Hello everyone – happy new week (sort of since it’s already Tuesday)!   Between being a mom, going back to school and moving, I don’t seem to have enough time in the day to do everything that I want to do.  Oh why, oh why do we need to sleep at all?  It seems so frivolous to lay unconscious & prone for a good 5-8 hours a day (more if you’re one of the lucky ones).  With that said, and realizing my limitations, I resigned as fall show marketing chair for the Colorado Potters Guild a few weeks ago.  I just can’t manage to find the time to squeeze in one more obligation – though I haven’t gone cold turkey.  As web-mistress for the guild, I agreed to continue in said position and am also doing the online marketing component by delivering event notifications to local online calendars, magazines, newspapers and am establishing a social networking presence.  I just don’t have time to cold call and do all the press releases etc.

The Colorado Potters Guild Facebook fan page

As a marketing tool, Facebook just can’t be ignored by businesses, individuals and non-profits.  It represents viral marketing at its best like the old Breck shampoo commercial – “I told two friends and they told two friends, and so on…”.  While the Colorado Potters Guild’s Facebook page is in its infancy, I think the venue has potential.  Today, I am super excited today to learn that I could add our Vertical Response Email Invitation sign up form directly on our Facebook page.  I have the sign up form installed on our website – but being able to add it to Facebook should help us attract new invitees who are interested in handmade pottery.

Do you have a Facebook page set up for your business?  Do you want to know how to add an opt-in email form to your site?  In the search pane,  type in “Static FBML” and then click on the application.  Once you are on the application’s page, click on the link in the upper left that reads “Add to my page” → then a pop up menu will appear prompting you to select your page → after selecting your page, go to your business page and click on the link under your profile photo that reads “edit” → from here you click on the “static fbml” application and click edit → copy and paste the code given to you from your email marketing company → save your settings.  Once you have saved the code, go back to the main page and click on the + sign at the top of your page and from here you can add the tab for your form.  Voilà – I’ve tested my form and it’s live.  If you use Vertical Response, they have a video tutorial highlighting the process – not hard to do and it took less than 15 minutes to set up.

Meanwhile I have a quiz for which I need to study, a paper to write (luckily I like writing) and am past due for my morning run which means I have to sign off.

Have a great week,

~Cynthia

Leaves hand built mug printed with linocut

I whipped this mug out last Thursday for something special that’s on the horizon….  Despite carving the design in the linoleum last summer, I hadn’t actually used the linocut to date.  The template wasn’t exactly made for this type of mug, but I sort of like that the vining leaves are on an angle.

Linocut mug templates - I used the bottom left linocut for the mug above.

Here’s a couple of my linocuts – I’ve added at least 2 since then and have ideas for many more.  I like  carving the designs into linoleum because it’s a rigid material, maintains a uniform slab thickness and leaves an evenly distributed texture.  And while I do use some commercial textures, I really prefer using my own imagery.

Meanwhile, I’ve been spending too much time online between blogging, social networking sites, Etsy Mud Team, my website, emailing and my volunteer duties with the PTA (which involves the computer).  My husband was just a tad irritated with me last Sunday and I agreed that I need to find a better balance.  It’s hard being self employed because as many of you well know, my computer and internet use is my life line to the world.  So many opportunities have come my way and new connections forged that I might never have made without my computer.

I did ask my husband how many hours he spends on a computer at work – he hemmed and hawed and admitted that it was 8+ hours a day – but he emphasized that he leaves it at work.  I asked him how he thought I could fit it all in?  As a small business owner and mom who works at home the boundaries between work and home life blur considerably.

Nonetheless, I conceded to limit my tweeting, blogging, commenting, Facebooking, emailing etc. to 10-15 hours a week.  I try to accomplish my computer time in the morning while having my coffee, but it doesn’t always work.  If I put in 20 hours min. studio time a week, that’s still part time work hours on my part and allows me to connect better to my family.  Regarding commenting on other people’s blogs – I’ve decided that rather than trying to digest my whole bloglines subscriptions in one sitting, I’ll answer those who comment on my blog first, and then attempt to read 5 feeds a day.  That’s so much easier than 70!

Question:  How much time do you spend online a day whether you’re for pleasure or business?  What is acceptable – what is too much?

Meanwhile, I made up for the perceived neglect by making some home made artisan baked bread…keep in mind that I’ve never made home made bread before – but I found the easiest recipe in the world.  I have to admit that it’s delicious and now my family doesn’t want me to ever buy store bought bread again!

Must run,

~Cynthia

Anti-fatigue mat for standing and throwing

On Friday, I drove to the hardware store because I was out of mapp gas for my torch and while I was there, I decided to pick up an anti-fatigue mat for my new wheel set up since I’m pretty sure, I’ll never sit down to throw again.  The mat is cushy and much more gentle on my legs than bare concrete, but it has that noxious rubber/new carpet smell that makes me nauseous.  Anyone know how to get rid of that smell?

On a side note, I was very sad to pull into my favorite mom and pop hardware store that’s been in Denver forever.  The doors were shuttered and a sign read “Out of Business”.  Instead of being able to run in and out of the store fast, I headed over to Home Depot to find what I needed and wandered aimlessly until I found what I needed.

Wheel thrown porcelain orb vases

This is one of my favorite forms to make.  I’m not sure how practical they are, but I like them.  I’m trying to figure out how to finish and glaze these after I bisque fire them.

The cool thing about my recent studio push is that a ton of new ideas are popping into my head every day.  Making stuff is giving me ideas which makes me think that when I’m having one of those uninspired moments, I just need to do something in the studio – anything.  I need to sketch/write some of these ideas in my notebookso that I can explore some of them after the sale ends.  Today and tomorrow are really  my last day to make work for the Colorado Potters Fall Sale opening in 2 weeks.  Today, I’m going to make some butter dishes and tomorrow, I plan on making some ornaments.  I figure the ornaments will dry pretty fast.

Hand built and wheel thrown vases with different necks and two in progress

I’ve also been playing around with different thrown necks for the slab built vase bases.  I kind of like how no two are alike.  Do you ever make stupid mistakes in the heat of making work for a show?  I did that on Saturday and I swear, I almost cried and was cussing like a sailor at my carelessness.

2 slab built vase bases and 4 wheel thrown necks hit the deck - err make that concrete floor

Shelving is at a premium right now and I had placed a ware board with 2 vase bases and about 3 wheel thrown necks on an unstable surface…topple, crash, bang, boom.  Lesson learned.  If I’m going to take the time to make the work, I need to be conscientious of where I place it.

Work is drying everywhere

I think it’s time for me to fire a load of bisque and to start glazing so I can free up some room.  My shelves are full and there’s no extra space for work.  Consequently, I’m getting creative.  If you look closely, that is indeed a margarita sitting on the drywall board.  The drink was courtesy of my husband and was his way of saying, “time to quit for the day.”

Meanwhile, I’ve been having a lot of fun playing around with Facebook.  If you’re on FB, look me up.  I’ve found a ton of old high school classmates and continue to add clay people to my “friends”.  I even chatted with someone from Turkey the other day.

I also have a ton of blog posts lined up – too much to say, so little time.  I actually sat down at the computer around 9 pm last night intending to write this post, but I didn’t have the energy to write.

That’s it for today,

~Cynthia

Wordle brought to my attention by Andrea

Wordle rearranges text in an artful way into a word cloud – I pulled text from my last blog post for this one. Where Andrea finds this stuff, I’ll never know….  It’s just too bad that the image is so small on my blog.

Meanwhile, I’ve been playing around with some social networking sites, like Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Flickr and others for about the last 6 months.  A lot of people use these sites including other artists, potters, friends, family, business people, and potential customers.  A part of the problem for me is that all of this takes time which of course takes away from studio time.

I lovingly tend to my blog – I post regularly & read and comment on other people’s blogs.  It’s enjoyable to me – and of course, I want more people to find my blog.  I think this is where social networking sites may be valuable since I’m able to liberally sprinkle my links around cyberspace for anyone to find.  I’ve also registered my blog with various blog catalogs and I keep track of my stats to see how people are finding me.

I do enjoy keeping up with other artists and have managed to connect with people all over the world that I might not otherwise ever meet in person.

So, here’s my lowdown on the few sites where I’m registered:

1. I’m not really all that enamored with MySpace, but am loathe to delete it.  For the time being my page is static and I might check on it once a month if I remember.  I have made contact with a few people from high school, but the truth is I don’t really like the way it works and looks.  I’ve received dating propositions even though my profile says I’m married.  It seems like a really good venue, however, for musicians as they can upload their music to their profiles for the public to sample.
2. I’ve belonged to Flickr for at least 2 years now and think it’s really worthwhile.  Not only can you store photos, but you can connect with other people with similar interests and browse other people’s photos.  2 years ago, I upgraded from the free account to a “pro” account for $24.95 a year.  With the pro account, I can upload unlimited photos of any size.  The free account limits the size of the photo and also how many are visible at one time.  I think only the 200 most recent ones are visible.
3. My Twitter page is fairly new – I think I’ve had it about a month now.  I don’t always remember to “tweet” on a daily basis.  It’s sort of like a mini blog where one has a 140 character limit for each post.  The jury is out on this one for me.
4. Also fairly new is my Facebook page.  Since coming back home, I’ve been tending my page and trying to figure out the ins and outs of how it works.  It seems a lot more valuable to me than Twitter and surprisingly, I’ve also found a few friends from high school – though the site doesn’t recognize my college alma mater.  I attended high school in Stuttgart, Germany while my dad was serving in the Army in the 80’s so it’s been fun making contact with some of my classmates who are spread out all over the world.  Facebook seems like it has the potential to really connect people together.  My only criticism – and maybe I’m the only one bothered by this – is that you can’t click on people’s profiles to gauge whether or not you may or may not know them.  Some names are so common that when you type them into the people search box, 10 pages pop up.  Who has time to wade through those, only to email 5 of them to see if they’re who you think they are?  But, I guess this helps in the privacy department.  So – I’m still trying to decide how this plays out.
5. I also signed up for LinkedIn a few days ago, but I’m not sure this is for me – it seems like this site is more geared to a business professional.

So, if you have any comments, suggestions or other about your experience with social networking sites and whether you find them useful, I’d love to hear your feedback.

~Cynthia

Oh, yeah, I almost forgot… remember this work?

Greenware

It’s been sitting on my shelves since late June and is surely bone dry by now and ready to be bisque fired.  This might be a good thing to do this week to get me back in the swing of things and to free up a little space.  I also have a couple of more glaze tests to do – my tests are already mixed up and waiting for me.