little vases

My journey in ceramics of the last few years has come to an exciting point this week, I've started adding my little vases to my Etsy shop. I didn't want to sell any ceramics until they were perfect in my eyes and something I wanted to share with the world.

To see my vases and buy one of your own you can go to the ceramics section of my Flowerpress Etsy Shop.

For those of you who follow my craft wanderings you will know that its been a while now since my first steps in this craft (how funny are those lumpy first pots!). I've been practicing and learning this skill since 2013, an itch I'd been wanting to scratch for ages.

The impetus was a blog story about a working ceramicist. I loved watching the process of her work and as my crafting has always been about making beautiful pieces to live with everyday, the idea of crafting my own ceramic pieces just seemed like a wonderful thing to work towards.

And it is, I love it!

What I didn't know when I started that process was that ceramics has a hugely steep learning curve. Much of it is complex and can only be learnt slowly by trial and failure. I went into it at a sprint, only to learn it is a marathon.

I like that too. I like the idea that the skills are hard won, my appreciation of ceramic work has grown so much as I explore all the processes involved.

Throwing on a wheel is hard. I'm often reminded of the idea that 10,000 hours of practice brings mastery in a skill. I'm slowly whittling away at that number, and enjoying it more as my skills increase.

It feels good to have earned a modest skill at throwing pots. It feels hard won.