A visit to Jennifer Prichard's studio

This tour really knocked my socks off. I knew it would be cool... Jennifer's really nice and I absolutely love her art.... but I didn't realize she was just a natural-born teacher who presented all this interesting information about the making of ceramics with so much clarity and charm and good humor. It was all so interesting and she got our hands right in some clay just as soon as possible, too... it was all so calming and delicious that even the two two year olds that were tagging along with us (who one might worry would be crashing around like 2 year old bulls in a china shop) were totally Zenned out. And she had us do just the coolest project, I'm so excited about it. We made rattles. We shaped our balls of clay into two half-spheres, and then filled each half with crumpled newsprint. Then into the crevices and crumples of the paper we placed little rolled-up balls of clay, and then sealed the two halves together into one whole sphere and decorated as we wished. When the rattle goes into the kiln, the paper will burn right up, so the sphere will be hollow inside, except for the little rattlers inside! Isn't that cool?

We were all totally hypnotized by the potter's wheel, too. Seriously, this woman was just so calm and relaxed... I don't know if I would be able to remain so calm with 9 kids in a small room with hundreds of my incredibly delicate creations that represent hours and hours of painstaking and delicate work.... she's either a very calm person or she's able to mask her anxiety incredibly well. Either way, gee whiz THANK you Jennifer Prichard! How lucky we were to get to spend a couple hours in your world!