Sneak peek at pinto's

Hey guys,
I had a thought last night (yep, it happens lol). I think people who work with ceramics are artists who want Christmas all year long. I say that because, every time I open my kiln, it's like Christmas-you never know what you're going to get. For example, would you buy the two horses in the first picture? I wouldn't. Yuck.

And yet, with a little masking removable, and overnight hanging out in the kiln, you get this..

See my point? It's like Christmas!! The two shown will both be for sale I imagine when they are finished. The larger one is a Loza Arab that *might* be offered at Breyerfest by the castor, we'll see when he's done what she thinks. The other one is a Pour Horse, I can't think of her name off the top of my head, but I bought her at Breyerfest last year cheap because of a broken leg. So the leg is being taken extra special care'd of, but it is in the stages of being repaired (the uplifed one).

I want to say, just for the sake of saying, that anyone who enjoys having or looking at china horses/stuff (like Hagen Renakers, Beswicks, custom glaze, ect), should know, it's hard. I was reading my HR book last night, and they had a breakage rate, by their best cleaners, of 1 broken to 5 intact. They broke one piece for every 5 they made. That's a lot, if you are a business that rely's on bulk pieces being made. I'm obviously not a business, but I'll tell you, even working with big horses with fat legs, my percentage isn't all that great. I figure that this rate, I'll be a master of repairs in about 2 months, because I have a box in the basement with at least 5 broken horses in it. However, this is my first real successful finished repair. Her right ear I broke off after she had been fired.


Our friend Alfred the horse got fired before I went into the hospital, I ment to get pix of him to post but haven't because he's drying (he has two broken legs). His mane cracked a little, so I had to fix that, and he'll be thrown in again, then I'll get back to building up his shoulders and butt a little bit. But, he's cute. Kinda homely looking tho.

And, for all curious, my back seems to be back to normal except for being a little sore. I have been taking things slow, and lay down a lot, but for as bad as that whole episode was, there's very little reminder of it. Strange, huh?

Til next time :)

Life is in my Way

Well, life has gotten in my way of glazing and doing fun stuff. I figure since only my good friends are following this right now, it'd be safe to post a few non-mud thoughts. But don't worry, I'll pull it back around to something interesting :)

Today was the first day since I came to the hospital where I went for a gimpy walk while I was in that place between drug induced fog and too low on painkillers to move. And I noticed something as I hobbled along with an old lady walker. I'm the only person in this section of the hospital that's under 60. No kidding. I was walking slow enough to see into every room, and even say hi to anyone alert enough. And I am being generous, I really think everyone's over 70. Last night, when I was moments from passing out from the painkillers, I heard a staff member say "well, she's only 29!" and the other member sounded pretty shocked. Now I don't mind telling you, it scares the peepers out of me that I'm locked in an old person ward, and I can't move fast enough to pass any of the other residents to get out. I've been here since Thursday, and it seems like the only two places I've been are out of my mind with pain, or totally drugged to the point of not being able to focus. I sure hope they find something on their tests tomorrow (they don't run tests on the weekends apparently), something fixable, because I don't want to go through life in a haze. They did some med switching, apparently the foggy meds could cause seizures (which would just do wonders on my back I'm sure...), so they put me something else, which made my face swell and breathing hard. Now I'm on plain old Vikadin. I'm grumpy, I want a shower but can't stand long enough to get one, today was considered progress because I could walk a couple dozen feet to get some paper to draw on. So what separates me from the old people? Well, that's pretty simple. I have a laptop, and I'm listening to music on my IPhone :P

Any time I end up in places like this, or situations like this (sadly, it's been more times than I care to remember), I feel bad for elder folks. It's flippin' depressing to sit around, day in, day out, with nothing to do, in pain, not being able to shower and always being at the mercy of your nurse. Not that the nurses here are bad, much the opposite, but you get my point. Using a bed pan is just a horrible experience. Having someone help you dress because you can't do it yourself isn't all that great either. At least I can always cling to the knowledge that I'm not 30 yet, I'll be going home eventually. But what do older folks have to think about? esp the ones that are just thrown into nursing homes because their too busy kids don't want to deal with them. I can see why some folks just fade away when they get sent to places with no hope of getting out.

So anyway, back to stuff that's more interesting. I bought these two off eBay. They were supposed to be mint, but the PO had other idea's. Aren't they cute? But they didn't ride well together. They are by Beswick, and about classic size. Does anyone know anything about them? I ordered a Beswick Book, so hopefully I can find out some info on them, but they will be excellent repair projects. And if they aren't worth anything, they'll be awesome glaze projects. Just picture them as wild appaloosa's!! I really like the bigger one tho.


And, while I was out checking in on my mom's house in Ohio, I stopped at a little shop, and picked up some Hr's. Not sure if I'm keeping them, the little foal has toothpick legs that are just waiting to snap. But, these are my fav's of the group (I think I bought 18 or something).

I really like the turning one, he's cool.

This is one of my fav Hr mini molds, but darn if I can't find one that's LSQ. This is the nicest copy I have (I think I have 5 copies) and she's just sloppy. So if anyone sees one that's actually nice, drop me a line so I can snatch her :)

Slow as Drying Mud...

I told myself when I made this blog that I'd post at least every three days. And here, the second post is late already! I had the best weekend tho, so it works. I went on a camping horseback riding weekend with my friend Nikki and her in-laws. Couldn't have had more fun, unless the 6 hour rides had been 8 hours lol. But, when I got home, I managed to pop a bone in my lower back out, and since I'm stuborn or something, took me 3 days to get to the back cracker. So things have been slow.

However, all that borning-ness to say...

I started pouring molds again today, with help from my side kicks of course.


Because if everyone isn't covered in mud, you're just not doing it right.

I also finished up some other projects. I like to experiment, and tinker, and these were the results of that. I went to a junk store not that long ago, and picked up 6 brand new pitcher molds for $1 each! They are really nice, easy to work with, and are about 4-5 inches tall when they are done. They are great for trying out colors that I'm not sure what color they will fire to be :) I've got close to a dozen done so far. Not sure what I'll do with them, but here's a couple I really liked.



I haven't done anything with the horses from the previous post, except to fire the pieces. I found that working with the greenware was tricky, at best, and the head of the itching mare was too heavy for just greenware to hold. I'm waiting til my back is behaving again to tinker with them, tho I'm feeling very impatient to wait that long..
But I did work on these two. The first is a little mule, that I was practicing mule pattern on. I think he turned out cute. I love that high gloss look, and the contrast of the white and black. I will be doing a lot of wild mules I think in the future, as I recently bought a bisque mule that I just love, but haven't found "the" pattern for it yet.



And this, is a Doc Holiday Thoughbred. Rather than call him all that, I just call him Alfred. The DH TB is kind of wonky to start with, so I've been working on building up his butt and shoulders a little bit, and gave him a new mane today. There's something very liberating about the thought "I can always make another one if I don't like this one". Unlike Breyers, where if you don't like the work you've done, you're out $10+, these guys, with mold costs and everything, are only a couple dollars each to make (they get spendy when you start firing them a zillion times with glaze, but that's for another day). Maybe that's why I feel so brave with resculpting them so liberally. Anyway, here's Alfred.


Obviously, he still needs some cleanup, that's just in the "leather wet" form of greenware. The body itself is fired bisque tho. I tend to squeeze the life out of them when I resculpt, so best to fire the body first with no mane :)
Til next time!

Hi All,
Well, I've never done a blog before. I'm not sure I'll be all that interesting, but I thought I'd give it a try.

Today was fun. In a "I have little to show for it" kind of way. I have recently suddenly re-fallen in love with working with ceramic and custom glaze horses, and, while I stink at it, I really enjoy it.
So today, I poured a few of my molds. Since I'm learning, I never wanted to drop a ton of money into molds, so I bought some Doc Holiday molds, which are pretty generic. I have several of them, but the two I worked with today are the Arabian mare, and the grazing mare. Now, I happen to adore the grazing mare, and I don't normally tinker with her, but last night, I got this great idea and wanted to try it. I cut off her head and neck, and am working on resculpting it to make her scratching her side. Much harder than I expected, since her head is heavier when it's fighting gravity instead of just hanging off her shoulders. But, here are the pieces of her. I'm letting her dry some, and will continue tinkering tomorrow.

The other horse I worked with was the Arabian mare. Now, my kiln is just a wee little thing, and this mare is about an inche too tall for me to actually fire as is (which I found out after I poured and cleaned one). So, I got the idea to cut her head and neck off, and just lower and turn her head a little. Nothing major, right? Til Rachel ran by (my two year old daughter), and Arab's head with PLOP on the sidewalk. Hmm. Thankfully, since I had pour this mare before, and in frustration, throw her into my scrap bucket, I went down, and broke the head off of what was left, and used that. Hence why it's a different color :)



Since taking the pictures, I have cleaned the bodies of both horses, and will hopefully have them done and ready to fire by this weekend :)