The mystery of the missing piece

Do you know when you get days when you're just extra clumsy?  I'm having one of those today.  I just seem to be breaking/dropping/bumping into stuff.  I've decided to stop making stuff for today cos i seem to be breaking more than making.  And somehow, i've have seemed to lost a piece of glass.
 I cut my spoons in about ten different pieces and whilst loading up my kiln I placed a little piece of a spoon on the controller of my kiln whilst I put other pieces in place.  The controller has vents in it and it dropped down into one of those vents. Not good!  So I called my dad to come help me and he unscrewed the controller to open it up and we couldn't find it.  I've still not found it and i'm puzzled where it could have gone.  Strange.

The tough side of business

My poor pride is feeling a little hurt right now.  I have today been travelling around shops asking if anybody's interested in buying my lovespoons (I felt like a proper apprentice contestant!).  Generally i've had positive feedback off people, although I didn't make any sales most people liked them and were interested.  However, I went into one shop and well, my ego took a bit of a bashing.  The lady who owned the shop was not interested at all and seemed very set in her ways.  I don't think she appreciated my 'modern' take on the lovespoon.  Each one of my lovespoons is my own little creation, my glass babies.  I put a lot of effort into every one and being the sensitive person I am, I guess it's to be excepted that my pride would be a little wounded.  I'm still feeling positive though!  In the future when i'm a multi million selling glass artist, that lady will regret that she was not one of the first to supply my spoons!

Crafters have groupies too!

I had a stall at Caerphilly Castle last weekend and well I seemed to acquire a little groupie.  He was only about ten and I think he belonged to another stall holder but he was wandering round all by himself.  He kept coming up to mine and another stall holder's stall and wouldn't leave for quite some time.  He even started drawing pictures and giving them to me.  When he did have to leave me at one point, he stood in the doorway staring at me so I waved goodbye to him and he waved back but just stood there smiling, so I waved again and he still wouldn't budge.  Eventually he skipped off to where he came from.  He was not gone ten minutes before he returned again.  And well, I like kids and I think most are cute but what I don't think is cute is when a kid fiddles with my work and manhandles my glass, often with grubby hands!  It makes me nervous.  Glass and kids just do not mix.  As nice as the little kid was, I was constantly on edge for fear of my work (and my nerves) being shattered into a million little pieces.  Luckily, nothing got damaged but it reminds me of a saying my sister always used to say when I was little; 'Look with your eyes, not with your hands!'.  Never has a phrase been uttered so much.

You won't miss this bit of advertising!

Check out my new banner!  My mam and dad got it done up for me as a surprise.  It's a big one!  You'll definately see me coming.  You can't see my chuffed face in this photo cos the wind was blowing my hair everywhere, i'm kinda glad about that cos I didn't have any make up on hehe.  Check out the excitement on my mam's face tho.

It's really hard to work when you look that cute!....

So it's great working from home and planning my own working day, I can even go to work in my dressing gown!  What I do find particularly tough is that my super cute little dog has a habit of looking extra cute and snuggly or wanting to play when i've got a load of stuff to do.  How can I say no to big puppy dog eyes?  It's like she know's I can't pay attention to her and so emotionally blackmails me.  How do dogs know this stuff?  They certainly are clever little beings.  She loves popping her head in my studio just to see me.  I was just working on the floor with my dremmel and she came over to me and stuck her head in my face just to give me kisses.  Aww, she's like my little furry employee.


The Four Legged Culprit



The kindness of craft folk

I had a stall at St Fagans this weekend gone.  It wasn't a great one for me but whenever I come away from a craft event I always have a lovely warm feeling inside.  Craft folk are the nicest species of human i've ever met.  Everyone is genuinely interested in how well you do and are more than willing to help each other!  It's such a welcoming community that I am very proud to be a part of.  Love to all the humble craft folk ♥

Just to say hi...

I've been a little quiet on the blog front lately so i'm just checking in to say hi :)  I've had quite a few love spoon orders so have been up to my eyeballs in spoons of late.  It's driving me a little insane!  I make a batch of spoons then get them out of the kiln and then something will have gone wrong in the firing process.  Any potter or glass fuser will know that gutting feeling.  It always scares me opening my kiln after a firing, you just don't know what you will find.  You do make some pretty cool discoveries this way too tho.  Has anybody made any cool discoveries?  Or maybe had an epic firing failure?  Share your stories, i'd love to here about other people's kiln debacles!  Well, i'm off to wade through my mountain of love spoons.  Watch this space for more chronicles of the kiln kind.