Creating Relief Tiles of Clay and Little Clay Houses

Unglazed Bisque Tile

It has been another busy couple of weeks. I don't know where the time has gone lately! It seems like it was just last week when school started and we will be winding down this semester in just a few weeks! Thanksgiving is behind us and the holiday season rush has begun! My Christmas tree is up, thanks to my daughter and husband! They took care of that last weekend. So now I can enjoy the next few weeks and not have to worry about setting up the decorations.

This week we traveled to have Thanksgiving dinner with my family. Wednesday we had my husband's parents over for dinner. Both kids have been home all week, so we have had a full house and the 2 granddogs! They are like having babies to take care of! But they are cute.

Small Mini HeartHomes before Glazing

I've have been busy working on some new tiny houses and tiles, as seen in my photos. I posted a photo of the little clay houses a couple of weeks ago when they were freshly made. In these photos, they have been fired once. I have also put the black glaze wash on them. Next, I will be adding the rest of the colored glazes and fire them again and they will be done. It usually wouldn't take so long to get one or two finished, but I made several and it will take me awhile to glaze them all. I've also been very busy with school and family, so I hope to finish them up in the next week. I hope to post them in my Etsy shop soon. This time, I made Small, Medium, Large, and Extra wide sizes for different price points.

Extra wide Mini HeartHomes

Medium Bisqueware Mini HeartHomes

Stay tune for pictures of the final version of the little houses. If you think you would be interested in buying one of my little houses, just click on my Etsy shop .

For those of you who have asked about the materials that I use, I will list a few of the things that I use for my houses and tiles.
Glaze: I use a low fire white Pottery Clay. If you do not have a local source to purchase clay, there are plenty of resources online.
Glaze: I use Mayco Stroke n Coat Wonderglaze for almost everything I glaze. I found these when I was teaching and have used them since.

Hope you all had a wonderful week of Thanksgiving!

~Beth

One of my clay hearts is being featured in a collection in a post on 'the creative JAR: d is for...d here---> the creative JAR: d is for ...d
I will be working on more clay tiles soon. The next batch of clay houses will go into the kiln soon. Stay tuned!

Week of Travel

Its been another busy two weeks. But part of last week, I was out of town. I went to the state conference for Art teachers, which I enjoyed alot. After spending 3 days with other art teachers and going to workshops, I went to Fayetteville to a Razorback game. That was a great way to end the week! And the Razorbacks won! It was a good game and beautiful weather, but I was ready to come home. I've spent most of today resting. It is exhausting to live out of a suitcase for 5 days. So hopefully this week will get back to normal, and I can work on some art.

The Live mascot is in the red trailers just to the left of the center of the photo. (You can double click on the photo to see it larger.)

His name is 'Tusk II'

The mascot that dances around on the sideline is at the end of the 10 yard line, across the field, standing next to the cheerleader. I'm not sure if he/she has a name or not.

Go Hogs!!!

~Beth

New Clay Houses

Now that the colored pencil show preparations are finished, I was able to spend my afternoon yesterday creating more mini hearthomes. I had so much fun with the clay! I also made some little angels. (on the right) You can click on the photos and see it larger. I plan to be working alot with clay in the future. I'm preparing to go to an artfest in May. It will be my first, so I'm looking forward to it. (More info to come about this.)

These mini houses have been fired and are ready for glazing. I believe they are tired of sitting around on my shelf! They are beginning to talk to me, they've been sitting there for too long!

Oh my!

Landscape Workshop & Busy Week!

Oh my, its been a busy week! I haven't even posted an update on the workshop and artshow from last weekend! After coming back from the workshop on Sunday, I tried to recover enough to get through this week. At school, we had 2 late days at work for parent/teacher conferences and a teacher in-service day on Friday. But apparently I didn't recover well enough, because I got sick this week. All week, I have been...well not sick, but not feeling up to my usual self. At first I thought I may be coming down with a cold or the flu, but it never really got that bad. Just enough to make me feel yucky. I'm feeling better, but I still have the sinus issues that are complicating my breathing through the nose. (I'm trying to say this without too much unwanted details! haha)

So, all that to say, its been another busy week! I'm ready for things to slow down! Work just isn't going to cooperate though. I'm really thinking that the time is getting close for me to hang up the teaching business. My goal is to get through next year and see what life brings to me.

I won a ribbon! It was a People's Choice ribbon. No cash, but its nice to get recognition. One of these days, I hope to win a ribbon that gets money with it!

I stayed with my cousin, who lives near the area. She went to the reception with me and my husband. It was really wonderful to get to spend time with Kay. She is a very special part of my childhood (and adult) memories.

Linda Wesner is shown here during her presentation of her colored pencil workshop.

She does beautiful landscape drawings.

Here is my landscape drawing that I started at the workshop.

It is unfinished, but I will go back and finish it.

I don't do alot of landscapes, but I did enjoy this and we learned alot about taking our own photos for drawing ideas. I took some photos on the way to the workshop on the 2nd morning, that I'm looking forward to doing something with in the future! Even though I am not a morning person, I loved the light that time of the day. And to always keep the camera handy!

Hope you have a beautiful day!

~Beth

The Door...

...is from a photo that I took on my trip to France last year.

It was interesting to me because of the colors first and the intricate details of the door. It is attached to the hotel where we were staying, but I'm not sure if it was an apartment, or an entrance for employees of the hotel. I went for a walk to take some pictures. While I was taking photos, I noticed that there was movement inside the door, so I cut my photo shoot short and moved on. I didn't want to seem invasive to whomever was on the other side of the door. So the shadow figure is a mystery as to who it is.

This piece is, like the French Cafe, done with Prismacolor Color Pencils on UArt paper. This will be in a group show with the CPSA Chapter in Memphis starting next Friday.

I haven't been able to think of a title for this besides "The Door"...but anyone has a suggestion, I'm open to them!
~Beth

Group Art Show Preparations

I have been working hard on my second piece for the upcoming show of the Memphis Chapter of the CPSA that will open next weekend! So I haven't had any time to write or do much of anything else. I am almost through with the 2nd piece now and will post a photo soon.

So I just thought I would post a little dose of cuteness! My daughter sent me these pictures of the 'granddogs'. She lives right in the middle of Razorback country. I think I need a photo of the dogs sitting in front of the tv with the razorback on. Don't you think? Too cute!