Its a gloomy, rainy, glorious day here. We love the rain. Today is even more special since my son decided it was time to let go of diapers. Potty training so far today has been fantastic and Im feeling rather proud. He's doing extremely well. Because of this new development in the house I decided to stay home. No Post Office visit or stroll. I figured it was best to stay within quick reach of a potty.
The extra time gave me plenty of opportunity to sit and think about how to package up my Sleepy Little mice. I have batch number two almost ready to be sold and was rather disappointed at my lame attempts at packaging batch number one up. (Apologies to the first batch of owners). I know all mice arrived safely just not in a pretty package. I like pretty packaging so it bothers me they were sent without something "special".
I decided the mice should be enclosed in a warm calico cloth, small blue ribbon with a teeny tiny hang tag and blue ribbon as a topper. Im rather thrilled with this idea and the look of it. The cloth is thick enough to keep all mice safe during transit. I wrapped up 7 mice and was hoping to wrap up the rest I fired in the kiln this morning, but alas, I pulled them out to find that their ear and tail color has totally burned away. I dont know what it is with reds, but they fire off pretty fast. Im going to have to finish up any color details on this batch and then fire the reds last and at a cooler temp. Not sure if that will help, but Ive grown very frustrated with loosing my ear and tail color for the third time.
Here is a quick peek into the kiln before I took everything out. I wanted to mention the traditional sized foal Im glazing in my studio news letter this morning, but I really have no idea who she is. Does anyone know who she is?
The piece came in a china body lot and I am slowly trying to bring her color up to a baby chestnut. The key with the china paints seems to be to go very slowly when building color. Everything seems to blend nicer that way. Of course, I can see 30 or more firing happening with such a method.
I really need to start experimenting with the airbrush and china paints. Honestly, I dread it. Im still hanging onto the belief that I will be able to get smooth supple application with old fashioned hand painting. I believe it just comes with practice. So, Ive been practicing on non horse subjects.
This bunny is currently the best piece I've painted free hand so far. The color is vibrant and very smooth. Even smooth along the ears. I just kept adjust the value of the original color each time it was fired. Im doing the same with the unknown china foal.
Looks like rain for the entire day. That means playing indoors and a cartoon or two and maybe adding that red back onto the mice.
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