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NEW NEWS ** As of December 11, 2009 there are more things on the studio table than I can finish by December 15. I have asked Ken not to take orders on things I have to work on so that all mailings can be done before Christmas. However, since I have decided that I won't be doing production work in 2010, I will take orders on the 2009 ornaments that are marked *Out of stock*. We'll take those orders between December 26 and January 15 although we may be gone one or two of those days. The website will remain open as least until the end of 2010 and I plan to occasionally make limited runs of International Children and Storybook Sets. There has been a lot of interest in the sitting elves from the Miscellaneous page, so I'll make a small run of those next year sometime. I still want to do the "special" orders. i.e., the ones you mostly design with a little input from me. Thank you for making 2009 such a busy, exciting year. We'll miss hearing from all of you so if you want to drop by or just call to chat, please feel free to do so. NOT SO NEW NEWS ** Thanks for your interest in the 2009 ornaments. Let me get the excuses out of the way. Ken’s computer crashed and burned early 2009 so email list is nonexistent and mail list needs to be reconstructed but I’m not sure we’ll get to it. I’ve been up to my elbows in gardening and processing garden produce but managed to get 12, just 12, prototypes figured out for 2009. I’m currently on hard production duty and hope to be able to post them on November 1. There are 6 Christmas girls, 5 Christmas boys, a Santa and a set of kids from Spain. The international kids I’ll probably take orders on since I used the first run as gifts and only have 2 sets left. I also made a couple of Peter Pan sets as gifts and did two extra. Those may or may not get posted. I have 10 gingerbread houses but they aren’t on the bases yet so have my fingers crossed (not really, that makes it hard to work) that I can finish those. I’m doing tiny runs of the new ornaments just to get things to put up but I’ll try to make myself work through November to keep up. I’m not certain but leaning heavily toward thinking this, 2009, will be my last year of production work. I love making the ornaments, but feel that there is so much else I would like to be doing. OLD NEWS ** Ken and I moved back to Ohio in October 08, bought a teeny, tiny farm just outside of Ashland and gave ourselves about 2 weeks to unpack and get set up before getting to work on the ornaments, updating the website and starting to take orders. Now that the 2008 ordering season is done, we are going to finish unpacking and getting organized. If you're interested in all of the whys and wherefores, my blog Four O'Clock Tootlings has some picture of the Ashland house and of the move. Also pictures of some of the stuff I like to do when I'm not doing clay. ABOUT US ** I began making bread dough ornaments in the early 1970’s. In 1983, I discovered polymer clay and found that this medium lent itself to more intricate detail of texture, color, and form. Much of what I had learned from making dough ornaments was applicable to my new figures but with the clay I could add buttons, bows and all the trimmings that I had previously painted on. And all of that detail was still there when the figures came out of the oven, which I hadn't been able to count on with the bread dough.
In 1989, I heard about millefiore, a technique that allowed for a design to be part of the clay itself. This ancient technique is seen in Italian glass paperweights and African trade beads. Once a fellow crafter explained the concept to me, it was an amazing time of discovery for me and my husband, Ken. Together, we figured out how to make ginghams, then more complicated plaids, and eventually what I call organics – blocks or canes of clay, which when sliced look like floral or paisley fabrics.
Over the many years that I have enjoyed working in this medium, finding tools to accomplish a given task has been an adventure. There are working tools like tapestry needles and razor blades, and texture tools from hardware stores, fabric stores and even leather stores. Once I found a tool that allowed me to make canes that look like counted cross-stitch (like the gingerbread cane above). My ornaments are unique because I mix all of my own colors of clay, build my own canes, and have a tool collection that spans many years. In addition, every year I create a number of new designs. Ken and I have been selling the figures at juried craft shows, mostly in Ohio, since the late 1970’s. In the spring of 2006, we moved from Ohio to Washington state. Establishing this internet site gives us a way to stay in touch with all of our beloved friends and customers. We hope you enjoy it! |
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