New Blog Design

Well, when I was going through blogs this moring Lorelei's Blog caught my eye. She had uploaded a cool new blog skin.  She got it from another kewel site that has bunches of blogger templates. Pretty easy to do, if you just use as is, but I am a tinkerer. It took me a freaking day to get it the way I wanted, I am just an obsesive tinkerer. I hope yall like it. It may be too much, I will live with it for a bit and see how it goes

New Leaf Hearts

Fresh from the kiln this morning:

My Etsy Shop

The Psychic and Magnetic Influence of Talismans and Gems

The Psychic and Magnetic Influence of Talismans and Gems

“From the remotest times, back even to the birth of humanity, Precious Stones and Talismans have been held in high estimation by all nations; the former, primarily because of their beauty, and the latter on account of their virtues, as transmitters of good luck and to avert misfortune.”

The Book of Talismans, Amulets and Zodiacal Gems

By William Thomas and Kate Pavitt

(just a little light weekend reading )

Earthy Hearts

Hearts are very popular in jewelry, seems everyone is wearing them, and all my fellow artisans make them. I just cannot bring myself to do the cute little hearts that I see every where. Just not me. But there is something enchanting about a heart. I decided to make some hearts, b ut do it my way, earth mama organic. I decided to make them like leaves. I carved a little mold from my usual stoneware, and then pressed clay into it. Each one looks a little different from the other, because I manipulated the clay after pulling it from the mold. I layered several shades of pink, and green, and even some clear glaze. After they were fired, I sculpted some more with my dermal tool, making vein marks and swirls right onto the glaze, a little bit of a no-no in the pottery world. Glaze over stoneware is VERY hard, so even the dremel tool had to work hard to touch the glossy finish, but if you look close you will see it :-) I hope you like my take on a classic charm motif!

Oh yeah, they are in my etsy shop,  http://www.etsy.com/shop/IndianCreekStudios

Packing up the Skulls

I am sending these babies off to a new home, at a gift shop in a rather unusual place, the Mütter Museum in Philly!
I hope they like their new home, there will be lots of real skulls there to keep them company! My daughter has wanted to go to the Mütter since she found out about it a couple of years ago. She wanted me to pack her up with these skulls, but she would really skew my shipping costs, so not this time!

Skulls! and glaze tests

I was contacted recently about my little skull charms, and I do not want to jinx it, but looks like I have a new venue to sell them, so I am getting a few together. They are so fun to create. I made a mold from found objects, but the charms come out of the mold lacking details such as teeth and nostrils, so those things have to be done by hand.

Each face has its own personality too, which is what makes it fun. These are the roughs, not cleaned up yet. It is good to be back to making things again, glad to be all well from my recent monster cold plus plus.

While I was too sick to look at them, the kiln gave me my latest set of kiln mice test tiles. I need to sit down and examine and catalog them, looks like some keepers in this batch!
Stay well everyone, and keep our Haitian neighbors in your thoughts and prays

I am back, sort of....

Well, yesterday I finally got my little netbook computer back from Acer, it was gone for about three weeks, and I had to borrow my husband's computer while it was gone. Functional, but alien. Unfortunately I also got diagnosed with a nasty case of pneumonia. Yesterday when I got up I was so weak I could barely get up and walk around the house, and my heart was beating way too fast, so with my husband's help I went to the Dr, had a couple of chest x-rays, got presribed $$$ worth of meds, but at least he let me come home, not go to the hospital. Sooo, I am to do nothing for the next several days, and my kids are taking turns looking after me during the day. The pictures were taken from my bedroom window, looking at the batch of fresh snow that fell overnight, and my new best friend the inhaler :-) Forgive me for the screens on the snow pictures, my old house has those old timey aluminum screens that always show up in pics, unlike the modern black screens that disapear from pictures. I have been watching folks get stuck all morning, but I am not going out to push stuck cars today, like I did last week, that may be part of the reason I am sickly today.  Well, I can get caught up on my reading now that I am a prisoner and have my computer back! I am looking on the bright side, finally someone else will be washing the dishes and cooking the biscuits! Everyone take care of yourselves, and Happy New Year!