Forgot to Mention Honorable Mention
I’m honored to report that on September 26th I received an honorable mention for one of my 5 piece dichroic glas fan necklaces at Festival in Park in Charlotte NC.
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The Power of Three
Every now and then I find myself completely overwhelmed by everything I need to do. I ended my last road trip by coming down with a terrible sore throat that turned into an ear infection. Not swine flu, just a run of the mill virus that knocks you on your can. This happened at the end of a road trip. So I returned home to stacks of mail and a long to do list. I felt terrible and had no energy to face what was ahead of me.
When I find myself overwhelmed by everything I need to go I use a technique I like to call the power of three. I organize everything I need to do, and each day I pick the three most important things I need to do and tell myself that just for today I only need to complete these three tasks. This gives me the freedom, to either stop for the day and rest or keep working depending on how I feel. If I’m sick I can stop and get the rest I need. If it’s a case of feeling overwhelmed, I gain new perspective. This strategy brings a certain level of ease to my day and I can often get quite a bit done!
Reflections on Show Preparation
I’m starting to plan new work that I would like to add to my line. My target date for having these new items ready is February of 2010. I have been doing a lot of reflecting on my preparation for August Buyers Market of American Craft Show. One key learning point for me is that preparation makes all the difference – not just being ready, but maintaining the right spirit during that process.
When I first started preparing for last large wholesale show, I created a production schedule. I looked at what I wanted to make, I took into account all the critical elements:
I wanted to make sure that everything could be ready by early July so that all the pieces could be photographed for the brochure and price list. I was pretty proud of myself for all this preliminary prep work. I even made sure to account for time on the road as well as commitments to completing work for current customers.
I had some ambitious ideas (like adding a gift line), but I felt that this planning would make that very doable. However, as it often likes to do, life intervened without taking into account my carefully planned schedule. Because of my saw challenges (see “Necessity is the Mother of Invention” for the full saga), I ended up losing 2 weeks work, and I still needed to go out of town which lost me even more work time. With the show deadline looming, I was now stuck playing catch up. Despite the fact that I would’ve loved to hurry things along or press the fast-forward button, there are certain things you just can’t make go faster, each step in the process takes a certain amount of time, I try to be as efficient as possible, but real efficiency comes from experience. Part of working in new areas is learning how to get it right, how to be the best you can be, where do need to spend time, where can you save time. Looking for tasks you want to get better at vs. tasks you want to delegate to other people.
I kept pushing myself to have all the things I had planned for ready, getting more and more anxious as I went along. I kept running into snags left and right, and I started making mistakes that I never make – I needed to do much more reworking than normal which ate up more time adding to my stress. I also had to juggle new set up requirements for my new items upsetting my normal production rhythm. Not to mention, I had to keep my inventory levels up for regular orders! I did end up making a variety of new items, but not all of them passed my “show-ready” criteria.
Instead of continuing to push myself, what I really needed to do was stop and reanalyzes my situation. Looking back, all of the problems I ran into were a result of not readjusting when life changed. I got so caught up in trying to do so many new things that I lost my focus and stopped enjoying the process of creation – one of my favorite parts of being a glass artist. I did have some success along the way. But here’s the real deal, the only one that had any expectations of me was me. So as I work through my plans for February it doesn’t really matter how many new items I have what matters is that I enjoy the journey. That I give myself permission to just stop and change my plans if I need to. I want to make sure that I don’t lose the joy of experimentation again.
Here are some of the new items I came up with.
Dichroic Glass Tiles
More Jewelry for your wall
My favorite Dish
Pattern Bar Dish
A Funky Trivet
A Trio of Small Dishes
A Collection of Coasters
The Great Pumpkin Appears in New Jersey
Last weekend I took a trip with two of my glass buddies to the Wheaton Arts and Cultural Center Fall Festival in Millville NJ. I thoroughly enjoyed being on the “other side” of the booth. I show my work at a few festivals a year, but never have the opportunity to take the time to enjoy artwork. It was a nice change of pace.
We had a great time exploring the Museum of American Glass as well as the different Museum Stores. There is an opportunity to purchase all kinds of glass art from small works to large sculptures. The buyers have taken great care to create a wonderful shopping experience.
The art festival provided an opportunity for us was nice to be on the “other side” of the booth. There was a nice variety of artists represented at the festival. It was good to see people buying art!
The pick your own glass pumpkin patch was great fun. It featured both pumpkins and gourds made by artists at the creative glass center. I selected a pumpkin to round out my fall decorations. The highlight of the weekend was the colossal pumpkin blow demonstration conducted by a team of arts at the Creative Glass Center of America. The team work that went into this effort was amazing to watch. They have great collection of pictures on their Facebook Page.
Something new…
I needed to take a break from jewelry so I thought I’d try my hand at making some wall vases. However, the jewelry maker in me just couldn’t resist adding a little wire wrapping. Now all I need to do is add a few beads!
Necessity is the Mother of Invention Part 2
Last Sunday I assembled and fired the some of the components I cut up with my saw. I was hoping to take a look at these items before I left, but the kiln temperature was 600 degrees and I figured with my luck, I open the kiln to take a look and everything would crack. I got back from a week in WI playing the part of Nancy the Consultant, and was very pleased with the result. Here are some pictures I took with my Iphone. I still need to slump and finish the blue and clear pieces.
New at NGlassworks!
I have been hard at work in my studio this summer, and have added a new piece to the NGlassworks collection - the Contemporary Pendant.
The new Contemporary Pendants take the NGlassworks’ signature color scheme and turn it into a more casual look. Featuring multiple layers of vibrant color and depth, these pendants have large holes threaded through with hand-dyed silk cord that can be finished with Swarovski crystals upon request. Contemporary Pendants are available in a red/bronze or jewel tone color palette.
For more information please send me an email.
Also, next week August 1-3, I will be taking my work on the road to the Buyers Market of American Craft summer show in Philadelphia. You can see the new Contemporary Pendants in person there.
You can find me (and the pendants) at booth #2618, and if you mention this blog post, you will receive 10% off your purchase.
Hope to see you there!
“Necessity is the Mother of Invention”
This past week one of the most important tools I use in my work went kaput. But, my technical difficulties led to a lot of interesting discoveries.
I value the saw as a tool because although my designs are generally chaotic patterns of color, I want to contain that chaos with a nice, crisp edge. I need a clean boundary in order to make the chaos work.
Earlier this year I decided to upgrade to a more powerful saw. When the new saw arrived the box was in pretty bad shape. I don’t think it could have made it another 100 feet. I reported the problem to the distributer just in case I ran into any problems in the future. A visual inspection of the saw didn’t reveal any damage. Looking back I should have returned the saw to the manufacturer, but I had so much work to do that I decided to take a chance that everything would be OK.
Initially I had a few challenges, especially when I was cutting smaller pieces. I chalked it up to working with more powerful equipment. Then one day everything I cut started to crack and shatter including glass that had never been fired! I noticed that the vibration level had increased. The whole unit was moving, but all the parts seemed to be attached properly.
I contacted the staff at His Glassworks, the distributer, and explained the problem and they worked with me to arrange for a replacement saw. They are extremely knowledgeable and have provided great service as we worked through this problem. It took a week for the new saw to get from California to Virginia. Since the saw weighed 100 pounds I decided to opt out of paying more for expedited shipping. I figured I could always rent a saw if I ran into troubles in the meantime.
As I looked around my saw-less studio at all of the orders I had to fill, and all of the pieces I needed to prepare for the upcoming Buyers Market show, and the fact that I need to be out of town the week of the 16th. I thought “okay, I need a saw to do all of these things and even though they need to get done, I can’t do them now…what else can I make?”
I began thinking about getting ready to make plates, bowls, coasters, and wind chimes – all projects that I had put on the back burner because of the more pressing need of filling orders. I always find myself wanting to create a layers effect, so I began thinking how I could translate what I do with layers for all my jewelry pieces into these other forms. I ended up experimenting and creating some prototypes.
After I fired the pieces, I realized that my immediate thought was to cut them up and turn them into something else. I kept looking at the larger pieces and seeing their components rather than the whole. For example, even though one plate was kind of boring on its own, it could be a really interesting as component parts for another piece.
The smaller coasters, however, made me really happy because I could see them as a cohesive piece rather than potential for smaller pieces. Because I work on a small scale, I noticed that my challenge was finding out how to translate the details I love into a larger format. How do I create larger pieces without seeing just their components?
Stay tuned for pictures of the results of the inventions of my necessity!
P.S. The saw arrived on Friday and after dealing with a bad motor and a failed water pump (thanks Murphy’s Law)… my husband managed to change out the motor and the water pump. I have been cutting like crazy! And saw #3 is on its way.
Personal Mastery And The Beginners Mind
One of the concepts from the Peter Senge’s book the Fifth Discipline is Personal Mastery.
“People with a high level of personal mastery live in a continual learning mode. They never ‘arrive’. Sometimes, language, such as the term ‘personal mastery’ creates a misleading sense of definiteness, of black and white. But personal mastery is not something you possess. It is a process. It is a lifelong discipline.”
So how does the beginners mind fit in?
“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.”
Shunryu Suzuki
So it seems to be about bringing your knowledge and expertise to a situation while being open to new ideas, possibilities and options.
Unexpected Guests
Just when I think I’ve gotten my tent set-up down cold, a new challenge presents itself.
Last weekend was the first outdoor show of the season. Our first challenge was the layout. The organizers set up the park so that each artist had a space that was exactly 10 by 10 to fit in a 10 x 10 tent. Since we opted to set up on Saturday we had to snug our tent in between 3 neighbors. We managed to get the canopy in place and were ready to add the legs when we discovered a family of mice had taken up residence in one of the tent pole bags.
I was both annoyed and in awe at how hard they had to work to build their nest. We store the tent poles up on the rafters in our garden shed. They got most of their building material from the storage area of the Corgi Cottage. They chewed a hole in one of the tent walls. They gathered yarn, feathers and other treasures including a few nibbles from the new, soft wood floor I use at indoor shows!
We found 4 baby mice. Their parents are somewhere between Williamsburg and Richmond. I’m not sure when they escaped. All I can say is that I hope that my car isn’t their new home! These little guys managed to survive being pulled from the rafters, dropped on driveway, tossed in the car where they spent the night at the bottom of a pile of assorted show paraphernalia. They made the 45-minute trip to Richmond, were piled on my cart, and were tossed on the ground. Think about it…mice in metal poles and not one casualty. They did have that deer in the headlight look!
My discovery drew a crowd probably because I screamed. I don’t know what it is about mice that make me scream. They’re cute, quite harmless. I think it’s that they show up in unexpected places, like your washing machine.
The welfare of this family became everyone’s concern. We scooped up the babies, put them in a paper bag, and finished putting up the tent. I was ready to release them when one of the officials informed me that I needed to move my car. He told me if I waited too long I might not be able to get a good parking place. So I carried my bag of mice past the food booths to my car. I held the bag tight. You can imagine what I was thinking as I moved my car.
I walked into a wooded area at the edge of the park and set them free. When I got back to the booth one of my neighbors asked me if I gave them water. I said, “Not to worry…it looks like rain.”
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