Custom Handmade Stoneware Mugs, your wish (within clay reason) is my command

Latest in the adventures of the glazedOver pottery studio are custom handmade stoneware mugs. It's basically whatever you'd like to see on a mug, from your dog to your boat to your business card. We've created anything from eccentric music lyrics to a set of mugs commemorating the rekindling of an old flame that included the room key he kept from the overnight tryst thirty years prior (be still my heart!). 

Check out some of our latest mugs for inspiration or drop us an email to discuss your creative idea. Let's collaborate! 

Just Married Mr. and Mrs Mugs

Pretty maids all in a row

If you can guess the breed then I'm the bomb

DMB forever

Because who doesn't love an orca

Local flavor close to our hearts

We're all mermaids

You're a star, baby

Best in show

The good life

Coming to a theater near you

Robert Moses Causeway, Long Island

Rock Lobster

Sunrise 

Life's a beach

Clam bar special

Kiln Hiccup

Bisque firing didn’t reach temp. Turns out I needed new elements, thermocouples, and relays…all those cone 6 firings finally caught up with me. Cost me a few weeks and a few bucks but I should be good as new by day's end, fingers crossed. Filing this one in the "Overhead of Life" folder.

The ill fated bisqueware

The spent heating elements

Heating elements waiting to be connected

The control panel

New thermocouples

Wiring diagram

 
Kiln inspector

Six hundred and eighty two percent

The new Ulta catalog came in today’s mail. A $3.50 coupon…hooray! That’s the limit of my excitement, though. I never read the Ulta catalog because:
(a) I don’t really care much about make-up
(b) I don’t have the brain space to read about all of the replenishing creams and magic age defying ointments

They’re reading over my shoulder. “You DO care about make-up, Mommy, that’s not true.” Ok, maybe I do, but not beyond the products I already use and I don’t feel any need to look at them in catalogs. Other than the coupon, Ulta can save themselves the postage in my case.

BUT…today I had a little time on my hands so I actually read the product descriptions. Some of them are award winners!

Here are my top three snake-oil salesman’s finest picks:

1. Perricone MD Cold Plasma

“A revolutionary anti-aging product represents Dr. Perricone's most comprehensive research to date and is the result of five years of development. Through Dr. Perricone's patented delivery system, Cold Plasma offers the skin all it needs for optimal health. Cold Plasma helps correct the ten most visible signs of aging: wrinkles, enlarged pores, dryness, redness, discoloration, uneven skin tone, impurities, loss of firmness, loss of smoothness and loss of radiance. Whatever your age or skin type, Cold Plasma delivers extraordinary results.
Benefits include:

Suitable for all skin types.

Repairs and nourishes the skin.

Delivers optimum cellular nutrition to achieve healthy, glowing and youthful skin.

Lifts and firms skin with DMAE.

Brighten skin's appearance.

Free of parabens, sulfates, synthetic fragrances and dyes.

Consumer Study Results:
4 week study for women 20-65 years of age.

99% reported that their skin was soft and smooth.

94% said they liked the results and felt it provided for their skincare needs.

92% reported that their skin looked radiant and healthy.

91% felt that their skin was infused with moisture.”

2. StriVectin-TL Tightening Neck Cream

“The Future of Anti-Aging. Strivectin started a goal. Create the most effective age-fighting product ever. So they powered up the original StriVectin with even more potent collagen-boosting peptides and re-engineered the formula with NIA-114. Discovered in DNA skin cancer research, NIA-114 accelerates the rebuilding of skin layers. Proven in Clinical Trials. And in your mirror. Strivectin's research was conducted under rigorous scientific standards. The result? Multiple patents, proven and documented in years of clinical trials. But the only results that matter to Strivectin are yours. So try it You'll see the future of anti-aging: healthy-looking, younger-looking skin. And skin that gets better and better”

3. SeroVital-hgh (my favorite)

“Optimum growth hormone levels have been associated with wrinkle reduction, tightening saggy skin, decreased body fat, increased lean muscle mass, stronger bones, improved mood, heightened sex drive, and making users look and feel decades - not years, but DECADES - younger.
SeroVital-hgh is the first and only clinically proven hGH booster to increase mean, endogenous, serum (blood) growth hormone levels by 682% in both men and women of an appropriately wide age range.”

Six hundred and eighty two percent? WOW!! That sure is a lot of percent! And can my neck really get tighter? Well, SIGN ME UP!

Cue: Danny Kaye:

Inspector General

The Great Knish Fire of 2013–Whodunnit?

Namaste, y’all, but I’ve got to admit, there’s nothing quite like a kosher style pastrami sandwich. Recently at my local kosher style establishment, I placed my order for a pastrami sandwich but asked that the fries be substituted for a square knish. Suddenly, the music stopped and all of the lights dimmed except for one single spotlight above my table.

“You haven’t heard?” the waitress whispered in horror.

“Heard what?” I asked.

“The factory burned down! It has been affecting delis and grocery stores across the country We haven’t had square knishes for weeks now. Nobody has. They said they’d be back up and shipping out knishes by January but I’m not holding my breath. We have round knishes if you want one of those instead.”

I politely declined. Round knishes just aren’t the same.

But a fire? At the knish factory? That’s crazy! My husband suggested maybe it was arson! But whodunnit? Was it sour pickles? Or, I know! Maybe it was the Hebrew Nationals who done ‘em in!

We may never know. The game is afoot!

Insomnia and Max

Insomnia has been my reality for years. On the nights when I do manage to nod off and stay asleep for longer than just 10 minutes, I can usually sleep for about two hours, but then I’m irrevocably up for the next three. I can only start the sleep process at midnight or 1 AM, so this can be disastrous as you can imagine. Think about those numbers for a moment. Here’s the worst case scenario:

1-3 AM – sleeping
3-6 AM – awake
6-7 AM – sleeping
7 AM - alarm
That’s just crazy! That amounts to an average of three hours of sleep each night. And it’s been going on like this for YEARS! I’m justifiably twitchy at this point!
Recently, a friend suggested that I try Max Kirsten’s Insomnia Cure: Sleep Now. The first night, I had to listen to it three times. It takes a little getting used to because it gets all echo’y towards the end and that struck me as a little freaky at first. But now that I’m used to it, I don’t bat an eyelash…especially because now I’M TOO BUSY SLEEPING!!!! It’s incredible. I didn’t think that was curable, but it is. Thank you, Max!

Happy Pigs

Do you think the pigs in blankets are as happy as the pigs in mud?

How to Heal a Ceramic Mug

The bus driver of our little one’s minibus is a funny man. We’re very lucky to have him, now for the second year. He somehow manages to crack me up each morning with some dry quip. That’s not really easy to do, it’s very early in the morning when he arrives. He’s very talented. And such a good guy. I love him!

Recently, he asked me—since I’m an expert in all things ceramic—how he could heal a favorite mug. The handle had fallen off and he thought I, of all people, would know how to fix it permanently. Before even letting him finish his sentence, (we New Yorkers are so good at knowing what people are saying even before they can get a word in edgewise), I said:

“You can’t; don’t bother.”

He didn’t take my word for it, though. As you can see…

This he gave to me as a present. He said he has already applied for the patent, in case I was planning on plagiarizing his design. 

Refrigerator Blindness

Refrigerator blindness. Don’t laugh, it’s an actual medical condition.

Ok, laugh. It’s alright.

I know what you’re thinking, though. I don’t have it. Nope. No I do not. I can find the milk every time. In fact, I can sit at a distance and verbally navigate my kid to the ketchup in the back left corner of the second shelf, even when I myself didn’t put it there. I’m good at that. Very talented.

…but…

…ask me to find anything outSIDE of the fridge and it’s a no-go. I’m utterly blind and completely clueless. So don't ask me where my idea list of what to cook tonight is taped up–or even if it’s up on a cabinet door anywhere in the kitchen at ALL! Which will itself tell you why I have to have an idea list of what to cook tonight in the first place!

So it shouldn’t surprise you to hear that I just stumbled upon this taped inside the door where I keep the Tylenol (and considering that I keep the Tylenol there, you can just imagine how many times I’ve opened up this door):

7 Lessons

1) Get out of your comfort zone.

2) Embrace the late sleepless nights.

3) Speak the language of the individual you want to become.

4) Find a mantra to anchor and guide you.

5) Always stay guided by your values not by your necessities.

6) To achieve unreasonable things, you have to become an unreasonable person.

7) Become hopelessly idealistic about the things that make you feel most alive.

Though I’m sure I was the one who taped this up whenever ago, I just read it now as if for the first time.

Then I took a nice deep breath.

A slow count to five on the inhale, a slow count to five on the exhale.

Ahhhh.


 

That’s better. The important things.

<<<Breathe>>>

Happy New Year, everybody!