blah blah blog

dang. best intentions to keep up with this blog have left me with only a few entries to date. I guess i can be comforted partly by the fact that i don't spend too much time writing about my work because i spend most of the time making it? It is true that i have been spending more hours working in the studio and less in the office-- aside from the time that i am on etsy and trying to list more items these days. I have definitely begun to find a correlation between listing more pieces more often and selling more. I guess that that should really be a no brainer, but i seem to just be figuring that out. What can i say? Etsy has really been my first online selling experience to date and i really feel like i am just starting to get the hang of what i am doing here.-- not that i have sold gangbusters on etsy yet... but things are picking up. The world of selling online is loads different than selling at shows and i learn more and more every day about what i am doing. thank goodness!

I have also been working a lot more on the wheel these days... primarily bowl and plate forms, vases and other vessels, and particularly mugs. i really want to arrive at some mug and cup forms that i feel comfortable producing in quantities. I will never (well, never say never) become a production potter, but i would like to develop the skills to be able to make more things more quickly, better and make them the same -- or very similar- if i want to.... so my journey towards that goal continues.... i have also been working on new stamps- clay stamps, carved linoleum, soft-cut and staedler erasers... also making more press molds, both out of clay and silicone, in my never-ending search for new pendant and button designs. Yesterday and today were mostly spent making porcelain buttons and pendants.... it is a never ending job to keep my supply of these little goodies up, and it seems that no matter how many i make, there are never enough.

One other item that i have been giving greater attention is my product photography. Due to some consultation with my mud team friends and in part from their wonderful suggestions, i have been taking more photgraphs of my pieces with more colorful and interesting backgrounds. The gray to white background just ceased to do it for me-- with my pieces. I think it looks quite professional and very striking with many peoples' work, but with mine it has often felt somewhat incongruous. Combining different colors and textures in the backgrounds of the photos feels like a much better fit, and i think that the resulting pictures are a testimony to this. what do you think?