Some sketches in response to a query

            I was asked over at Kickstarter if I would do a sgraffito dragon on the $10 reward, which is a small bowl. The answer is yes! Because I want to make these bowls swiftly, I am aiming for simple, yet effective, designs. Here are the two dragons that I can make available at this reward level as a special request:

        There's this little guy, who is a Western-style dragon. He's appeared on my mushroom bowls before.

            And then there's this fellow, who I just sketched out this afternoon. He's more of an Eastern-style dragon, with whiskers but no wings.

This is the link...

... to my Kickstarter project! http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/317283323/bringing-the-fire-to-riverdragon-ceramics. Click on it! Copy and paste it! Spread it on toast... er, I mean around to everyone you know! Let's do this thing.

Update on Kickstarter! Going live Friday at 8 am!

            I have just received notification that my Kickstarter project has been approved! Hooray! I will launch the project tomorrow, Friday August 17 2012, at 8 am. We have 18 days to reach or exceed $3,888. If we do, then I will have a kiln! If not, then I will have no kiln and everyone will be sad. So tell your friends and family! Tell your neighbors and coworkers! Tell artists you meet! Direct them to this blog and to the Kickstarter page!
            To find my project, go to the Kickstarter homepage (here) and type into the search bar: Bringing the Fire to Riverdragon Ceramics! In the morning I will have a direct link to the page up for you.

Press Release: Kickstarter, here I come!

            I have some exciting news! In the next couple of days, I will be launching a Kickstarter project. What is Kickstarter, you ask? The people who created it explain it here.
            What is my project for? As those of you who have been following this blog will know, I am well on my way to having a functioning ceramics studio here in the barn at Riverdragon Ceramics. But I do not have a kiln. My goal is for this studio to be fully functioning and as self-sufficient as possible. I am an independent spirit, and I want to do everything myself - I want to take clay and work it into the shapes I want, I want to do my own bisque firings, my own glazing, possibly with glazes that I mix myself, and my own glaze firings in my own kiln, right here at home. I now have the capability to do all of that... except for the firing, which is arguably the most important, and the most expensive, part of the process.
            I am so excited for this project! I have been planning and preparing all summer for this. The rewards you will get for pledging to my project will all be hand made here in my barn-studio by me, and fired in the new kiln. I am offering a wide array of objects for pre-order, and if you like what you see but want something specific, like "I like the sgraffito bowls! But can you do a gryphon instead of mushrooms?" I will make you a custom piece. Since I am in charge of the whole process, it costs me little to nothing to make such changes, and I love to make special things that will be cherished by the recipient. (Also? If you're pledging to this project, you are helping me get my first kiln, and as such you have my eternal gratitude and I would make any adjustments you want, within reason, to the reward for the pledge level you chose.)
            I have a place in the studio all ready to go for the kiln. All it needs is fire proofing (it is, after all, an old wooden barn), which I will begin doing once the Kickstater project is launched. I have a nice strong fan for ventilation that I will install above the kiln. I have had an electrician who is experienced in installing kilns look things over and let me know what is feasible in the space. So I'm ready to go; all I need is the kiln!
            So now you know what I was doing in July rather than posting here. Never fear; with this post I am returning to the usual arrangement of several posts per week. My project is undergoing the approval process at Kickstarter as I type this, and I expect it to come out the other side with a big red "approved!" stamp in the next couple of days. Stay tuned for the web address of my project! I will announce it here as soon as it is available to me!
            I am planning a series of posts about the various rewards I'm offering, the particular kiln I'm planning to get and why, and other odds and ends that may come up. Check back often!

Bumble bees

            Part of the yard here has been left wild, and there are different flowers that come up and bloom at different times of the year. Currently these tall white clusters of blooms are everywhere. I don't know what they are, but this is what the back yard looks like.

            Twined in between the stalks of the white flowers are these thin vines with clusters of purple flowers that look like this.

            Both kinds of flowers seem to be very attractive to bees and butterflies. I have seen honey bees and big fat bumble bees and swallowtail butterflies and monarch butterflies and black and white butterflies I'm not familiar with all over them. I've also seen another kind of bee that I've only ever seen in Maine. Mr. Riverdragon and I call them Copper-Butt Bees because they have this lovely tuft of copper colored fur on their rumps. They are actually called Orange Belted Bumble Bees according to the internet, but we like our name for them better. They look like this:

            Maybe sometime I can get a closer picture of one. They don't sit still long when there are tasty flowers to explore. I discovered in a previous summer that you don't want to step on them, because they give a nasty nasty sting. They sure are pretty, though, and I don't mind having them around. I just have to watch out where I put my feet! I would rather have a thriving bee population and watch my step than not have enough bees to pollinate the plants we depend on to provide us with food and beautiful flowers.

Signs!

            Remember this post in which I showed off a nice piece of birch bark I found by the shore? Well, I finally got around to painting it, and it is now a sign for the door of my studio!

            The figure in the lower left corner is one of my simplified dragons, like on the cups in this post. I am also working on a sign that can be put out by the road to let people know to stop by the barn-studio and see my pots while I am working. That one still has some work that needs done:

            Yeah, ok, a lot still needs to be done with that sign; it's still just a pile of lumber. But when I am done it will be a lovely pale green with black letters. 

Some work in progress

            As you can see, I've been doing a bit of trimming today. I think I need to do something about all the trimmings that land on the floor. The splashpan on this wheel seems to work fine for catching slip while I'm throwing, but doesn't catch trimmings well. In the past, with other wheels, I have put plastic all around the wheel so that I could just pick it up and dump the clay into the reclaim bucket. I think I might cut up some garbage bags and tape them together in the right shape so it's a little less fiddly when I go to trim.
            And the results - a soup bowl:

            A carved serving dish:

            This clay is a porcelain that is intended for wood firing, and is the same clay that I used for the lighter colored dragons in my thesis. Example:

            I also used this clay when making a set of these bowls:

            I like this clay very much, although I don't have a whole lot of it left. I'm hoping to find someone in Maine who has a wood kiln who will share kiln space with me. I'm willing to do a lot of work preparing wood and stoking the kiln and cleaning up after! I'm still new to wood firing, but I love it.
            I'm thinking that the carvings on the carved dish will look really awesome when they catch the ash. I'm thinking of doing the same thing with a darker clay as well.