Tag Archives: clay

New rug and our Christmas Tree.

Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days of ………Christmas….???

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Christmas time, and the livin’  is easy                                                                                                              the snow is dumpin’                                                                                                                                           and the drifts are high …….

This is the first year since for…..ever….. I am ready for Christmas. The house is clean, well as clean as it is gonna get. The baking is done, again, as done as I am going to be. I’m just waiting for Christmas. Oh don’t get me wrong, I am not complaining, it just feels weird. This time of year is usually so crazy busy. Last year we were working on the house here and overwhelmed by the size of the job. We had to drive back 600 K to Edmonton on the 23rd, 450 K to Grande Prairie on the 24th. Then back to Edmonton Christmas Day to finish packing up the house to move out by year end. The years before we were working right up to Christmas and then I had all the prep to do. The kid or kids were home. This year is so nice.

We celebrated Christmas this past week with the community here in Coutts.  We  went to the seniors Christmas party, a pot luck and gift exchange. That was a HOOT.

Me at dinner with a Santa hat.

We had a fun gift exchange of Rob Your Neighbour.  On you turn, you can take a new gift from the table, or if you like someone else’s gift, you can take theirs. It was a lot of laughs. We almost had to take home an old and re-gifted box of very smelly men’s stuff, but at the last moment, some one surprising took it. The box of chocolates Jim ended up with was much better.    Table of gifts at the dinner.

Next we had the ladies Clay Class party. We had some food , drinks and another fun gift exchange.  The girls made some wonderful pieces for their first time working with clay.

Friday we had the kids clay class party, but we didn’t get any pictures. We had 13 kids after their last day at school, just before the ski-doo party. We fed them some sugar, supplied the with all kids of paints and for some reason, we got busy and forgot to take pictures. It wasn’t until they had left in a flurry of parents, hugs and  goodbyes, that we looked at the mess in the studio and thought ….. shudda taken some pics. Next thought was just leave the mess and close the door. It will be there next year. We did just that.

My son arrives tomorrow for a few days of doing nothing and taking the entire time to finish. We plan to visit the neighbours for Christmas Eve and then just us three for Christmas and Boxing Day.  We will eat, drink and binge watch Netflix for a few days and then he goes back to Edmonton Saturday or Sunday.

I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah and best of the season. I hope you all have a very happy, healthy, wealthy and wise New Year.

Relax and enjoy!

Until next time,

Cindy

 

 

 

AKA Mrs. Clay

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Out of the Fire Studio

Sunrise in Coutts, blue and pink.

Pots are delivered and Christmas is on its way.

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It was a good week in the old school and the studio. I got all my pots made and delivered. We took a truck load, literally, but we have a small truck, to Calgary.  Walking into Galleria Inglewood  was like walking into Christmas. It was beautiful. There is over 9,000 square feet of gallery filled with art, craft and Christmas. If you live anywhere near Calgary AB, it is certainly worth to trip! Our pots looked good and now there is a truck load more.

 

A display of Moonshadow
A display of Moonshadow.
A display of pottery glazed in Prairies
A display of the Prairies glaze.
Almost empty shelves of our pottery.
The cupboard at the gallery is bare. Need more pots.

 

 

Tuesday, the town had their annual  cookie exchange. To participate, you make four dozen cookies and bring them to the library in the Historical Coutts School. Put the cookies together, and everyone brings home four dozen cookies, just not the ones you made. Jim made chocolate chip, peanut butter, oatmeal, they were really good. We got a great variety of wonderful and not so wonderful cookies. There were about 25 people that took part and the library was hoppin’.

Tuesday night was the last adult clay class, next week is our party. The studio was full of students. The gym was rented out to a family that was playing and exercising.The cookie people came to the studio to visit, the studio people were checking out the cookies, the family in the gym was back and forth.  The school was buzzing with pre-Christmas excitement. It felt wonderful to be a part of it. The old girl was alive!

Tonight is another supper, not pot luck this time. We were invited to join the neighbours at the Milk River Senior Society Christmas Dinner.  It should be fun. I am getting dressed up, new jeans, and taking my hair out of the pony tail that it has been in since we moved here. Tonight, I am letting my hair down.

We stopped in Lethbridge on the way back from Calgary and did the normal in town, run around shopping. We also got all new Christmas decorations. When we moved, I gave them all away. Back then, I was feeling like the Grinch and Scrooge all rolled into one. My daughter got all the decorations, wrapping paper, everything, if she wanted it all or not . I was done with Christmas.  That was then and this is now. I am glad I did the purge. Out with the old and in with the new, is very much like our life here. As time goes on and we get our new rhythm in the new life, I can only wonder how different next Christmas will be. If last year to this year is any indication, I should hang on for the ride.

Until next time.

Cindy

 

 

 

AKA Mrs. Clay

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Out of the Fire Studio

Motivation, what is it and why?

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Last post I talked about being back in the grove again. Being motivated to work and really enjoying working. It’s true, I’m there. I have made more pots in the last month, than I have in the past 2 years. One of the motivators, I have to admit, is money. ‘Tis  the season. I like making pots and I like selling them.  The product is  doing well at Galleria Inglewood. The sun is shining so I am making hay…..well pots……. I will deliver my Christmas batch the second week of December. However money is not the only motivator, it if it were, I would never have become a potter. So what is the motivator, what is motivation, where does it come from? I am only asking the questions. I don’t have any answers,  to those questions and many others.

I am working on a batch of pots that I know will sell. The same old, same pots. Bowls, tea pots, casseroles, mugs etc.. I was checking out Facebook and a friend of mine, Dori Braun a potter and musician I have known for years, is working, I will assume, the same Christmas market and  making some very cool candy dishes.

DoriDish
Dori Braun’s Candy Dishes.

Now I have been in head down, flat out production mode. I have a good idea what will sell and have been working on that. The potter came back and the pots are  flying.  I plan to play in the clay in the New Year, but right now my motivation is making lots of pots, or so I thought.  When I saw her candy dishes, I wanted to make candy dishes too. I was motivated. Time is tight and play time is short., but I took a bit of time time to play, to listen to the motivation. Her pots are very different from mine, but the motivation was the same, play with clay and make candy dishes.

Two dishes
Raw clay dishes.

We need to pay attention to what motivates us, what makes us want to work, what gives us that drive to create. More important, we have to act on it.  I don’t know what motivation is or why it shows up, but if I listen to the potter inside, I know what it feels like. We all need to pay attention to that. Work with it. That’s where our best work comes from.  I made some candy dishes. It is not for me to say if they are good, bad or ugly. (odd and out of place Clint Eastwood reference) We can never judge our own work. If we didn’t think it was good, we wouldn’t have finished it. All we can and should do, is go with the feeling, the motivation to create. What could happen?

 

SantaDish SnowmanDish

It is a candy dish week. We, The Clay Teacher, are making candy dishes with the kids classes on Friday afternoon.

 

 

Since it is a candy dish week, if anyone reading is making candy dishes, or has been motivated to make candy dishes, please send me pictures and I will include them in a future post.

What can I say about motivation…..SWEEEET…..

Until next time,

Cindy

 

 

 

 

AKA Mrs. Clay

Out of the Fire Studio

The Clay Teacher

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I’ve got my groove back!

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We have been in Coutts for almost a year now. Last year at this time we had the house here and were back and forth from Edmonton settling things there and setting up here. We moved here in January into a real fixer upper. Here is link to my last blog that talks about the move, fixing up the house and the studio. We finished in August.

Before we retired and moved we were  The Clay Teacher reaching about 8,000 students a year. Before that we ran a gallery for a short while and before that, I was a potter known as Out of the Fire Studio. We shut the big studio down in 2006 to start the little gallery and studio in down town Edmonton. Like most bad ideas, it seemed like a good idea at the time. I was burnt out as a production potter. When we closed the big studio, Jim and I had about 45 different retailers across Western Canada and we processing about 10 tons of clay into production pots. We opened our shop just before the Financial crisis of 2007-08. That didn’t go so well. The building isn’t even there anymore.

Long story short. I was a potter. I worked way to hard making way too many pots  for way too many clients and burned out. Then ran like a crazy woman to run a gallery, but we lost the race. Then  ran a little faster when we were The Clay Teacher. In all that running, about 15 years of it, I lost the potter. She came back this week, or was it last week? I have been working in the studio for the last couple of months, but it wasn’t until just recently that it felt like the old me.  But the old me was  15 years ago and now I am old….hhhmmmm… ??anyway…. I feel like I have my grove back. I am a potter again, and not just someone who makes pots.

We have been here for about a year. The house is done, the studio is done, and it took a while, but I’m settled and very happy in the new life. I had to catch my breath and find a new rhythm. It is a much slower rhythm. I only work when I want to and the hours that I like, but now I like working. I’m work longer and longer hours and enjoying it more all the time.

Today we went to the local craft fair, 11 vendor tables. It was a small show, $15 a table and juried by cheque. There are no small shows, just small potters! It was good. There has never been a potter at the local craft show. Not only did we do well at the show, next year, we are in charge of the show. Today we inherited a craft show. It has been the same two ladies putting on the show for years. They were more than happy to pass the reins. Next year I know there will be a potter at the show.

craftshow1
Me behind the pots.

The best part about a small table show in a small town is knock down. Packed up and home in less than 30 minutes.

Until next time.

Cindy

 

 

 

AKA Mrs. Clay

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The Clay Teacher

Out of the Fire Studio

Details of Couttsgrass colours

New Glaze, Old Glaze

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Five Mugs Glazed in Couttsgrass
Mugs glazed in Couttsgrass

I have been using the same glazes for about a decade. Playing with glazes and discovering new colours and textures has never been my strong suit. It has never really caught my interest as much as it should. But then, how much should it? We all have our areas of interest. That’s what makes us the potters we are.  I have always had cool glazes….. I think. I combined two glazes I have used together for years, but in a whole new way, and voila…..

The new glaze “Couttsgrass”

Facevase in Couttsgrass.

 

Details of Couttsgrass colours

Close up to show all the colours of the new glaze.

Face details
Details of the face.

 

It is a busy time of year. We have a new venue, Galleria Inglewood in Calgary. It is a wonderful store, and they will take as much pottery as I can send them. They sell a lot of pots. They don’t have me on the website yet, but they have been very busy. As I said, it is a busy time of year. I have a few local Christmas Craft shows coming up. Pot production is in full swing.

Gotta get to work.

Until next time.

My signature

 

 

AKA Mrs. Clay

A view of the Sweetgrass Hills.

I don’t have to.

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For the first time in decades, I don’t have to do anything. I have worked for years as a potter and The Clay Teacher. I have had orders to fill, dead lines to meet, classes to teach and work that just had to be done. We moved to Coutts and we had the house to reno and the yard to landscape. Now it is all done. Well the house will never be “done”, but it is done for now. We got the studio up and running and I had orders to fill.They are done.

Group photo of the three kids , Jim and me.

 

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