Jude Marguerite & Ben's blog: The Clayroom adventures

There are many ways of entertaining oneself but when Jude and Marguerite moved to Brookline they learned of another. The Clayroom is 'a paint your own pottery studio' located on Beacon St. Having passed by it on many occasions Marguerite or Jude would often comment 'we must go in there and do that some day'.

So for their 11th anniversary celebration (of meeting on 11th May 2000) Marguerite and Jude decided to go clean buck mad and do just that............ they would go make their own pottery item.

'Here Jude I want to make one of those', said Marguerite as she gawked in the windy.

'And here's the one I want', said Jude as they made their way into the shop.

'Here Marguerite, you should do this one, it's a wee garden gnome'.

Jude looks slightly puzzled at this stage, like he does not really have a clue what he's getting himself into.

Now he's over asking for instructions from some punter who is hiding behind thon corner. So the instructions from Doug the shopowner were: 'ye get yerself a palate, stick some paint on it, draw a picture on the pottery with a pencil, use an eraser to rub out the drawings until ye get them right, then paint the blighter'. 'Eh......dead on squire', replied Jude.

So Jude tried to figure out what he was doing, why he was doing it, and if there was any way he could get himself out of it. When he could not come up with a valid escape excuse, he decided to just get stuck in.

So before long he was off and running. It was like being back in Mrs Breen's Art class, 'Get the base coat on first, I say get the base coat on first folks', Jude rambled on to himself.

Meanwhile Marguerite dove straight into the funky colour schemes by nailing a cool colour as her base. She's soooooo artistic that one!!!!!

'This is going to be a work of art', said Marguerite.

For the past couple of days Jude had been trying to figure out just what to draw on his pottery. Jude can make big decisions quickly, like move to America, buy a new house, etc.........but see when he has to decide what to draw on a mug, well that's a whole new ball game!!!!

Finally when hoaking through the kitchen drawer the other night he came across a couple of auld tickets for a Baseball game and a Basketball game. 'Too complicated', he said to Marguerite, 'Far too complicated'.

Marguerite has belief in Jude's ability, much more belief than he has himself actually!!! Anyway, he decided he would do the logo for the Boston Celtics.

Drawing the circles for the base/background took at least an hour.

And after much drawing/erasing/drawing/erasing.....he eventually got the foundation for his painting done. The wee Leprechaun had never looked better!!!! Yet even getting the writing done perfectly in line/proportion etc was just as hard as the drawing.

Across the table Marguerite needed no encouragement. She is an artist. Her ability to see things in an artistic way never cease to amaze Jude. In fact Jude is always telling her that if she ever gives up her investment work she could take up interior design.

100% focus!!!! 'I just knew that O'level in Art would do me good eventually, it took a while but 20 odd years later, it came good', Jude rambled.

'Hey Jude, this is magic, pure class like, we should open one of these in Belfast when we get home', said Marguerite. 'Eh.....aye dead on Marguerite, sure your Kevin, Leah, Cormac, Rhiannon and Grace would have the joint wrecked in one Saturday afternoon sitting, sure the place would be wrecked in no time', replied Jude

The painting has started.........

.........but Jude is in the zone.

When Marguerite called Emma to say what activity she was doing to celebrate her 11th anniversay Emma burst out laughing and saying, 'you two are like Ken and Deirdre, two melters!!' Apparently in the great old British/Irish pasttime of watching Coronation Street the two famous characters Ken & Deirdre have taken to pottery classes. Well if it's good enough for Ken & Deirdre then it's good enough for Marguerite and Jude!!!!!

Wha?

Marguerite and Jude went into the shop at 1.00pm. This pic was taken at 6.30pm. Nearly 6 hours Jude worked on that wee blighter there but his attention to detail looks like it just may have paid off.

At 1.00pm this place was buzzing with folk running around all over the shop..........but now there was only Jude. Even Marguerite had left hours ago having finished her mug.

Now Jude thought that an opportunity to do this, i.e. design his own mug, would not come around too often. So he added this cool wee touch, it's only a Boston Red Sox logo on the arse of the cup!!!!

Still he wasn't finished though as there was a gaping big bare patch on the other side of his mug, so what did he do?

He spent 4 hours the next day (Sunday) putting the Boston Red Sox logo on the other side of the mug.

When the art work was finished the mugs were given to the shopowner who then took a few days to blast/glaze them.

How did they finish up?