here today, gone tomorrow

I am in the process of getting a show together for Riverside Artists Gallery in Marietta.  More on that later.  Let's just say when it hasn't been time consuming it's been mind consuming.  My own work has been neglected.  Etsy?  What Etsy?  But then I received a convo from a potential customer about pumpkins she had seen listed in my sold orders and would I be posting more this year?  That was motivation enough to dust off the photo booth and get to it.  They were listed and gone in less than 24 hours. This is one of the photos I posted showing three out of the four pumpkins I listed on Etsy:

 

That customer purchased three pumpkins.  But before she did a customer who purchased a pumpkin from me last year bought another one to keep it company. This is what she wrote to me later on:

 I just checked your shop and see that all the pumpkins have already sold!! I have been checking regularly hoping that you would have more this year and was thrilled to see them listed yesterday. You may not be having luck with shipping labels, but you certainly know how to make a pumpkin!!

That makes the whole photographing, editing, listing process worth it. Here's the explanation about the shipping label comment:

I had to contact her to apologize that she may have been sent more than one shipping notification.  For some reason I cannot print out online shipping labels either from Etsy or direct from USPS.  But once they're up there on the screen I've paid for it and the customer is notified that it's a done deal. So I applied for refunds then went to the post office and got it done the old fashioned way.

 

I just unloaded the kiln today.  There are more pumpkins, but I'm afraid these are going to have to stay local.  We'll see after next week.   

 

 

O Canada

I thought about rhyming a post about shipping costs to Canada's national anthem but found I didn't have it in me. Wow, international shipping prices are ridiculous.  And this one's only going to Canada.  I've had three international sales through etsy- two to Canada and one to England.  This one was a little larger sized than my usual stuff, but I was still amazed by the cost-  USPS international first class was $23.45.  That was the cheapest I could find.  I added a little for covering the box and packing material, so ended up charging $25.00. 

An international sale requires some communication with the customer because I don't include set rates for countries other than the U.S. in my shipping profile.  I ask the customer to contact me with his/her city or postal code so I can find an accurate rate.  Plus side of this is creating a connection with the customer.  Down side is the time lags between communications due to time zone differences, and having a life away from the computer. In our communications I learned that the wall hanger above was meant for a belated mother's day gift.  When my customer received my message with the shipping cost I calculated she was shocked by the shipping price, too. She wrote back saying she would go shopping that evening and if she didn't find anything she would purchase the wall hanger.  I told her to let me know and I'd reserve the listing for her.  I also said I'd take a little off the purchase price since the shipping is so expensive.  Normally it sells for $40.00 and I told her I'd lower it to $35.00.  Maybe I shouldn't do that, but I feel guilty charging that much for shipping.  Next day I got the go ahead to reserve the listing.  Nice to know that my item won out over the shopping trip.  I suppose sweetening the price helped, too.

time factor

I just listed a few things on Etsy today.  I tend to put this off because of the time consuming process of photographing, loading, editing, figuring out the shipping costs, descriptions....etc.  And every time I list something I hear the same thing going round in my head- if you were more of a production potter instead of this one of a kind stuff you do you could use the same listing over and over.  Maybe one of these days.  I don't think I'll ever truly get the hang of it.  I was thinking of that today when I got a notice that one of my pieces was entered in a treasury list .  I have never made a treasury myself.  At first because I didn't quite understand what it was all about, but also, I can't quite figure out where the time comes from, knowing I would torture myself with making decisions about what to include.  I do admire what others come up with, though, and greatly appreciate when someone includes one of my items in their treasury.

Speaking of time...I was asked by someone at the market if I keep on producing even when sales are slow.  I guess my walking around and socializing made it apparent I wasn't reaching any kind of sales quota.   Well yes, I do, except for that unplanned month and a half off because of my wrist injury.  Then, when the wrist was better I concentrated most of my efforts on Empty Bowls.

 And now, I am waiting, waiting, waiting, for things to dry so I can fire. Here's some planters-in-waiting.  The saucers for underneath these are still too wet to trim.   

I'm not sure about making more of these. It's more time consuming (sorry about the t-word again) putting these together than I remembered.  I'm thinking of making some wheel-thrown only planters. 

Large mugs. Also drying.  Last summer when I had the request for a large 20- 24 ounce mug I made several, probably 10 or 12 because that's what I do when something is new to me to figure out the size and shape needed.  Well they all sold pretty quickly.  I had no idea people were that interested in over-sized mugs. I think of them as "Dan Mugs" since that is the name of the guy who made the request.  These are in the stage of drying where I feel safe leaving the plastic off, but am keeping them covered with a lightweight cotton cloth. The cloth obviously allows more drying, but still seems to slow it down somewhat.  It absorbs moisture, keeping a damp environment around the mugs even while evaporation is going on. The cloth thing is a tip from another potter, by the way.  I never think of these things myself. 

I do have dry ordinary sized mugs.  They are waiting by the kiln for these other ones to catch up.  Oh, and I want to get test tiles made before the next firing.  Better hurry up...



there's no place like home

That ran through my head a couple of times at the farmer's market Saturday.  I've been absent from the market for several weeks because of the shows I was doing.  It was quite the project getting set up again and I feel very lucky we have a building so I don't have set up and tear down every time. Business was great, which I was amazing because of the complete disarray my stuff was in.  People were buying before I was even 10 percent set up.  One couple asked if I had honey jars, which I hadn't unpacked yet.  I managed to find one pretty quick and was going to look for the other one I knew I had, but they said they were happy with the first one.  Decisive.  I like that.
I do have my slow days at the market. Wish I could predict those so I could just stay home and work.  It was completely unexpected that I would have such a good day in the middle of that setting up mess.  Nice welcome back.
Here's some vases from the last firing.  Same shape, different glazes-

I have another of this glaze combo at the market. Something I noticed when I looked at the  Harvest Moon show pictures was the dominance of decorative pieces.  I very much appreciate functional pottery and hadn't realized I was leaning so much into the decorative area until seeing those pictures.

Ahhh......Weathered Bronze.  I have a customer who wanted to see more pieces made in this glaze so I'll put these aside for him.  This is a very strong glaze and is not appropriate for just anything.  I lined these vases in a clear glossy glaze for easier cleaning and to make sure of the seal.  I am still learning with this glaze.  Every glaze has it's special characteristics:  how it acts where it breaks over texture, what it looks like where it's thin or thick, and how it reacts when it overlaps with other glazes or coloring oxides.

Focus, focus.  It seems I focused on the Japanese Lanterns and not the vase.  The Japanese Lanterns are very worthy so that's O.K.   These lanterns are a couple of years old but since I store them in a dark place when fall is over they retain their color pretty well.
Nice turquoise glaze.  I'm always thinking of phasing it out, though. Looks very anemic if applied thin, tends to crawl it it's  the slightest bit thick.  Customers like it, which makes the phasing out thing difficult.

I neglected my etsy shop all summer.  Mostly, I was unhappy with my photos so I let a bunch of stuff expire.  I did experiment with a different photography set-up but wasn't especially pleased with that, either.  I'll probably never be completely satisfied with my pictures.  I'm thinking of eventually taking it in a different direction:  I'd been kicking around the idea of carrying only decorative items instead of functional in my shop even before seeing this little trend in my show pictures.  I do have a number of non-functional items listed already.  Anyway, whether functional or non-functional, I've started the slow process of getting it repopulated.