BOCers Who Blog focus on EveryHeartCrafts

If you have not visited Erin's blog EveryHeartCrafts, you are in for a very pleasant surprise. Erin is a very talented bead maker whose use of porcelain clay is superb. She makes beautiful leaves and hearts and has now added Owls to her repretoire. And soon to add even more delights. You can see her unglazed Owls here

What I like about her work besides its beauty is that it is so versatile for beading purposes. The scale, color and size of her beads make necklaces and bracelets look wonderful.

BOCers Who Blog Spotlight on Chinook Jewelry

Here is a new and exciting connector bead from Chinook Jewelry. You can read more about this incredibly creative bead artist on her blog and see even more of her work on her Etsty store.

Melissa states that

"My goal is to make distinctive, beautiful jewelry and ceramic pendants that will complement the wearer as well as remain stylish indefinitely. I pride myself on my attention to detail and the quality of the materials I choose."

Thermocouple Woes

Just in case you have a digital AIM Computer and your Thermocouple fails, here is how to get the right new one. Now that AIM is not taking any orders it has been hard to find out how to replace this. Luckily I found a helpful person at Bailey, who I could talk with once I had learned from Marla James that I needed a K type thermocouple.

Very specifically this is a 7" 14 guage thermocouple. However, it has to be cut down about 4 inches. The sheath on the wire is in sections and we left 3 on. We also took off the porcelain block since the one in the kiln was fine. It is important to keep the yellow and red wires in the right part of the block. The wire comes with a red and yellow sheath and under the sheath the wire has a red mark on it. When you take off the high fire sheath in order to bend and cut the wire the red make will no longer be there. So it is important to bend the wire in the control box of the kiln so that you know the red wire can only go where it is supposed to be. We must have done everything right because the control read out lit up immediately and I could get the program I always use to come back.

Specifically the order number at Baily is C-172-50. Here is the catalogue page link.

Now the woe part. Actually, not that bad. I ordered the wrong part the first time, I made several calls to Aim and looked around quite a bit on the internet before I ran into the nice person at Bailey who let me return the wrong part and told me about the right one. It has been about 4 weeks since I have been able to use my AIM Kiln. Although, I have other kilns, I love my AIM and am not willing to put a small load in the big kiln. It is so great to be able to do that again.

Beads 2009 Lots of Clay

Beads 2009 has many ceramic artists included this year. So far the accolades go to Lisa Peters, Gaea, Vlad, Jangles, Off Center Productions ( Joan Tucker), Marsha Hedrick, Melanie at Earthenwood Studio, Joan Miller, Tracey Isley, Kristie Roeder, Marla James, and Deb Becker. As I find out about more I will add to this post.

CONGRATULATIONS ALL OF YOU!!!

Lisa Peters in Beadwork Magazine

There is an article about Lisa Peters in the current issue of Beadwork Magazine. You can find out more about Lisa by reading her blog. She always has wonderful eye candy and energy to share with all of us. She is known for her fantastic raku beads, buttons, and pendants.