Today, I will

Today I will finally do all of the things I have promised myself to do.

Now that you have stopped laughing, we will get down to reality. I have been so impressed by blogs such as that by Joyce Stahl, Mealy Monster Land, Pumpkinrot.com, and of course the Creagers, that I am anxious to make some figures in clay. I have done a couple of switchplates, brooches and other flat things. They have helped me know a bit about how to handle the clay itself. And of course, I have had to learn the baking technique. How to handle baking without burning. I admit to having burned one guy's butt badly enough that I had to amputate. Not having a butt makes sitting difficult so I pitched him.

One of the things I have found is that some of the clays I have are quite hard and I don't like working with them. Some are soft and I am not sure I like them either. So I am trying to learn to mix them or at least not fingerprint the soft ones. Also I finally figured out that I need work on the eyeballs. I can't afford glass eyes at this point and many artists paint eyes beautifully so I will work on that with any creatures I can make. But today is armatures.

About 10 or more years ago I was doing a bit of clay work using Maureen Carlson's book about wee folk. I loved the figures and enjoyed the work. But I have not gotten as good at faces and digits as before. It is amazing how it's possible to forget. By the way, I don't think I could ride a bicycle now either. But anyway, I am going to take inspiration from all of the wonderful artists I have seen and try to do some faces that reflect my own vision. That is the problem with using another artist's work as inspiration. It is hard to know where their vision ends and mine begins. As I would eventually like to get good enough to sell my work, I will try not to overtly copy anyone else's style. It I do, any artist may feel free to contact me about it and I will withdraw any work which offends. In the meantime, please send good thoughts to me for my learning process.

Since I and my honey still have no income, I will be trying to improvise on things I would normally buy to work with my clay things. I have decided that, rather than complaining about it, I will take this as a challenge. At night when I am waiting to sleep, I find myself designing and figuring out how to make things. And in the morning I sometimes remember some of the ideas. Now I have a notebook for those ideas and sketches. Alas, I am also quite rusty on sketching. Another thing to work on. But whooptidoo. I will enjoy practicing. Anyway, thanks to all of you wonderful artists who have posted beautiful and interesting work to inspire all of the rest of us.