Things that are not clay.

You might think that my one and only love in life is ceramics, if you were to judge my life from this blog. All I've posted for months is finished and in progress work. In fact, I pretty much set out to make this blog dedicated to my ceramic process and work, and intended to keep it focused solely on that. Seems like some know-it-all blogging expert somewhere said something about knowing your audience and keeping your blog on topic. Or some crap like that.

Of course, I'm kind of lazy, and I also get sidetracked doing all the other things I like doing, and that means super sporadic posts. So I decided fuck it, I'm gonna put what I want on here. I mean, I have a grand total of 49 followers. Are you all going to revolt if I write about my pregnancy, sewing projects, or my recent and insatiable need to bake things? Would you hit unfollow in a huff of disgust if I posted a book review or a picture of a weird bug I found? I'm hoping you're not that fickle, and if you are, there are plenty of other crazy awesome blogs out there devoted solely to clay, so feel free to bail. I won't hate. I just know I love reading other blogs that are not only clay (I recently discovered Corvus Tristis, a science/sewing/crafting/embroidery blog, that I heart completely!), and that it feels dishonest to act like there aren't tons of other awesome things that get me all jazzed up, or other things going on in my life. Anyway, it all comes together to inspire the stuff I make anyway. So, in a round about way, it's still a pottery blog. See what I did there?

Here are some things I've been doing recently that are not made out of mud.

*Cue FANFARE! Da na na NA!*

One of my amateurish hobbies is sewing. I've been obsessively lurking on craftster.org and t-shirt surgery for years, drooling over all the awesome things you can make out of $5 worth of t-shirts from the thrift store. My love of making practical things, my hatred of clothes shopping, and my being an eternal cheapskate all neatly fit into clothing reconstruction. Sadly, I rarely actually sit down at the sewing machine, because I dream of making things much more than I actually follow through. Recently I've had a burst of crazy preggo energy, however, so I made some comfy maternity pants and a hoodie.

Shitty cell phone pic - sorry about that.

 


Also, I've been baking. A LOT. If you lived in my house, you might think I'd given up life as a potter and had decided to do a career switch. I can't help it though; I love sweets, and being pregnant makes me so hungry! I've been cooking a fair bit too, but I don't have crappy cell phone pics of any of that. However, in the future I may start sharing recipes for things that turned out particularly awesome. If you ever tasted my beef stew, you might be tempted to propose. Just sayin'.

Strawberry mango pies.
There's liquor in them:D

I got obsessed with pies over the holidays. One day soon,
I am going to make a second attempt at a lattice top,
and you will all be impressed.
These were Cranberry Peach with a custardy filling.

I had an insatiable desire for cake one week, and all we had was yellow cake mix in the house.
I doctored it up with orange extract and sour cream,
and made my own chocolate ganache icing. Soooo delicious!
Although the artist in me wishes it were prettier.
Like maybe a seven layer deal or something.

Banana bread!

Finally, I must share with you the recipe for this banana bread. A loaf never lasts more than a day in this house. A lot of the reviewers said they don't like the big purpley chunks of banana, but that is one of my favorite things about this recipe. It's the most moist awesome banana bread I've ever tasted.

This weekend hopefully more ceramics will be made, but I have to finish a charity t-shirt design before I can do anything else. It's top secret, so I can't post about it here... but stay tuned, good people. I will do my best to keep up the awesome, clay or otherwise, and share it here with much enthusiasm and overuse of exclamation points.