in the mornings

Recently, I've fallen in love with early mornings again.

When I was living in New Hampshire, and firing twice a year at my friend Jody's wood kiln in Maine, my preferred shift started at 4 am. It meant an early bedtime, and a groggy start, but I was so fond of tending that fire while the rest of the world slept. The morning light would slowly brighten, the birds would start to chirp, and I'd feel so productive so early in the day. (Admittedly, this last bit is a big part of why I love mornings!)

In the past four months, as we've been adjusting to parenthood, we've been trying to find ways to continue making pottery - and get sleep, and have quality family time.

And so we've both taken on "parents" hours, as we like to call them, with me up before dawn and Nathan in the studio after baby's (and mama's, ahem) bedtime. Nothing too extreme - sunrise isn't all that early in the winter - and baby's bedtime isn't all that late!) but enough to give us some quiet time by ourselves to collect our thoughts and prepare for, or close out, the day.

Also new for me is having regular studio time most days.

It sounds odd to say that - wouldn't a potter naturally have this?! - but our last five years were largely dedicated to building our kiln and studio. Pottery, in many ways, became something we squeezed in between the flow of more pressing projects. Now, thankfully, our pace with all that building has largely come to a halt, and studio time is once again the priority. (There's a BIG kiln to fill before spring!)

And I must say that there is nothing like regular studio time to enhance a feeling of flow and creativity. I've also chosen to focus on making one thing - mugs - for several weeks. It's been surprisingly pleasant to continue with one train of thought, so to speak, and watch my rhythms with throwing and handles get smoother and more streamlined.

{A bit of springtime while the snow falls - Nathan brought in a broken crab apple branch - and we had pink blossoms in an otherwise black and white landscape.}

Sticking with one type of piece for a while has also allowed me to develop new ideas more fully. Before this, I made maybe ten or twenty of one thing, and moved on to the next shape. Maybe I've become more patient, or perhaps this style of working makes somewhat choppy hours that I have between meals and baby feedings feel more contiguous.

And there's the fact that I personally have found myself enjoying my morning mug of tea all that much more. A mug can be a really personal, intimate thing. A quiet moment with a favorite mug can really set the tone for the day.

It's been anything but boring. In some ways, I feel as though I could keep making mugs for a while longer, although my hands have more recently begun twitching for a different form. Soon.

I've been enjoying the new bird-shaped stamps that I made. . . and figuring out fun ways to store the stamps so I can see 'which bird is which.' :)

Oh, and there have been bikes, too. New designs, or shall I say, 'new-old' ones.

And of course there's my trusty studio buddy, who, in the mornings, isn't up to his usual trouble-making tricks yet. He sits quietly on my wedging table, 'protecting' me. :)

I must say, it's been quite peaceful in these early mornings.

~Becca

this new year

It's 2014, and life could not have changed more since 2013. Since Zoe joined us, the part of my brain that finds space to write reflectively about our lives as potters seems to have been swallowed by the all-consuming duties of motherhood.

So be it. We wouldn't trade parenthood for all the studio time in the world. It's been wonderful.

So here's to a new style of sharing - photos and brief bits about where we're at - probably not all that different from what I shared before, but maybe shorter and somewhat less eloquent and slightly more random. :)

{insert gratuitous cute baby photo}

It's hard to believe that one year ago, we were hanging the siding on our studio in the snow - it had a dirt floor and zero insulation - and making a few pots in a cramped upstairs bedroom.

This year, we are happily at work inside, making pots in the warm, sunny space we dreamed of for many years before.

We're so glad we put in five years of hard work on "infrastructure" - wood kiln and studio - so that now, between naps and diaper changes - we can get a few pots thrown. (With Lego, as per usual, seeing that we pay attention to HIM. Yes, he's on my wedging table, ahem.)

I started off the year in the studio with a few new experimental hand built pieces - pears and 'trenchers' fashioned to look like primitive wood bowls. We'll see how they come out. It's nice to experiment before heading full-force into making mugs and butter keepers. (That's my next task.)

Nathan has been working away at kiln and studio maintenance to get the kiln- and kiln shed- ready for our next firing. (Yes, we are still cleaning up from Firing #3, with a new year's resolution to clean up DIRECTLY following the next firing. :) It seems we're always running off to a show or something . . .)

In any event, he's been cutting wood and installing vent hoods and washing buckets - and on a more fun note - installing a pull up bar in his studio! It's the little things that bring joy . . .

The other day, with grandparents on the premises, we had a morning to ourselves - a "date morning," if you will - and we headed enthusiastically . . . to the kiln shed. Yup, grinding shelves and cleaning up from our third firing was our job - and actually, it was quite lovely. We were together doing what we love and putting our work lives in order. (Never thought I'd use the word "love" and "kiln maintenance" in the same sentence, but having a baby does change everything!)

In other random news (I told you there would be randomness) - we have studio plumbing!

This might not seem that exciting, until you consider that these pipes translate to things like a SINK and HEAT.

It sure is handy having a sink in a pottery studio! And central heat - in this case, radiant floor heat - is sooo nice. We'd be keeping things warm with the wood-stove while we waited for delivery of a water heater, but we were plowing through our wood and it wasn't all that warm. Just before Christmas family visits, our plumber was kind enough to jury rig a temporary set-up that involves one loop of our radiant tubes to be filled with warm water. And oh, how nice. The studio is warm and the heat is even and comfortable and requires zero maintenance. The full system gets installed tomorrow!

A warm bright studio with a long winter of pottery making and hanging out with our little girl lies ahead. Sounds about perfect to me.

Hope you're all enjoying a wonderful start to 2014.

~Becca

studio building - little things and big things

We are in total studio building immersion these days. Despite the tiniest indications of spring, the weather in Vermont has continued to be wintery and cold, adding to the sense that we are in some kind of crazy time-warp where we are always building and it is always winter.

We've gotten a lot done, though!

The last few weeks have been punctuated by some very big things (a concrete floor! the last door installed! wiring! stairs! a heat source!), and some little things. First the little things: the gable ends got finished - photo above. (No more staring at purlin overhangs and the underside of our metal roofing.) We also made soffit/vent boards out of pine and bits of screen for the eaves, and installed them. (OK, we haven't totally finished the south side . . . but progress, nonetheless.)

Nathan continued trimming the underside of our windows, and we worked inside to fill the smallest triangles with rigid foam so our cellulose installer will have less hassle.

Nathan has also been busy with the foam gun - using the expanding stuff to seal the edges of the triangles and rafter bays (in pink, below), while I trim it back where necessary.

We insulated the entire cupola with rigid foil-faced foam for the highest possible r-value - in a space where a lot of our heat is likely to rise. (Until we get a ceiling fan, that is!)

We also roughed in the wiring in the parts of the studio that will soon be buried in cellulose insulation. We're still running off extension cords for now, but soon we'll have outlets for pottery wheels and tools! And overhead lights, entry fixtures, and switches in all the right places. Even a motion sensor that will kick on for those dark evening trips to the studio to attend to drying pottery.

Here's the big picture on the first floor - which will be our primary "making" area. It's about 800 square feet. (And yes, still very much a "work zone!")

But enough about the small stuff. (OK, maybe you can't call any of that "small" stuff - but you can argue that the next parts of the project are a lot more exciting. :)

We completed the pick-up and installation of a new-to-us wood stove! (Made, incidentally, by Vermont Castings, whose plant is less than a mile from our house. Yay local.) It's so nice to have a source of heat in the building - although insulation will make it a lot more effective! ;) Nathan worked diligently at installing all the components of our metal asbestos chimney- which begins way down on the first floor and reaches through the peak of the roof and up past the cupola. The wood stove will be our main source of heat until the radiant system is hooked up, which likely won't be until next heating season.

But it wouldn't really make sense to light up a fire without first closing in the building completely - during a mid-March snow storm no less. (And to think last year it was 80-degrees at this time of year!)

After some additional framing was completed in the rough opening, the last of the siding was installed under the awning, and the door went in and got trimmed out in record time. It's so nice to have the last (south) side of the building complete from the outside!

Next up on the list of big accomplishments: stairs!! We can now walk between floors of our studio without traipsing through the snow, mud, or any combination of the two.

Oooh, boy, are we excited about these winding beauties! (Thanks to Bob for all the tricky math. :)

There are still lots of little things to do - and at least one major thing before we can get to making pottery - insulation! We are used to working in the cold at this point, but we'd rather our freshly-thrown pots didn't freeze overnight. ;) (We've been through that before.) Here's a preview of the next insulation stage, during which our entire upstairs will shine like a new rocket ship . . .

. . . to be followed closely by dense-pack cellulose in the walls and ceiling . . . and a big 'ole drywall job!

Counting the days until we get to make pottery! (Will we remember how??)

Happy Spring,

~Becca

studio building - many hands

Things are getting a wee bit warmer in our new studio building! A couple of weeks ago, Nathan and I began the work of fitting rigid foam (a.k.a. "pink board") into the spaces between our rafters. (The purpose here is three-fold: create a vent-space for our roof, provide the beginning of our insulation, and make something nice for the spray foam insulation to stick to a bit down the road.

It was slow going at first - cutting and fitting the foam in and around gussets, collar ties, and rafter ties, but we got the hang of it and finished maybe a third of the building in several days time. We were pleased, but it still felt like slow going. Knowing how much work was still ahead before we actually occupy the studio, we decided to call upon some friends.

These are the best kind of friends - willing to drop their own winter projects and show up for long, cold days of hard and dirty work. They've been with us on several other big projects over the years - our kiln shed in '09 and its addition in '11-12, the new roof on our house in '10, and the inglorious work of stripping and cleaning our foundation forms after this past autumn's foundation-building marathon after I came down with an untimely case of the flu. Needless to say, we are ever-grateful to Bob, Orlando, and Todd. (Here's Bob's dog Petey and our yellow lab Lego asking Orlando if they could pretty-please-have-some-of-that-morning-coffee-break-donut . . . sorry guys, you have to earn those snacks!)

With many hands on deck, the progress over the past week was nothing short of AMAZING. We finished insulating the rafter bays in record time, moving on to all kinds of tricky additional framing details in the cupola and reverse gable that will help immensely when we do the finish work post-insulation. (The cupola got insulated in blue - for reasons other than making a crayola effect.) :)

Perhaps the most exciting of all was the installation of the upstairs door! We've had the doors here for a couple of months now, just waiting for this day, and the guys made it look easy. In it went, along with the siding patched in around and below - even a (temporary) set of stairs and a landing that will make coming and going a lot easier.

We hope to eventually do some more landscaping (and hard-scaping!) that will allow for a nice gentle ramp/bridge thing-y of some sort, but this is great for now.

Having 'finished' the pre-insulation work upstairs, the guys moved down to the lower level, making quick work of finishing the leveling (or slight slanting, as the case may be) of Nathan's awesome sub-floor plumbing extravaganza. (For our sink, various floor drains, and a radon vent. We don't know if we have radon here, but better safe than sorry.)

In a couple of short hours, they had everything just right and covered over again with the crushed stone. The work of rough leveling was done with the transit, and remarkably, we are ready to start laying down foam board (4" for good insulation) and our radiant floor heat tubing system beginning this coming week.

We're opting to hire out the work of pouring and scree-ing the concrete slab - although we've done a bit of concrete work at this point, we don't have the skills to get things perfectly level, nicely sloped to multiple floor-drains, and SMOOTH. (We want the clay-making area of our studio floor to be really smooth so we can mop and clean up our clay mess with ease.)

Waiting in the wings in the nearby tractor shed (a.k.a. the covered area where our open-studio events extend into!) are additional stacks of rigid foam, rebar mesh, and the lower entry door. Once we get this floor poured (soon!!), we'll be able to fully close in the studio, and call our spray foam insulation friends.

Can't wait!

~Becca

studio building : siding is done*

*And by "done", we mean "mostly finished for now." :) The bulk of the ship lap hanging is behind us anyway . . . once the doors go in, we'll patch around them and call it truly good and finished.

A break in the bitter cold weather allowed us to get back outside to work on our new studio building this past week. We finished the last of the siding on the south side (as seen with chickens above), and flashed and sided the reverse gable at the north entrance. We were able to get the cupola all buttoned up with our builder the week before - in a snow storm, of course, with Nathan out on the metal roof, tied off to the framing. (We like to keep things exciting, apparently.)

It's great to be working on the studio after a little cold delay, and we're now focusing our efforts inside, insulating our roof system with rigid foam board. It might sound warmer to be 'inside', but there's no heat in the building yet . . . we keep up with the many layers of wool, keep moving, and hope for sunny days.

Slow and steady towards pottery making within these walls come spring . . .

bitter cold and the thing we said we'd never do

This was supposed to be a post about how we'd finished the siding on our new studio. Instead, it's a post about something altogether different, something we swore on multiple occasions that we would never do: we made a studio in our house.

{very chilly building & very frozen eyelashes}

A prolonged and bitter cold snap in our region prompted some rethinking of our path. Our main goal of the winter has been - and still is - to get the new shell of a studio ready for pottery making. Winter, however, has had other ideas. With the out-of-doors practically inhospitable (we're talking days that don't reach above single digits with sub-zero wind chills and 50 mph gusts), we found ourselves INSIDE.

There is still plenty of what we call "G.C." (general contractor) work to do on our part, and we've certainly been at it - educating ourselves on our insulation options, getting bids on said insulation, discussing our plans for radiant floor heat with a plumber, researching said systems, procuring floor drains, and the rest of the pieces of our as-yet-to-be-poured concrete floor on the lower level - we've been staying focused on studio planning, if not physically building.

But with the days and weeks ticking by (how is it almost February?!), we were feeling a bit antsy about the time and number of pieces it takes to fill our wood kiln. And thus the unthinkable happened: we moved our wheels out of storage and into an upstairs bedroom of our 160-year old farmhouse.

I'm sure there of those of you who are thinking, "Well, what were you waiting for? You had unused space that could have possibly been construed as a studio?!" A fair question. (You might also wonder why we have an unused room in our house - short answer: the upstairs has been awaiting a much needed renovation. And not just a lets-make-it-prettier reno; there are actual holes in the walls from a previous project, and asbestos-containing insulation in the eaves. Not to mention Nathan brushes the top of his head on the drop ceiling. So, yeah, we haven't been living up there much.)

It would seem obvious, on some level, though, that after years of trucking our pottery home from our rented space, we wouldn't just do this in the first place. Oh, but we had our reasons, and some of them are good. The chief reason NOT to put a studio in our not-so-large house is DUST. Clay dust is insidious, and can cause serious health problems when inhaled. If we're not neat about it, it gets on our shoes and clothes and up our forearms - and is then sprinkled imperceptibly but insidiously through our living space.

This time we promised ourselves we'll keep it neat. Very neat. As in, one pair of studio shoes that stays in the studio. No clay on our clothes. Plastic on the floor. Wipe up clay while it's still wet. So far so good.

Truth be known, it's pretty delightful to put a meal in the oven, a log in the wood stove, stream some podcast of some kind, and just mosey on up the stairs to work, with the puppy/dog to make trouble keep us company at the top of the stairs.

We're keeping things small (or so we tell ourselves) - there isn't much room to really produce plates or large bowls, (heck, there's not even room for us both to turn around carrying a board of pots) so we'll stick to small numbers of things that take time and attention.

For now, it's keeping us busy while the arctic wind blows, satisfying our need to make, and getting us just a little bit closer to our next wood firing. We will, however, be back on that building just as soon as it warms a bit!

I continue to chuckle at how Making A Plan (I believe my exact words were "the next pottery we make will be in our new studio") is the very best way to get Something Else to happen. :)

{looking out from our temporary studio to our future studio . . . <3)

Stay Warm,

~Becca

winter is for . . .

Cake stands are not always for cake . . . but winter is always for eating. ;)

{wild blackberry muffins and cake stand by Becca ; painting by Kristine Lingle}

siding in the snow

Winter really is a lovely time to be outside. The skies are gorgeous, the air crisp, the world a little more quiet. We've had quite a bit of new snow here lately, and the temperatures dipped way down below zero and then way back up above freezing. We've worked through most everything, wearing puffy down jackets, two hats each, even ski pants. Working off the ladder has been a little dicier with the slippery ground and our minds weren't quite as clear with sub-zero wind chills, but we're making steady progress hanging ship lap siding on our new studio building.

This last photo is the wall that faces west - and the one we see when we pull down the lane and into the driveway. It sure is nice to have the siding on! We've actually wrapped around the south (i.e. the last!) side of the building, and are hoping to get to the cupola and the reverse gable soon.

We're really looking forward to prepping for the radiant concrete slab downstairs, followed by a bit of insulation (OK, a lot) in there. And installing doors and building stairs . . . oh, so much to come!

It's been a great start to 2013.

~Nathan and Becca

must be making

I've often heard it said that creative people need to be making. I find this to be very true. Over the years, I have known myself to be healthier and more balanced when I'm making something. Anything, really. Because as it turns out, it doesn't so much matter what the medium is. Sure, clay is often a first choice for both of us, one that holds our attention and satisfies a certain addiction to need for productivity.

But I've also found a lot of creative enjoyment while cooking, doing carpentry, making cards, designing logos, growing vegetables, even splitting and stacking firewood. We have a potter friend who has found satisfaction in everything from wooden spoons to his current pursuit, handmade skis.

This winter, as we find ourselves 'between' pottery studios - and working diligently at finishing our very own - I've found a lot of joy in this bowl of yarn. It's been years since I knit with any regularity, but it's proving to be just the thing to satisfy a certain craving to make.

And in this season of fewer salad greens and more root veggies, it seems an appropriate re-purposing for our favorite wood-fired salad bowl. ;)

~Becca

building with wood

With our concrete foundation work behind us (yay!), the structure of our studio is coming together quickly. Just seven days into building with wood, and we're pleased to say we've got rafters up! The pace and intensity of the project has left us with little time for much beyond building, sleeping, laundry, cooking, eating . . . not much energy left for writing! And thus, we share mostly photos here today, and the musings of our builder, Mr. George Abetti.

"We started this studio a couple of days before Thanksgiving after the intrepid couple did the entire foundation themselves assisted part time by some willing and available friends. I must say I marvel at their courage--with me staying away from concrete with a passion only matched by love for building with wood....hmmmmm...probably an integral connection there somewhere.

Both Becca and Nathan are experienced carpenters and indefatigable workers--which is what allowed us to work out a mutually agreeable arrangement where I would run them and as many willing friends as a crew for a few weeks to get the main shell up with roof, windows and doors and leave the siding to them. We were doubly blessed at the serendipitous timing of two wonderful guys wanting to consider Geobarn careers calling to ask to work for free for a couple of weeks just to experience this kind of work....so yes....be our guests! John and Charles--we humbly thank you. (Yes, thanks, guys! We are very grateful for your help.)

The building is quite creative--timbered with massive hemlock posts, our typical free span floor system--and incorporating both gallery and working spaces on both levels accessible from either below or above. The views are magnificent and even though the weather has turned quite cold--their passion and energy (and high energy parents and home cooked meals) have all contributed to keeping us warm, well fed and filled with energy for the task at hand. We finished the upper beam in spite of some tough site conditions and were overjoyed to have their wonderful excavators back fill the trenches and even hoist a few of the heaviest beams into place that we were otherwise struggling to carry up hill and wrestle into place onto the 7' kneewall....

Nathan and Becca cut all the rafters while I prepped the upper beam with her dad with layout, blocking, gussets and some diagonal framing to stabilize the upper level prior to the roof system....when it essentially becomes equivalent to a large sail ready to fly away in the high winds if not well anchored down--and this is a VERY windy hill as we discovered yesterday when our ladders not only blew over but flew out of the building.... the cold took its toll on us today--we have worked most days into the dark but today when the sun began to set we all looked at each other and agreed that going inside was the glorious thing to do. - George"

We returned to building Saturday morning . . . and in a snowstorm, we began to assemble and hoist rafters! Despite the snow and cold, we had great success.

We are very happy potters!

Stay tuned - there is so much more to come . . . we can hardly stand it.

~Nathan and Becca

winter scenes

It is mid-winter on the farm, and I've managed to capture a few photos of the ever-elusive snow cover. What a strange season it has been! We have more ice than anything else, although a few warm days have allowed us to finish work on the ever-expanding kiln shed. (It is wonderful!) With the 'outside work' behind us for the next few weeks, we find ourselves mostly drawn to the studio these days, our pup slumbering by the wood stove while we work independently- and collaborate!- on new pieces for our new kiln.

(Got to get this camera of mine to the studio . . . soon!)

I hope this finds you warm and enjoying the beauty of the season.