What are you working on this week? I'm getting my need-to's finished, but not my want-to's, and somehow that's making me feel like I'm falling behind. Does anyone else ever feel that way?
In ceramics I've run the kiln a couple of times - oh, excuse me, I'll be right back, I meant to start the small kiln (with some color test tiles) first thing this morning - OK, I'm back. Where was I....? So I've run the kiln a couple of times. A good glaze firing towards the end of last week, a bisque firing (both in the large kiln) and a small kiln firing today. Do I need to name the small and large kilns? I always thought if I got a second big kiln, I'd name one Spock (because it's a Vulcan brand) and I'd make sure to get a Scutt for the second, so I could call it... Scutty... and make jokes about how it's givin' me all she's got, cap'n!. I'll just wait while that sinks in (#startrekjokes). Then I caught part of The Abyss on tv the other month and thought the names of the submersibles might make good kiln names, but now I can't remember what they were (Big something and Little something, but The Google isn't helping me). Hoo, boy, have I gotten sidetracked here!
So. A couple of kiln firings. I've thrown about a dozen mugs, the February mug and also a new shape to do the Biohazard mugs with. I went to the pottery supply shop up in Jacksonville, and while they were out of the clay I wanted to restock myself on, I picked up a brown speckled clay and also a black clay, both to play with. Those will probably wind up being the March and April mugs, heh. I'll need to go back up to Jacksonville in a couple of weeks when they get more Laguna B-mix in, though - I've decided on a shape for the mugs I want to do that combine both the knitting and crochet yarn stamps and also a decal that says "Knitting/Crocheting since birth, Drinking since noon" and I'm itching to get started on those.
I was hoping to release the pizza plate this Friday, but things are just a little too crazy this week and I haven't had time to glaze them. I probably could have glazed them yesterday, but I wouldn't have been able to glaze enough other bisque for a whole kiln, so I decided to test some of the new colors of glaze I bought, and some combo colors (where I use more than one color on a piece) instead. That's what I'm firing today. But that means that next Friday I should have both the pizza plates, and some new zipper mugs!
In soap, I've made some in a new fragrance for the shop; Rhubarb & Sugar Cane. I used this fragrance last year for the soap club, and it was well-received... so I thought I'd bring it in this year as a new fragrance. Right now I'm only making full-sized bars, but it might show up later this year as part of a guest set.
In yarn, I got the January yarn club out on Tuesday (Domestic; International went last week) and I've started winding February's yarn. I'm already thinking about what theme to choose for next round. I've been thinking I want to do one on favorite spaceships; so, colorways could be inspired by anything from The USS Enterprise to the shuttles Columbia or Discovery. But on the drive to Jacksonville, the mystery we were listening to was over and I made us start Watership Down, since Richard Adams just died at Christmas, and That Poor Man has never read the book. Within the first chapter I thought of three colorway ideas I haven't used on the other two Watership Down-inspired yarn clubs that I've done, so I might do that instead of spaceships. Oh, ideas! It's not *where* I get my ideas, it's *how do I herd them properly*.
In other things... what else is going on? I put all my knitting aside to knit two Pussyhats for friends; I was trying to get a third done for a friend of a friend but I still have about two inches to go and there's no way for me to get it to her in time.
I'm prepping hard for the Open House this Saturday. I'm excited to have Leslie Tharp, a local blacksmith, coming to do a demonstration! There will also be a couple of surprise guests at this round, but I can't say who because the surprise is actually for another couple of people who are going to be there (sorry, vague, I know... all will be revealed after the fact!).
That's about it for me this week. What about y'all? What are you working on?