WALLYWARE

Mother’s Day, Teacher’s, Dad’s and Grad’s Gifts

We’re loading up the kiln this week with lots of pots aimed at the upcoming “appreciation holidays”: Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and the graduation season.  Here’s a rundown of our top gift items for these celebrations.  I highly recommend visiting the new section on my online store where you can see them all grouped together.  Here is a collection of pics of some of the items you can find there:

For Mother’s Day, this set of three nesting bowls is an awesome gift to bestow upon anyone who loves making food.  Yes it’s kitchen-y,  but they are such a treat to use and display.  If you like the look of this set, there are a lot of other great red pots in the Ohata Kaki Red section of our online store.  We’ve also got a slew of mugs that are perfect for Mom’s big day.  Here are three really good ones: The queen of caffeine, “Holy shit! That’s good coffee!” and “I am carrying Big Foot’s love child”.

We have two excellent teacher mugs that are great for the guiding light in your child’s academic world:  “I am your teacher” or “Spacey kindergarten teacher vs. grumpy Republican” could be the perfect item to show your kid’s teacher that you really appreciate the work that they’ve done this year.

For the graduates, we’ve got a couple of great mugs, too: “How many cups of coffee does it take to graduate?” comes in both male and female, and “Wally goes to college to play beer pong” is a custom item.  You need to specify the college he or she goes to so we can get the logo on Wally’s sweatshirt, and be sure to allow 3-4 weeks for delivery.  We might be able to do it quicker if the kiln schedule allows.  SIDEBAR: I will be out of town the second week of May because my youngest daughter, Monica, is graduating from the University of Puget Sound with a BA in History.  She’s an amazing kid who took classes throughout Asia last year, met the Dalai Lama and climbed to Everest base camp, among other amazing adventures.  A week after graduation she begins the Teach for America program and next fall she’ll be an English teacher in Phoenix, Arizona.  Yes, I’m a proud parent!

And last but not least, our very best Father’s Day gift is the classic “Why we like Dad” mug.  It says it all!  Actually, practically my entire line is great for wacky Father’s Day presents.  For a super-deluxe gift, you could consider something from the new Bowie-Pop mug series. What could be a cooler gift for Dad than the “Chairman of the Bored” mug?

It’s time to buy your crazy sweetie an insane new coffee mug!!

I just rolled out the first kiln load of the year this morning and, while I didn’t specifically target these five new mug designs for Valentine’s Day, they do have an odd appeal for the V-Day gift shopper.  What’s the common theme?  THEY ARE ALL ABOUT CRAZY PEOPLE!!!  Yup, these mugs celebrate five different aspects of insanity so one or two of them might just be the perfect goodie for you to bestow upon your lovestruck significant other.  If this just happens to be the case, get your endorphin-crazed brain over to the funnymug section of my online store and make a purchase!  We can ship most items in the store ASAP for Valentine’s Day (February 14th). I’ll let the pics of these pots speak for themselves, but I would like to mention that the “I AM CARRYING BIGFOOT’S LOVE CHILD” design would be a most amazing gift for that mother-to-be with a significantly wicked sense of humor.  Am I right?!!!

(you can click on the pics below to see a larger image)

And the winner of the 2012 Holiday Ornament Design Contest is…

…Pam Hamilton and her stunning Lance Armstrong/Charlie Brown idea!  This is my favorite entry out of well over a dozen submissions to our yearly ornament design contest.   One of the secrets to Pam’s success is that she hit us with a Don Rickles-esque slew of topical digs at celebrities and politicians (the worst of the bunch: “Which home for the holidays?”  Tom and Katie pulling Suri Cruise apart like a wishbone.  Ouch!)  So when I drew up the rough draft for the Lance Armstrong design, my wife and I realized we’d like to give some of these to our cycling friends and it was apparent that there just might be a good niche market for this design.  We’ll see.  If you want to vote with your credit card, zip on over to our online store and grab a few.  They are wheel-thrown, hand decorated and sell for a mere $12.50 each.

Here are two more new ornaments for 2012.  In case you didn’t know, marijuana will soon be legal in Colorado, so some ornaments commemorating this milestone in the Mile High region seem like a must.  Personally, I think it’s kind of sad that the healthiest state in the U.S. is now going to be known for legalizing a drug that addles the mind.  But I’m certainly not above making jokes and trying to make a buck off of the situation here in the land of the Rocky Mountain High.  “Don’t throw out the Colorado fruitcake this year” and “Rudolph the Red-Eyed Reindeer” are available in limited quantities at our online store.

And last but not least, here are two honorable mentions from the contest.  We received a lot of Paula Broadwell/David Patreus jokes and my favorite of the bunch was Michael Doherty’s allegation that Santa Claus is the next shoe to drop in this sordid affair.  And it wasn’t beneath Suzanne Davis and Katrina Garcia to go for the “B” joke in their commemoration of one of the most memorable moments in the 2012 U.S. presidential debates.  A gracious “Thanks!” to everyone who submitted ideas this year.  You people are nuts.  We’ll do it again in 2013 because it’s such a fun tradition.  Merry Christmas!!!

Custom dog bowls and milk bone jars!

Dogs love Christmas: the family spends more time in the living room, unattended food gets left out on the coffee table, and above all, everyone gets presents.  This year your dog has an amazing opportunity to receive a gift that says so much more than that generic chew toy purchased at PetSmart at the last minute.   I’m talking about a custom made dog bowl and/or milk bone jar with your dog’s name and personal logo painted on it.  I just threw some fancy milk bone jars and blank bowls in two sizes (7″ diameter and 5.25″ diameter) and they are ready to be personalized for your mutt.  Here’s the design we did for our dear dog, Ivy The Wonderdog:

Pretty cool, huh?  I’ll do just about anything you want on these bowls, but please don’t expect me to do a portrait of your dog because dog portraiture isn’t my forte.  I made just a few of the milk bone jars and here’s what they look like without the decoration:

Is this the perfect gift for your pup?  If so, simply hop on over to our online store and place an order.  We are doing a firing every other week so the turnaround time is 2-3 weeks.  Oh, and we do make something for cats, too:

THEY FIND LIVE SHEEP INSIDE SHARKS ALL THE TIME!

This is definitely one of the weirdest design ideas I’ve come up with in quite a while.  For the record, I didn’t think up the words for this one.  That credit goes to my wife, Lori.  We were having dinner with our daughter, Robin and I don’t exactly remember the context of the conversation but when Lori said, “They find live sheep inside sharks all the time” Robin and I both laughed a lot and marveled at what a weird picture that sentence paints.  So many questions!  How does a shark come in contact with a live sheep?  Can sheep hold their breath for days at a time?  It all just boggles the mind!  So a few weeks later, I immortalized this story on a mug and now it’s for sale in my online store.  I only made four of them as I’m not expecting it to be a runaway best seller, but you never know what hits with the public these days.  I sure like it a lot and I’m drinking my coffee out of one these days.

Father’s Day is just around the corner, and my weird pots (see above) would make great gifts for your weird dad.  This morning I put together a “Father’s Day Gift Ideas” section in my online store.  It’s got over twenty funny pots that just might be the perfect item for you perfect pop.  All of these items are in stock (as of today) and ready to ship.  We even do “No Frills Gift Wrapping” for just 75 cents, so get on over and get your dad something fun!

Clearance Sale! Mugs, plates and bowls for $10.00!

While I love doing topical humor on pottery, it does have its downside: it gets dated.  And sometimes topical humor gets dated really really fast.  But it’s wonderful to own an old design and wait a long time because after a while that old joke can have a certain quaint charm.  Take a look in the wallyware collectables section of this website and you’ll see some great little artifacts of pop culture (e.g. “Wally makes the mistake of using George W. Bush for his lifeline on ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire”).  Last month I pulled a number of designs off the shelves in the stock room and put them at a ridiculously low sale price: just ten dollars.  The response from my fans was good, so I just pulled some more old items and slow sellers out of my local galleries and we’re having round two of the big ten dollar clearance sale.  There’s a $10.00 section in Wally’s Bargain Basement in my online store to make it easy for customers to see all of these sale items in the same place.  If you are shopping there, be sure and order only the amount of items we have in stock as I don’t have inventory control on my retail website.  I have to take the items off the site after the sale is made.

Here’s a rundown of some of my favorite items that are available as of the date of this posting (03/17/12):

“Cats and dogs and pigs and bears are cute but if you make a composite animal of all of them it’s kind of creepy”

“Tell me about your drugs”

“Wally learns that Tiger Woods holds the world record for the youngest person to sell his soul to the devil” - available in mugs, plates and bowls.

“Wally learns that on Etsy, “hand-drawn on ironic tableware” means a sharpie drawing on an old paper plate – available in mugs and a plate.

“I WAS GOING TO BUY A GUN AND KILL YOU ALL BUT I COULDN’T AFFORD ONE SO I BOUGHT THIS MUG INSTEAD”

“I’M ON A DRUG. IT’S CALLED CHARLIE DONALD TRUMP SHEEN.”

Awesome Ohata Kaki Red Gifts!

We shipped out a lot of pots last week, and it’s been really rewarding to see that my ohata kaki red pots have a solid fan base.  I really like these pots and highly recommend them as gifts.  A handmade mug or bowl with a rich glaze is a great item to give or receive as a holiday present.  The eight inch diameter salad bowl (above) is a one of a kind and sells for $55.00 in my online store.  Here are some more iron red glazed gift ideas:

Here are three great mug shapes that we have in stock right now.  The “fancy foot mug” ($22.00), “morning mug” ($25.00) and “paddled square mug” ($25.00) may be purchased in sets, but be sure and email me first to see how many we have available.  I’m drinking out of a morning mug this morning…. really!

These 5″ diameter red altered bowls sell for $20.00 each and are perfect for cereal, ice cream, or serving bowls at parties.  The big red loop mug holds at least 14 ounces of liquid and sells for $28.00.  This is a great gift for a guy!

The “red handle jar” ($40.00) started out as a holiday gift idea my wife came up with.  She wanted me to make something to hold homemade fudge so I made a series of them for our friends.  This is the item that launched the entire ohata kaki line!  And I still have two of the “8 inch diameter serving bowls with handles” ($45.00) left.  These would make fantastic gifts.  We do “no frills” gift wrapping for just seventy-five cents!

And here’s a great combo for the “substance enthusiast” on your gift list: the ashtray ($18.00), beer stein ($28.00) and shot glass ($10.00) combo. Be sure and have a designated driver.  Cheers!

Yes, as a matter of fact, we can ship it ASAP!

Oh man, it’s the crazy season!  I still have a lot of great pots available in my online store, but the stock on hand is limited.  I’m almost out of some of our classic top-selling items such as the “Jesus is Coming” bowl and “Holy Shit! That’s good coffee!”, so if you have a specific gift item in mind, you might want to take a look to see if it is still available.  This year I took on a lot of new consignment accounts and we shipped some big orders to them this week.  Take a look at the “Find a Gallery” section of this site to see if there is a fine craft gallery near you that carries my work.  Here are some of the items we still have in stock here at the Wallyware headquarters.  All orders placed online will get a confirming email with the date the item is to be shipped.  We also offer “super-cheap holiday gift wrapping” for just $0.75!  It’s a great way to send out a unique gift with your holiday message taped on the wrapping paper.

Here are some of the items we have in stock and ready to ship:

The 10″ diameter red floppy bowl (above) is a one of a kind and sells for $55.00.  You can find it in the “Ohata Kaki Red” section of my online store.

The “Holy Guacamole!” bowl sells for $36.00 and was designed as the companion piece to the ever-popular “Jesus is coming and he’s bringing the bean dip” bowl.

Here’s the best seller from last year’s “deluxe funny mug” series! When I made the “When I was your age we had to make our own coffee and it tasted like crap” mug, I didn’t realize its excellent birthday gift potential.

We’ve got dozens of Wally mugs in stock, and here are three that are still on the shelves as of Thursday morning (12/08/11): “Wally goes to a party and realizes that he is the only one who is not on anti-depressants and it makes him sad”, “Wally joins the Tea Party because the brain-eating space monsters prefer the taste of smart people” and “Wally wanders into Jackson Pollock’s studio”.

Within the last couple of years, I’ve collaborated with alternative comics writers Noah Van Sciver and John Porcellino.  These guys are famous in the world of wacky drawing.  Noah was nominated for an ignatz award (the comix equivalent to an academy award!) and John P. has a huge following to his work, which he has been publishing for over twenty-five years now.  There is a section of my online store that carries a couple dozen one of a kind items by these guys.  It’s REAL ART! Check it out!

And I’m totally out of this new Tim Tebow design, but as of this morning, The Evergreen Gallery in Evergreen, Co has a couple of mugs and a couple of plates.  I should have made more!

This year’s best selling items

I’m unloading the last firing of the year tomorrow, and it’s always fun to be shipping out lots of holiday orders to my wholesale accounts and my retail customers.  If you are still in the shopping mode (as most of us are!), here’s some suggestions based on what has been selling well this year.  The ohata kaki nesting bowls (above) are one of my favorite items in this line, and they make a wonderful gift.  Last fall I made ten sets of these, but right now I only have one set left.   So if you want to buy it, you should get on over to my online store ASAP to snap it up.

Here are three of our top selling mugs right now.  “ELECTRIC CARS ARE GOOD FOR THE ENVIRONMENT BECAUSE ELECTRICITY COMES FROM MAGIC!” is really popular with engineers, eco-cynics and electric car fanciers alike.  And it’s really funny.  It’s a scientific fact: unicorn farts are funny.  “Holy Shit!  That’s good coffee!” is available in male and female motifs, and it’s still one of the designs we draw the most.  This is practically the first cartoon I ever drew on pottery and it’s still a huge hit.  Go figure.  “WHEN I WAS YOUR AGE, WE HAD TO MAKE OUR OWN COFFEE AND IT TASTED LIKE CRAP.” is a new twist on a similar theme, and it’s turned out to be a great birthday gift for people with, how shall we say, a certain wisdom born from years of experience?

Did you happen to see the Broncos/Vikings game yesterday?  I listened to the fourth quarter on the radio and at the end of it, I was saying to myself, “Damn!  I should have made more of those Tebow pots!”  We sold all of the ones we got out of the kiln last week in the Evergreen Gallery, and I only have six mugs, two plates and two bowls coming out of the kiln tomorrow.  This will make an awesome present for that Tebow fan on your holiday gift list, so I suggest you snap one up if you still can!

“Jesus is coming and he’s bringing the bean dip” has been one of my best sellers for almost ten years now, but this year we produced more than any year ever!  I’m pretty sure this is because of that crazy preacher who falsely predicted the apocalypse not once, but twice this year.  Like the other items in this post, my inventory is limited so get on over to the online store if you want to purchase one this year.

Nothing captures the spirit of the holidays like a pile of fudge.

Here’s a plate that just screams “HAPPY HOLIDAYS!”  For some reason, my customers tend to love tasteless jokes, and every time I push the envelope in this department, my sales climb.  This item is, of course, in stock and ready to ship so if you want to own the perfect plate for your holiday fudge, get over to the online store and snap one up!