A while back, Jenny asked me if I could paint a colorful, mostly-not-blue, dottery teacup and saucer for her collection. I told her I wasn’t sure when I’d be able to do that, since the studio where I usually paint doesn’t often have teacups and saucers on its shelves, but that I would look into it.

The next time I went to paint, I asked about special-ordering a teacup and saucer…and was told, “You know, I think we have one in the back! Follow me.” It turned out, the studio had been commissioned to paint a bunch of teacups and saucers for an order, and there had been a couple leftover that they had not used. Serendipitous for me and for them and for Jenny!

I had a lot of fun with this custom order, partly because Jenny didn’t give me super-specific instructions. She just told me to make them dotty and happy. I think my favorite part is the saucer’s dottery center. It’s hidden until you lift the cup to drink, and then it’s a nice little surprise.

Thanks for asking me to paint this for you, Jenny! They’re in my Etsy shop whenever you’re ready to purchase them.

Wow, I have not done a pottery post for a while! I can’t believe I haven’t blogged some of these yet. I have a lot of catching up to do, so let’s get right to it…

I’ll start with my favorite thing I’ve painted recently. Before we went to California, Madge told me that her husband Fish was a wee bit jealous of the dottery mug I’d painted for her birthday last year. He was wondering if I could paint him a mug too, maybe with a Battlestar Galactica reference on it? As a BSG fan myself, I jumped all over that one. Madge and Fish and I batted around a few ideas, and eventually settled on “Oh my gods…this is FRAKKIN’ good coffee!” I added “So say we all!” on the inside as a surprise. Troy liked this mug so much that he asked me to paint another one for him, which is fine with me. It was super fun to paint.

Now I’ll go in chronological order, more or less, starting with this mug I painted for Kristen (better known in 7 Days circles as sarkasmo) way back in March, but neglected to post photos of till now. Not sure how that happened.

This was inspired by a photo she posted of herself drinking cocoa out of a “got coffee?” mug. Kristen doesn’t drink coffee, so it seemed like she needed a “got cocoa?” mug. When she had surgery last spring, it seemed like this mug would be the perfect get-well gift. The “enhancement optional” is because she spent much of the December 2009 7 Days run making extra-hilarious comments while drinking hot cocoa “enhanced” with an adult beverage of some kind, and it’s become sort of a 7 Days in-joke.

Also, on the bottom, along with my name and the date, I wrote, “It’s a FACT: Kristen is funny.” Because she IS funny, and because we’re both Kids in the Hall fans. (Semi-explanatory KitH It’s A Fact Girl skit.)

When I asked Erin what she wanted for her birthday this year, she said something like, “I must be getting old because I can’t think of anything I want. Maybe Annalie could make me something? I’d love that.” I asked Annalie if she would like to make anything for Auntie Erin, and Annalie immediately said she would like to paint her a volcano plate, because Erin loves volcanoes. Annalie designed and painted the plate entirely by herself. I especially like the ash plume, and the river flowing in the foreground.

You might recall the I-knit-so-I-don’t-kill-people mug that Brenda and I painted for Lauren early this year. A blog reader saw it, loved it, and wanted to buy it for a friend’s birthday. Brenda graciously allowed me to copy her design onto a second mug. I added the little ball of yarn with the needles stuck through it on the inside bottom of the mug.

Here’s a cereal bowl I painted for no other reason than that the colors made me happy.

Erin from two more seconds asked me to paint these little sake cups for her, so she could turn them into pincushions for a swap. She gave me some photos and a blog banner for inspiration, and it was fun to do something a little different than my usual mugs and plates.

I liked the colors I was using for Erin’s little cups, so I painted a little bowl for myself.

I happened to be painting these all at the little pottery studio that’s about ten minutes from my house. It’s a nice little studio and it’s much closer to me than my regular studio, but I don’t like that they charge a $6 studio fee per person. I also don’t like that their fired pieces often seem to have these black marks on them. Marks from the kiln? I don’t know.

I painted these red and orange dotty ‘be happy’ mugs at Mike‘s request, as he was thinking ahead to Christmas. They’re in my Etsy shop whenever you’re ready to buy them, Mike!

A lil’ happy jack-o-lantern dish Annalie painted while we were in California. I think she did a great job with it! She’s getting so much more precise with her painting.

Brenda painted this for Troy when we were in California, kind of as a joke. Note the empty, unpacked box in the bottom of the mug reminding Troy while he likes it when she and Bug visit us. Luckily, he thought it was pretty funny. And Brenda and Bug ARE coming back to visit us in November, yay!

I painted this square funky dish for no one in particular, just for fun. Anyone out there want it? Gimme a shout, I’ll put it in my Etsy shop for ya.

My mom asked me to paint a bowl for their remote controls, so they’re not forever searching for them. I added my own little touch inside.

I hope this bowl is big enough. Mom, do you want me to send this to you, or hang onto it and give it to you when you’re here in a couple of weeks?

I painted a Halloween plate a couple of years ago, but I was never 100% happy with it. And recently I felt compelled to send it to Bex for some reason. Maybe God whispered in my ear that she needed a little care package of happy because He knew she was going to have kind of a rough September, I don’t know. In any case, I painted a new Halloween plate for myself…and I’m not 100% happy with it either! The orange paint I used was much less orange once fired than I expected it to be. But oh well.

I do like what I wrote on it. I think I might stick this in my Etsy shop. Anyone out there want it? Let me know, I can reserve it for you if you do.

Whew. You still with me? We’re almost done, I promise!

This mug is the second one I’ve painted with one of my favorite Shakespeare quotes, from Much Ado About Nothing, Act IV, Scene I: “I do love nothing in the world so well as you: Is not that strange?”

Someone saw the first one in my Etsy shop but didn’t buy it fast enough, so she asked me to paint another. Anna, it’s in my shop whenever you’re ready to buy it.

Once upon a time, way back in March, the lovely Claire asked me if I would be willing to face a crocheting challenge for her. She wanted seven crocheted balls, in varying shades of red; and one ball crocheted out of jute twine, representing the city of Dundee, Scotland, where she lived. (Dundee is famous for, among other things, its jute mills.) I assured her that I loved a challenge! I could do it!

Yeah, did you notice the part where she asked me in March, the month during which we were moving into a new house and hosting a variety of houseguests at the same time? That was also the month during which I unknowingly became pregnant and started requiring 14 hours of sleep per day and not wanting to drink coffee. I was also working on a million other crochet projects at the same time. I got the red balls done by mid-April, and then…just…came to a stand-still. I looked around locally for the jute, but couldn’t find what I needed. I ended up having to order it online, then went out of town, blah dee blah, etc. FINALLY I finished all seven of the red balls and the jute ball. I emailed Claire to tell her it was done! I had completed her order!

Naturally, Claire (who was extremely gracious about my slowness throughout the spring and summer) and her husband were about to move away from Dundee. She assured me that the balls would be a lovely memento of their time there, and that she still wanted them. That was when I realized I’d forgotten that one of the red balls was supposed to be striped in the six other shades of red.

Sigh.

I scrounged around through my yarn bins and found most of the red yarns I’d used originally, and made an eighth ball, red and stripey. And now, finally, five months later, THE ORDER IS COMPLETE.

Claire, the red and jute crocheted balls are in my Etsy shop, waiting for you! I have no idea why this order took me so long, other than the obvious reasons of (1) moving cross-country, (2) being pregnant, and (3) not finding jute locally. Those things should have made this order take two months, maybe, but not five. Thank you again for your kindness and understanding.

(I saw we take my banner’s advice and just blame it on the baby. She won’t mind.)

I painted this mug way back in April, when I was in Omaha and I went painting with Katrina and Kassie. This mug is notable because it’s the first time I tried painting in script rather than printing. It turned out better than I thought it would. The quote is from Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. It’s one of my favorite lines from a good play that was made into one of my favorite movies. That line has always struck me as a sweet and hilarious sentiment at the same time. I found myself thinking, Someone should put that on a mug! So I did. And then I put that mug in my Etsy shop.

I was trying to branch out from my typical brightly-colored dottery when I chose these colors. It turned out to be one of my favorite things I’ve ever painted. I love this color combination, so cheerful and summery with the sky blue and lilac and violet and apple green! And a little bit of gray for summer storm clouds. Perfect. It’s in my shop too, if you like it.

This is the red-white-and-blue plate I painted as an example when I taught that dottery class in June. I used a speckled paint for the white dots, so it has tiny bits of blue, red, and yellow paint in it that help the white dots stand out a bit more. I also used a larger paintbrush than I normally do, so it looks a bit different from most of my dotty plates. I really like it! If you like it and want one, I can paint another one for you—just ask.

A couple of months ago, I painted this green dotty mini bowl for no one in particular. (I don’t think I ever blogged this…it’s been a while since I’ve blogged any pottery-painting.) Brenda saw it on Flickr and asked if I could set it aside for her to buy. Instead, I set it aside to give to her for her birthday. Then I forgot to put it in her birthday care package. So now it’s going to be her thank-you-for-letting-us-come-visit-you-in-California gift.

Sonja saw the first green dotty mini bowl on Flickr too, but Brenda had already claimed it. She proclaimed her love for it, and asked if I could paint her another one. Alas, this is not exactly the first bowl’s twin; it’s slightly larger and has a couple of different shades of green in it, since I painted this one at a different studio. But I think it’s just as adorable in its own way. So this bowl is going to be Sonja’s thank-you-for-letting-us-come-visit-you-in-California gift.

Last Christmas, Melissa saw the star ornament that I painted (the one that now lives in Bex’s cubicle at work year-round), and said if I ever came across another star ornament, she’d love it if I’d paint her one. Unfortunately my pottery studio in San Diego had already run out of stars, and I’d never run across any more. Then when I painted with Anna at the beach, they had star magnets. I threw caution to the wind and painted one for Mel in bright colors, adding the word ‘hope’ just because it seemed like the right word to use. Mel might have thought she was going to buy this magnet from me, but I decided I just wanted to send it to her as a gift. Because isn’t hope always a gift, really? Mel, it’s already on its way to you!

Here’s the dotty ‘be happy’ mug I painted in Omaha last month, thinking of citrus fruits when I chose the colors. Not sure what I’ll do with it. Anyone out there want it? Let me know, I’ll throw it in my Etsy shop for you. (Gently! I will gently throw it since, as Sonja pointed out to me, it’s breakable.)

Finally, here’s something I’m really proud of. I’m kind of throwing caution to the wind posting it now, because a blog reader asked me to paint this as a birthday gift for her mom. She assured me her mom doesn’t read my blog, so it’s most likely okay to post photos here, but I’m not going to mention who commissioned it just in case.

I wasn’t sure how this one would turn out, because I rarely paint with the “right” end of the paintbrush. In my head, the dotty center looked good, and the shades of orange and golden yellow I chose for the sunflower’s petals were just right, and the true blue color I chose for the outside of the bowl and the dotty pattern inside complemented the colors of the sunflower perfectly…in my head. But once it was painted and I was waiting for it to be fired I got nervous. What if I was wrong about the colors? What if the petals were totally brushy and amateurish? What if I was too freeform on the blue dotty pattern and it looked like crap!?

But when I saw the fired bowl, I breathed a sigh of relief because I loved it. I hope my reader’s mom loves it too! And I hope I remember this lesson and branch out of my painting comfort zone a little more often because sometimes the end results are worth the nail-biting.