New Studio Space!

I moved into the new studio last week, or maybe it was the week before. Anyway, it took longer than expected. There was a lot of stuff to go out to the garage from that little sun porch. Days of carting stuff across the driveway. And then I had to figure out where it all went and how it all worked in the new space. I'm still doing that, and I find that no matter what, I'm still getting up to get something on the other side of the room.
I bought a counter top at the Restore which will be the sink and glaze area on the far wall. Eventually, but for now I'm using a bucket of water from the kitchen as always. The plan is also to have ware shelves across the north wall, but for now, there is still construction material for house reno stored on the wall, and it will be there a while I think. For now I'm still using the small ware shelves that we had in the other studio.
I'm in a decorating phase right now which you may notice from the pots of paint littering the table top. I signed up for a tile making and decorating course at the Nova Scotia Centre for Craft and Design with Suzi Cameron. I was attracted to the decoration aspect of the course in the description because I know nothing about painting (and it shows) so my pots always end up looking like a 4 year old painted them, but not in a good way like naive art or folk art, or Jackson Pollack but just in a bad way like a completely talentless hack had a go.
So I've been practicing on greenware with underglazes under Suzi's very expert direction, and in some ways I'm actually getting the hang of it, but it still looks pretty amateurish. Plus now I want to go out and spend money on better brushes because her brushes actually do what I want (sort of) and mine I bought in a package of 10 at the dollar store 4 years ago. Nuff said.

Also, we moved all the orphan pottery equipment that we have collected over the years into the studio. You may notice a large treadle wheel and a belt driven bench style wheel and a stand up cabinet style wheel in the photos. These came with various kilns we acquired on kijiji. The bench wheel was my first wheel which I used until the sweetie (and inlaws) bought me the new one a couple years ago at Christmas. All the wheels work, although the electric ones are slow and a bit jittery. The treadle wheel also came with a motor but the wiring was apart, so we just took it off and the treadle bit works amazingly well. I had a go this week for the first time. I've never done it before, and I was surprised at how much energy it took. It was like riding a stationary bike and my heart rate increased by the time I was finished centring.  An art workout!

The cabinet wheel has only one speed, and I think we will turn it into a sharpening wheel because it isn't very fast and I don't think I could manage to throw a pot on it, although I thought for a while I could use it as a dedicated trimming wheel.
Oh, and the studio has a facebook page! The world must be coming to an end if I'm on facebook. Except I don't understand what I'm doing, and I can't seem to make anything work. My page doesn't have a search window or a fans or events button, so I can't do anything but post to myself and post photos on my wall. I'd like to invite you to see it but I can't. Just search facebook pages for Sun Porch Pottery and Like me (or don't) and maybe it will start working, or something.
Cheers
Jane

Happy New Year 2012 - Remember to Have Fun

Yes, I know. It's been ages.
Why?
Something's gotta give.
Can't do everything.
In June, the sweetie said to me one day...."All we ever do is yard work or work on the house. I want to have fun"
Now, I was surprised at this because I love the yard work, (some of us would call that gardening.)
And I love my house, as unfinished as it is and crazy as that may seem. But I understood what he meant. We used to go hiking, camping, drinking, adventuring, exploring, whatever, and we don't do that anymore because:
1. We spend any extra money we have on the house stuff.
2. We have too many projects on the go. It can be overwelming.

It was getting him down. He's already a little stressed because of this phD project. He wanted some leisure time.
So for the past 6 months or so we have been working at having fun.
I abandoned the garden and the blog (two things which suck up a lot of time) to do other things. Fun things for both of us.
Boy, was it expensive.
In July we bought a new truck. It's blue, and still doesn't have a name. That wasn't so much fun as necessary. Casper was 11 years old and starting to really fall apart. We sold him to friends who didn't have a truck at all, and sometimes we still visit.
In August we drove the new truck to Montreal and bought a new bike. The green one to match my red one. Now we are twins.The plan of spending time riding together was foiled by the crappy summer weather we had and also that the green bike (which still doesn't have a name) was in the shop being fixed for a month. We bought it used, and it had some unknown problems which are now fixed and we are eagerly waiting for spring. Vroom.

In August we also bought kayaks. We were having so much fun with those that we forgot to take pictures. We put the kayaks on the truck and went to various lake and beaches all over, getting wet and exhausted and pretending we are 20ish rather than 40ish.

In September we built a new garden for a friend (yup, that's yard work but I managed to squeeze it in anyway). We used the new truck for that too, you can just see it in the distant background. September we decided I needed a new larger pottery studio and began renovating the upstairs of the garage. Including putting on a new roof. Thanks to our friends Peter and Gabrielle for helping with that. This is the new studio space under construction. It looks better now. The electricity is in, the lighting and the insulation and vapour barrier are in. There is a wood stove for the heater, along with a couple electric baseboards to keep it from freezing at night. We still need to put down the vinyl floor and plumb a sink before I move in. Oh, and a couple windows would be nice. It will be rudimentary, without drywall and will still be a storage space for much of our renovation and summer activities, but it is a much larger space that the sun porch I am currently in.
In October we renovated a craft fair booth we bought from a friend and went to a craft fair in November. Exhausting but fun.Over Christmas we collapsed from all the fun.

In the Boxing Day sales we bought me a new computer to replace the 8 year old antique I had been using. (for using - read swearing at and getting frustrated when it would hang up or crash)
The new one is much faster and easier to surf with, so perhaps blogging won't be such a time consuming task and I will do it a bit more in 2012.
Happy New Year to all, and remember to have fun.