Here we go…. the second month… February… second of twelve…
And another batch of holiday ornaments made by me &  four of My Talented Friends.
Remember, we’ve all signed-on for a Monthly Holiday Ornament Challenge.
The plan is for each of us to make a new ornament each month of the year.
We’re two months in… one sixth of the way!!!

My Talented Friend : Cory McCrory
Cory embraces our second month of ornaments with a wonderful batch of textured & constructed ornaments. They’re amazing so far!!! And I LOVE them… so I’m sorry, but there may not be any of these left to share with anyone else after I buy them all from Cory!!!  Ha!!!

My Talented Friend : Sarah Chapman
This month, Sarah takes a more “natural” approach with a beautiful stone and “twig.”
Some stylized wire-work and voila… another beautiful ornament by Miss Chapman.
I’m sure this one will really glisten in the sun… or Christmas lights?!

My Talented Friend : Roberta Polfus
Roberta continued her love affair with porcelain & carving. Her ornaments could make a beautiful Christmas Constellation if you promised someone the “moon and stars.”

My Talented Friend : Amy Taylor
Amy takes another spin on her already popular ADORBS Collection…
this time looking forward to Spring with that one ADORB-able eye!

My Talented Friend : … oh wait, it’s ME!!!
And for my February ornament, I’ve been making some porcelain snowflakes. The stamping is giving them a sort of knit texture. I’m hoping to glaze them with a clear glaze that will make them shine with a very slight cool blue hue.

So there they are… the ornaments of My Talented Friends Cory, Sarah, Roberta & Amy. Be sure to check out their websites. They’re all in the LINKS section in the far right column. And they all have fun Facebook pages too. Find your favorites & follow them everywhere!

And oh, but wait there’s more!!!
Remember, the ceramic folks have a little tougher time actually finishing their ornaments due to kiln firing schedules. So we’re frequently posting the dried greenware versions monthly. And then, once they get glazed & fired, I’ll post the “finished” results here too.

Like this one… a few finished January beauties from Cory McCrory!!!

Well, here’s The Challenge… we’re doing it again!!!
Three years ago Sarah Chapman and I did the Challenge – just the two of us.
It was a tough task to come up with twelve new & different ornaments. One each month. Keeps you on your toes… and we were looking for another challenge to keep us going this year. We struggled with new project ideas. And finally decided to stick with the Monthly Holiday Ornament Challenge. But to mix it up this time, we’ve invited three of our other Talented Friends to join in on the Challenge!!!

So, this time around, we have five artists playing our silly little reindeer games. Three ceramic artists and two metalsmiths. The challenge is to make a new holiday ornament each month. Each group has different “struggles.” It’s easier for the ceramic folks to make multiples, but tougher to get them done, fired & glazed in time to post… so you’ll be seeing a lot of greenware ornaments. Finished glaze photos to come as pieces are finished. Whereas the metalsmiths work with materials that are generally more expensive than clay. So they may only make one or two… and in some cases, maybe not even in metal?!

So there will be a few “challenges” within the Monthly Holiday Ornament Challenge. And we’ll see how this plays out over the course of the year. Hopefully everyone will keep up with it. I’ll post them here on the blog, as well as on my pottery Facebook page. I plan on making multiples of all of mine… so I’ll have plenty to sell at the Holiday Home Shows!!!

So here we go…. the first month… January… first of twelve…
and your first glimpse at the five “Talented Friends” taking on The Ornament Challenge!
Be sure to check out their websites. They’re all in the LINKS section in the far right column. And they all have fun Facebook pages too. Find your favorites & follow them everywhere!

My Talented Friend : Cory McCrory
If you’ve been following my blog for awhile, you know that I have quite a crush & quite the collection of Cory’s whimsical pieces. She is an amazing handbuilder using paper clay. Her pieces include a lot of textures, colors, and humor. I can’t wait to see these ornaments glazed in bright colors. You know I’m going to need one for my tree… okay, well at least one!

My Talented Friend : Sarah Chapman
An amazing metalsmith and good friend, Sarah is known mostly for her oxidized silver jewelry with an urban-architectural-textured flair. I have quite the collection of Sarah’s work as well. And since we did this challenge together three years ago, I was interested to see where she would take it this time. Looks like she’s going back to her childhood with some traditional “paper cut-out” snowflakes. Except they’re no longer just for paper…

My Talented Friend : Roberta Polfus
Roberta is known for her exquisite carved porcelain pods, urchins and other organic forms. So it’s not a big surprise that her first ornament in the Challenge is miniature versions of her pods. I love them. So sweet. So precious…. and I can’t wait to see where she goes to from here.

My Talented Friend : Amy Taylor
What?… no hinges??? Taking a spin from her already popular ADORBS Collection, Amy came in with an ADORBS-able ornament to celebrate the New Year. I have an ADORBS necklace, and my niece Taylor has an ADORBS necklace that she refers to as her “good luck charm.” Since everyone loves their ADORBS… let’s keep the lovin’ going with an ornament version. And I love how that one green eye totally matches the tree!

My Talented Friend : … oh wait, it’s ME!!!
I’m the fifth artist partaking in the Monthly Holiday Ornament Challenge. My ornament for January is a porcelain stamped Christmas Tree. My plan was to glaze it green, but now I’m considering making it a White Christmas after all. For more about my January ornaments… just read the blog post right before this one!

I got a wonderful e-mail this morning from my friend Sarah Chapman.
Celebrating the holidays with her version of a Christmas tree. So cool…
and pretty sweet to be the “featured” artist!!!

Heyro there Mr. Jackson!
Here are a few shots of our new tree filled with all of your ornaments from 2014. And a close up of some of my favorites including the Gingerbread man wearing pants! He really should be wearing shorts since you made him! I love them all….

However… it looks like her tree could use a few MORE ornaments?!
Which is good news… as Sarah and I have recently decided to do our Monthly Ornament Challenge once again this coming year. So get ready for another new ornament every month through 2016!!!

Gotta start thinking. Gotta start sketching.
Gotta start planning… a lot of new ornaments to come…

Still getting ready for tomorrow’s big Holiday Home Show!
Repelnishing shelves. Restocking inventory…
and adding more to the Tired Of Shlepping Sale shelves!
And we’re marking down a LOT of holiday ornaments.
Originally $15, $20 or even $25 each… on sale tomorrow only for $5 each!!!
Snowflakes, gingerbread men, stars, fortune cookies and even some Ho’s!!!
Here’s a quick glimpse of the ornaments I just now put on the back porch…
because I’m just plain tired of shlepping them around!

Need some new holiday ornaments for your tree???
There will be plenty of them available tomorrow at our MUD & METAL event.
Stop by my place between 10:00am-6:00pm tomorrow to do a little shopping,
or just hang out & enjoy the festivities… and the comfort of my couch!

Just a quick heads-up… “The St. Nick’s Day Online Sale” officially closes tomorrow at Noon. Several of the mugs & ornaments have been claimed, but there are still plenty of sweet gifts to be purchased. Consider this your 24-hour reminder!

Click here to go to the Facebook Photo Album to start shopping.

ONLINE SALE CLOSED!!! Thanks for playing.

ONLINE SALE CLOSED! Thanks for playing.

Quick… the St. Nick’s Day Online Sale just went “LIVE” a second ago!!!
Click here for my Fire When Ready Pottery Facebook page.
There is a Photo Album of the mugs & ornaments up for sale.
Each of them is $50 which includes shipping & handling.
For ease of getting everything out by Christmas, contiguous US please.

Simply find the piece you want, then add a Comment on the individual picture in the Photo Album. If you’re the first person to claim it with a simple “MINE. MINE. MINE”… or something similar… you get the mug or ornament. It’s first come, first claimed.

This online sale ends on Friday, December 11th at noon.

So hurry up… what are you doing here wasting time…
Get on over to the Facebook page and see what’s left. Snatch ’em up quick!!!
Christmas is coming sooner than you think.

A quick layer loaded into a bisque kiln.
Rapid replenishment for my Second Holiday Home Show on Saturday, December 12th.

Thrown & stamped Saturday… Trimmed & handled Sunday… Drying & into a kiln Monday.

Unloading the kiln is always a weird mix of excitement.
A fun treasure hunt to see everything coming out. But kind of a hurry to get it all done. Unloading all of the pots, packing them up, cleaning the kiln, scraping the shelves, re-kiln washing, sweeping up and all of the other “glamorous parts” of the process that no one thinks about. So many of my pieces go straight from the kiln and into a box to get them home.

Pretty excited about the latest batch of spoons & ornaments.
I’ll have time to really look a them later… for now it’s time to clean & scrape!!!

One of my students just stopped by with a sweet treat to make my Glazing Day go better. So festive now with peppermint & ornaments!!! Thank you Catherine.