Good morning, friendos! How's your week starting off? I'm in that place of "I really want to be playing with work 24 hours a day" and "I really need to give my studio a good cleaning so that I have room to play." But I'm getting a nice long day in the studio today so hopefully I can get a little of both done.
This week in ceramics, I'm doing a lot of handbuilding. I kind of thought, when I started just playing around with making new things a couple of months ago, that I'd give it up by now and start working on stocking my shop with regular items that sell well over the holidays. But I'm having too much fun still making new things, and I keep thinking back to that other ceramic artist I talked with at GLAM in the Spring, when I said that I wasn't really making the things I wanted to make right now, and she said when she passed by me later that she hoped I was able to start making the things I wanted to make soon, rather than the things I thought I needed to make.
One of the things I read extensively when I was starting my shop was to make the same thing over and over again so you didn't waste time taking new pictures of new things that you'd never get to use the pictures again for. I bought into that for a while, not gonna lie. But then I realized that if I'm making the same shaped thing year after year, I absolutely can NOT make it the same color all that time or I will get more and more bored and uninspired. So if I'm making the same thing, but in different colors, so I have to take new photos anyway... why don't I just make new things? I love taking different photos, I love how some photos are just so amazing that I'd almost frame them, so why should I deny myself that just because it "takes time"? What about what I do DOESN'T take time?! So maybe I should just make whatever I want to make, if that's the case. Der. Took me long enough to get there, haha.
Which is my way of saying that next year might see a lot of new things that may or may not become regular things in the shop.
Whoops, got off point there. I'm making a bunch of things, fairy house toad homes and orchid pots, things that I've not had before but am absolutely having a blast making, and want to make so many different styles of. Going forward, slowly because I do have a lot of slipcast bisque on my shelves, I'm going to be doing less slipcast and more handbuilding work. I'm still going to do slipcasting, don't get me wrong - I will always have a selection of WTF mugs in stock although they may occasionally change shape. But over the next few months I'm thinking I'll be shifting more towards more unique, less cookie-cutter items.
I have some soap to wrap, some restocks of things that have already sold out (thanks, y'all!) and I have some more soap supplies on order. I definitely plan to make a big batch before the holidays, although it might be pretty close to Thanksgiving by the time I get them all done.
Would you believe I still have some yarn to wind? Sigh. I need a new Shop Elf!
Speaking of yarn, I just finished this month's club yarn, and got it mailed out yesterday. I'd like to see club get a little bigger, but I'm not sure how to do that with Patreon. Like, I can't advertise Patreon yarn club on Ravelry, because the ad has to go directly to the link where you can sign up, and the page on Patreon that shows you what tiers are available shows all the tiers - not just a page about yarn club. I'm wondering if I should add it back onto the HaldeCraft site, even though that's got it's own headaches since you can't easily do recurring payments on Shopify, so I have a lot of stuff I have to do by hand for that, that Patreon lets me do automagically. I'd love input from those of you who've been in yarn club before but haven't moved over to it here on Patreon. Feel free to message me privately if you don't want to post here!
And speaking of Patreon, all the benefits have been mailed out now, and I've just got the next chapter in The Guilford Chronicles to post - what is today? The 27th? That'll probably be on the last, or next to last day of the month. I love how y'all are loving that story - those of you who've told me that it feels like such a love letter to Gainesville and fairy tales... you really get it! It totally is.
I think that's about all I wanted to say today - time to get into the studio and get my hands dirty! So that's my week, what I'm doing and what's on my mind. How about you? What are you working on? What are you reading? Cooking anything delicious this week? Finished a project? Let me know what you're up to!