In the studio

 In the Studio

 

 

August has been very hot, as usual, but the temperatures here in Arkansas have cooled down to a much more comfortable level this week. I seem to have more energy when the weather is nice so I am beginning to look forward to fall. I would say it's my favorite season but I love something about each season. 

What I’m working on…  

I shipped the first small batch of rainbow houses last week and finished making the next batch of houses to glaze. While those were drying, I have been sketching some ideas and thinking about plans for future projects.

I worked on some sketches for my next tiny house design. Last year I made Halloween themed tiny houses, and only a few fall themed houses, so I decided to go with fall this year. Many of my customers have become collectors so I want to make sure I offer a variety of themes for customers to collect. The photo below is my first sketch. I will make a couple of samples when I make another batch of rainbow houses. My priority right now is finishing the rainbow houses and hope to have enough time to get the fall houses made!

Ready to Ship Sales

Since I started taking pre-orders for the tiny houses, I have not been having many ready to ship restocks. The pre-order system seems to allow for more of my customers to purchase a house, but it takes me quite a while to fill all of those orders, which doesn't leave much time to make extra houses. However, I do have some samples and some slightly imperfect pieces that I will probably put up for sale in the near future, so if you missed out on pre-orders, make sure you are following me on Instagram or signed up for my newsletter to get notified of the details when those events happen. 

Link to Instagram: Beth Macre on Instagram

Link to Newsletter Sign up. Newsletter Sign Up

Blog post updates

Also, check back here weekly if you are interested in finding out what I'm working on. There is a link at the top of my website, BethSMacre.com. (See photo below)

I think email inboxes have become so full that many of us, me included, miss seeing the newsletters that get lost in the advertising emails. The social media algorithms don't always show us the accounts we want to see, so I thought that if I started blogging again, you can come to my website and catch up on what I'm doing, if you are interested. It won't disappear after 24 hours, it won't get lost in your emails, and it will be here as long as I am here. 

This blog dates back to before Instagram, Facebook, and all of the other sites that have come and gone. I originally started it to document what I was doing with my art while I was still teaching. I stopped blogging for awhile because social media kind of took over that goal. But time changes everything, so I thought I would get back to blogging and document what I'm working on again. I plan to create some long form videos for You Tube, but I'm still learning to create content that would be interesting to watch, and trying to figure out what I want to vlog about. I love to draw and paint and would love to do more of that and maybe create some drawing or painting how to videos. Working with clay is very difficult to video and my process with clay takes so long and would be kind boring to watch, in my opinion! Like watching grass grow. It is a slow process. 

So if you've made it this far, leave a comment below and let me know if you like to watch videos and what you would enjoy watching. I will share a link when I upload some video content. 

Until next time...

Ceramic Rainbow Themed Houses

What I’m working on…

This month I took pre-orders for my tiny Rainbow themed houses. I made several samples to try out different details so I had some examples to show my email subscribers.

Here are photos of the samples that I made. Each one is a little different but I selected one style to make for the pre-orders. In the second photo, you can see the style I chose and the progress I’ve made so far. 

I am going on a trip with some friends this month so I will take a short break then start glazing these and begin another batch. I work in small batches because the clay starts to get a little hard if I let them sit (in an airtight container) too long. 

This batch has a dozen houses. I need to make the tiny hearts that hang from the chimneys but the houses are finished and drying. 

I am currently using a white earthenware clay. This clay is gray while in its greenware stage. After it dries completely it will be fired in my little kiln and will turn white. It will then be ready to glaze and be fired again. I will post more photos when I get to that stage. 

Supplies used: 

Low fire earthenware clay, Nichrome 20 gauge wire, Mayco Stroke&coat glazes.

Affiliate Link

Nichrome wire : https://amzn.to/40svyno

Hey friends! 

Welcome to my studio blog! I’ve decided to resurrect this blog to talk more in depth about what I’m working on, share some behind the scenes photos and videos, answer questions, and possibly have some small tutorial lessons for diy art projects. I’ve been wanting to have a place to create community with my Instagram and Facebook followers that can all come together in one space. 

Latest Rainbow House to come out of the kiln. 👉🏻

I’ve been on Instagram and Facebook for a long time but I’m limited on space and what I can do there so I decided to go back to my original online journaling space…the blog. I actually have two blogs. This one, Beth Macre Studio, since 2007, and my second one that I started in 2011, while I was still teaching high school art. I retired from teaching in 2012, so I didn’t post much on that blog after that. Just an occasional tutorial. But I want to add any tutorials that I may create over there on the Art Class blog. My plan is to also create some YouTube videos to enhance tutorials and demonstrations on projects I decide to share.  

There is a link at the top of this page to ‘Art Class’ or here is a direct link if you are interested in checking that one out. 

Mrs. Macre’s Art Class 👉🏻 https://macresartroom.blogspot.com/

Follow along if you are interested in what I’m working on and let me know what you would like to learn more about what I do. Leave a comment below. We’ll see where this goes. 

Until next time, 

Beth 🌈❤️🏠

Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube (more coming on YT in the future). 

My Kiln

My Little Kiln

She is small but mighty. She gets the job done. 

The size of my kiln does limit what I can create, but I get a lot of use out of it. When I purchased this kiln, I planned to use it to fire my little clay houses and other accessories. So she has plenty of space for that plus more. I also use it to fire small bowls, ornaments, and other small items that I sell from my online shop. You can see how big it is inside in the photo below.

 There are many times that I wish that I had a larger kiln so I could fire larger things and fit more layers, but I can fill it with a variety of houses and accessories, as well as ornaments and bowls. If I am careful, I can get quite a few things in there and fire a load overnight. And because it is a small kiln, it really doesn't use a lot of electricity. A little larger one would be great to have, but this one works for me.

What I love the most about my little kiln is the automatic timer. After having this feature I could never go back to having to change the temperature manually. Well, I could, but I wouldn't want to! It is so easy to just set it in the evening and unload the kiln the next morning.

Type of Kiln

I use a Paragon Xpress with a kiln sitter.

I keep my little kiln in the garage. It only a requires 120V plug that we had an electrician add next to our electric panel in the garage.


Next Size Up:
I recently did a search for my model and apparently, this exact model is not available anymore. If you are in the market for a little kiln, look for ones that are 120V. But if I were going to purchase a new one, I would get the next size up. 

I just did a search for Paragon Kilns and the website where I purchased mine does not sell Paragon Brand any longer. But I did find one similar to mine on this website:

Paragon Kiln Xpress 66-3

I have no affiliation with this company. I'm just sharing where to locate this style/size kiln. 

It is 240V, so you would need to have the proper wiring installed.
Obviously, you would want to do your research on the different sizes that are available, based on your needs.

Thanks for stopping by!

Beth♥

Garden Markers for the Creative Gardener

Ceramic Plant Markers

Plant markers are a fun way to decorate your garden and to
mark your new or existing garden plants.
I've seen many different creative and fun styles of markers out of different materials. Some I've seen are made of stamped silver spoons, wooden spoons, and even tongue depressors! As an artist, I believe in decorating any space. Gardens are no exception!


I am a 'wannabe'  gardener, but since I work with clay I decided to make some plant markers for the garden I dream of.

My gardening has mostly involved flowers over the years, but herb and vegetable gardens are perfect little gardens for the pretty plant markers.

Veggies? Herbs? Flowers? Potted Plants?

Any herb, vegetable, or flower can be stamped into these plant markers. I have received orders for plants that I have never heard of, so it has been a learning experience for me! What are your favorite plants?

Update: I am not currently taking orders for the plant markers. 

Happy Spring Planting! 
Beth

Painting a Pumpkin on Canvas

Decorating for Fall 

Fall is finally here. The days are getting shorter and the weather is cooling off. Now it is time to pull out the decorations for fall.

Decorating with Pumpkins

I love Fall decorations but I have to admit that I do not have many. The Fall season goes by so quickly. I love pumpkins and wanted to paint one or two onto a canvas to help my house look a little more like fall. I love the orange ones but I also love the white pumpkins (or gourds) too. I love how the white ones look with blue so I decided I would paint one with my favorite turquoise blue in the background. I had a 6"x 6" deep canvas so I used it because it can sit on a shelf.


DIY Pumpkin

I also decided to do a tutorial about how I painted it. If you are interested in seeing the tutorial and learning to paint one yourself, I shared the tutorial over on my Teaching blog here:

DIY Painting a Pumpkin on Canvas

FAST and FUN
I enjoyed spending an afternoon painting and I am pleased with how it turned out. I hope to paint more pumpkins in in the future different colors and shapes. I will post a link here when that happens.

Now I need to work on my decorating game and add more fall decor to the porch!

Happy Fall Y'all!

DIY Pencil Holder

Keeping the Pencils Organized

Do you have a lot of pens, pencils, markers? 

When you have a lot of art supplies, you need a system for keeping them organized. I have a lot of colored pencils. When I draw with my colored pencils, it is very important to know where I can find certain colors when I need them. I shared my system of keeping them organized a few years ago (here), but I thought I would share it again and offer a few of my tips.

Here is a photo of my colored pencils organized by colors in my handmade pencil holder.

I use my holder for my colored pencils, my Prismacolor Colored Pencils and I have a lot of them.  But this holder could be used for pencils, pens, markers, or paintbrushes, or a mixture of all of these. I should probably even make another holder to hold all of these items.

DIY Pencil Holder

Whatever your pencil or pen obsession is, you may face the same problem that I do.
How to keep them organized and easy to use.
A few years ago, I needed some way to keep my growing colored pencil collection organized. I had gone to a colored pencil workshop where the Instructor had made a holder for her colored pencils. I liked her idea, so I took her concept and made my version of it. Actually, I made two of them.


Small Pencil Holder
The art instructor's version is smaller than the one I made. Hers is great for individual projects, but I wanted mine to hold my entire collection of colored pencils. Or at least the ones that have been sharpened. Yes, I have that many pencils. She used smaller PVC pipe and a thinner, more lightweight, base piece of wood.

Her pencil holder would be great for keeping your pencils for one or two current projects organized. (If you use colored pencils, you probably understand that you may use 20 or 30 colors in one project.)
The smaller version could also be used to keep a variety of drawing tools.

The Large Pencil Holder DIY

Supplies for the Large Version

Cutting Tool - We used a table saw.

3 Inch PVC Pipe -  We bought 2 pieces and cut into five 4" pieces with an extra 2 1/2" piece.
Tip #1: Cut them short enough that the pencils will stick out of the top and tall enough to hold the pencils upright. I had one shorter extra piece that I placed on the end to hold short pencils.
Tip #2: Thanks to a reader tip, I have learned that the printed letters on the PVC pipe can be removed with fingernail polish!

One 8 ft. piece of 1x4 Lumber -  Cut into two pieces to the length that you want your holder to be.
Tip: You may want to place the cut pieces of pipe onto the board to see how many will fit then cut. I cut 2 pieces that fit on top of a bookshelf.  (I painted the board white to match the PVC pipe) You can cut as many strips as you need for your supplies.

E6000 Glue - Clear
Use the E6000 tube of glue to attach the pieces of pipe onto the pre-painted board.
Tip: I made sure the letters that are printed on the pipe was facing another pipe so it would not be so obvious.
Let the glue dry and it will be ready to use!

For more how to details, check out my previous post. You can find it here: Pencil Organizer

Now go make your pencil/pen/supply holder! Hope this inspires you!

Until next time!

Beth♥