Thanks

Thanks Anne and Stacy for your comments and sweet words. I live in North Carolina and have many galleries here in this area. I also have work in VA and SC. I put up work on e-bay and here is the link. You can access me from here.
I also do orders and commissions which I really enjoy. I am going to put my e-mail on my blog and you can always email me if you see anything that you like. I am trying to get my website up and running but have been extremely lazy. Hopefully by July and then I will have a link here for that.

The Rabbit

Here is the first of many rabbits for the show. He is about 2 feet tall and features the rabbit jumping down his hole with Alice watching.


When I think about Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, the rabbit stands out to me as the most important character. He caused the whole ordeal to begin. Not only that, he is also fast and elusive and mysterious. I can never really grasp as many times as I read the book why he is in such a rush. As it is no one really gets their head cut off and the queen is ineffective and just walks around bellowing.

I have thought about this book a lot. Knowing that it was meant as a children's book, I try to see it through the eyes of the child still left in me. Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn't but I am trying to work as a child might think. Trying to see things in black and white with little wiggle room.

Tea Party

I am making the tea party dishes and here are a few.....a cake plate, which will have real cake for the opening but ceramic cakes for the rest of the show. And a butter dish with the mad hatter on one side and the march hare on the other.
I love working with the checkerboard pattern.
It's time consuming but the results are so dramatic and I love contrast so it fits!

Last weeks painting

More painting out in the neighbors yard.
It is not done but I like the beginnings.
I don't know what I am going to do with all of these tree paintings but I am enjoying doing them.

Some tiles for the wall of tiles.

I made a wall of tiles for the Dorothy show and so I decided to go ahead and make one for the Alice show. They all have little sayings on the back of them...just quick notes or drawings or quotes from the book.

And so it begins.....

Here are the beginnings of the Alice show. I have made 3 pairs of her legs that will hang from the ceiling of the gallery with no less than 8 other pairs. Then I am beginning the place settings for the table. I will also have a tea table set up with some dainty cups and crazy crocked teapots. I can't wait! I have so many ideas for the installation that I can barely keep track and have been furiously writing and drawing all the while I am carving and building. It is good to be inspired and I feel very caught up in the delirious crazy world that is Alice in Wonderland.

Dogwood

I couldn't resist taking a day to do all the things I want to do. I woke up late snuggling next to Will and the dogs. Breakfasting on cheddar and triscuits and grapefruit juice I watched some animal planet. 3 cups of coffee later and I made 2 clay legs for the upcoming show in July...installation of Alice in Wonderland....and then gathered all my paints and went out to the yard. My favorite dogwood as a model I have just started this small painting. I couldn't resist and it helps that the other ones are pretty wet and not ready for more work.

Dad's Work

I have been teaching mom and dad for a little over a year. We started with drawing from still- life and then progressed to painting. Lately since the change in the weather we have been painting the landscape. Here is dad's start from this week. He has already let me know that much has changed and that the first thing he did was to paint the grass blue. I can't wait to see how he finishes. He is using acrylic inks which are really vibrant and loose.

Painting Update and the New weekly project

This is the update of the cedar painting from last week and the new painting from this week.
Mom was actually out of town so me and dad trecked over to the neighbors backyard to paint again the monstrous old cedars. It was a cloudy day that screamed of a downpour but the skies held out for us until we had enough to take home to use just through memory.
Neither is truly finished but I love to think of them as done because I am eager to start anew. Alas.....

updated paintings

Cedar trees

Me and my parents went to my neighbors back yard to paint these lovely old cedar trees> Here is my started painting.

Happy Birthday!

to me!!!!
'My mother-in-law and her husband Dick gave me a gift certificate to Amazon.com so that I could buy these amazing books!
I am so excited about the Irish crochet. It is a lot like free form crochet but of course more complicated and tedious. The stitches have to be really small and precise and controlled. Because they use a cord on which to crochet I am having to relearn how to hold all the threads so that they stay tight and in place. It really is an amazing craft and I plan to master it one day I suspect far into the future.
I am still working on Will's sweater the Jolly Roger from the Happy Hooker and have progressed a bit. I am thinking I will finish it on the way to NY this summer for our vacation.

My mom gave me this knitting novel to read. I'm sure it will be sappy and cute and leave you feeling good. And I say what's wrong with that? We need more feel good moments in our lives.

Original

Here is the original set up...the front of the studio.

New Painting

I started this painting last week. It was my set up for Mom and Dad's lesson. It's not finished but I am waiting for some drying time. I like the way the colors and light are coming along. Some of the angles are bothering me though and I will have to see how the whole thing comes together in the end.

A brain to eat?

Will teaches a class every couple of years where the students are required to watch an autopsy video. After which he brings in this chemistry jar with a brain floating in it. It never fails that one student will ask him to eat the brain and then of course, Will obliges...much to the horror of the students. This is the brain before Will took it to school. It was made with peach jello and condensed milk and a super cool jello mold that can be purchased at 1-800-autopsy. I have to say that it is a pretty real looking brain and it is slimy and shiny. I still get grossed out looking at it.

Late night music

This is what happens when it is late at night and the music is blue grass and you simply cannot stop playing your trusty mandolin. You just lie down and play.

Happy Birthday Dad!

I have been trying to finish this frame for awhile now. Me and Dad had decided to go into a joint venture of making mirrors with really cool painted frames. Well, he upheld his end and I was the slacker. Then I was thinking about what to get him for his birthday and decided that this would be a good present. This picture is not finished but it's close. Happy Birthday Dad and happy spring to everyone! This frame is actually based on the idea of spring with it's noisy peepers, and all of those frisky birds rushing around preparing to make babies.


***note...I changed out the pictures and this is the image of the finished frame****

Nantahala

This past week me and Will and his 2 brothers went to western NC for a trip to the Nantahla Outdoor Center for rafting guide school. http://www.noc.com/I know, I know, it's cold and all but we lucked out and had a week of 65-75 degree weather. It really was great fun and even though I don't want to be a guide, the boys probably will end up doing some raft guide stuff in the future. We went down the Nantahala river and the French Broad. I fell out of the boat, or more like bounced out of the boat, twice and went in voluntarily for a drill. The water wasn't that bad. It was cold but you just don't think about it that much. We had a beautiful cabin up the hill from the river that was right on the Appalachian Trail. I took Wednesday off from school and hiked the AT for about 7 miles. It was so amazing. The beauty of the mountains always astound me and this day I was awe struck. I also was blessed to see a piliated woodpecker on the top of one hill as he flew off to a neighboring tree. I also saw a bald headed eagle soar above the French Broad River. Sigh......

I have been making these basket forms for the last couple of weeks. Really taking myself back to the beginnings of my clay days when all I did was coil handbuilding. I actually thought making pots was stupid...I was a bit arrogant at 20. Anyway, when I start any process the first things I make become the test subjects for glaze. And this one is was the tested for this turquoise glaze. It was supposed to be a light turquoise but alas, as with most glaze recipes what I think is light turquoise is not what the author thinks is light. I do like it though but it is not what I had in mind....so back to the drawing board.

The knitting bowls

I have finished 4 knitting bowls. That is the good news. The bad news is that I am having some weight distribution issues and this is causing some cracking. I am fixing the problem in the new knitting bowls but the sad thing is I have these 4 lonely, beautiful, except for a few small cracks, bowls that are sitting in the studio. I thought I would let the friends of THK aka Miss Grey or Mouse as I like to call her, try them out for me but I hate to give anyone a piece that is not pretty perfect. I guess my point here is if you would like to try out a knitting bowl that has some small defect, pipe up and I will work on getting it to you. The only requirement is feedback and lots of it as I plan to make many of these for a gallery in Virginia. Miss Grey, you have first pick if you want one of these but I really want yours to be perfect and it is already in the making.