In the spirit that (hopefully) perpetuates this blog, I visited one of the events from the past weekend. I give The Mud Oven experience a rating of nine out of nine unbroken mugs.
The Mud Oven was the second event in a row where adults were vastly outnumbered by sticky children. I suppose this is a normal weekend for The Mud Oven as they only kept a handful of adult aprons (I got to wear a purple polka-dot apron that came to just below my belly button; I looked really, really cool).
The Mud Oven was the second event in a row where adults were vastly outnumbered by sticky children. I suppose this is a normal weekend for The Mud Oven as they only kept a handful of adult aprons (I got to wear a purple polka-dot apron that came to just below my belly button; I looked really, really cool).
Though one might assume that a small shop full of mini-humans, shelves of ceramic, and an unending supply of paint means chaos for any who shall enter. However, the lock-down on organisation the Mud Oveners have makes me want to set my day planner on fire. They have a tall shelf set up with all they have available to paint, a library of reference material (that seriously lacked a National Geographic magazine; my unguided interpretation of the Vhavenda tribe's breasts was terrible), and tablets that show the various stages of a paint colour's opacity as you layer.
It can take hours to paint one mug (it took us three).My take-away advice is to bring someone you are comfortable sitting in silence with. I was very lucky to go with someone who is at-ease in quiet moments and incredibly honest when acknowledging them. Still, we arrived and got settled in a cloud of our own chattiness.
As we got more and more into our respective artwork, our chatter died down, eventually ceasing, and whole half-hours would sneak by with hardly a peep between us. After some time, my private bubble of concentration would let a little of the environment leak in and I 'd remember that I had company, seemingly at the same time as my mug-buddy. We'd start chatting again, though remained eager to get back to work and abandoned conversation-continuity as soon as our brushes started moving again.
We left our work in their shop for them to glaze it and fire in their kiln, ready for pick up by Friday. Don't let the kid-phobic review deter you; those skinny-armed little tykes are downright civilised compared to their parents:
UDPATE
Mug's home!
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