick run through of the day goes like thike this-
Make sandwiches for 3 chaps
Run 2 boys to school
Swim 20 lengths in the local pool
Find parking space and dash to the shops for 1 bag of shopping.
Unpack 5 plates from kiln and various other pots.
Decorate last big shallow bowl (See top picture)
Make dough for 4 (or more) pizzas.
Now I am anticipating opening a bottle of red wine to go with those pizzas and having a relaxing evening by the wood burning stove!!
Happy Friday everyone.

After-School Club

A local school for children with learning disabilities has asked me to run a pottery club after school for five weeks. Here are a few of their jolly figures. I think they reflect the fun the students had making them. I was told that the school invited students who were not involved in any other schoool activities if they would like to join the club. They all took their work home very proudly.
The plates below are some of the ones I threw the other week, but I realise I am very behind in recording things as some of these are allready finished and fired. Will try and take my camera out to the studio tomorrow!

Aquamanilia

Today I picked up a wonderful book from the library on aquamanilia. These amazing objects were made from the 12th century through to the 15th century. Although all the vessels in the book are made of metal using the lost wax casting system there would have also been pottery aquamaniles. I imagine that it is only the metal ones that survived. As with many other objects I suspect that richer families had these fabulous metal ones and poorer folk had copies in pottery. Anyway, I would like to make a slipware one when I can spare the time from my usual production. They come in a vast array of forms from birds, horses and lions.
The book is titled'Lions, Dragons and other Beasts Aquamanilia'.