odds and ends...

So some odds and ends of pots, plus a good pic of the entire Christmas pile.  The marbled bowl is actually with a celadon glaze, you can't tell by the pic. Frankly the pix look better than the actual pot.  The main clay body was white, too much white.  this glaze looks best on dark clay in my opinion.  It is a Laguna red that adds the "marble" to this clay.

The other pot is glazed with eggshell and then drips of blue and red glaze.  I like this pot better then the rest of this fire.

blue slip

Porcelain with cobalt carbonate.  mixed and dried till it was as thick as table cream.  Large paint brush, and a couple of good swipes on the pots.

The overall glaze is eggshell, the clay is ^6 reclaim mix. the reddish purple is called Wine Red, and was dripped on with a spoon.

you see a mix of bowls and pasta bowls, I did post these as greenware previously.  I guess I am ok with these, not super excited by them.  The blue is nice, but I think it needs slip trailing to contrast with it.  Not sure, just not real taken with them right now. The forms are nice though.

Greenware Teapot

Yup, yup. It's my first teapot.  Greenware right now.

Of Tea Pots and Christmas

I am not a huge fan of the ever growing Christmas season.  I know that is most of us, yet we all tend to collude with it anyway.  I grew up Catholic and so Christmas doesn't start until Christmas eve and then goes on for about a month after.  Advent is before Christmas and is a season of its own that isnt' about all of this buying shit. Quite the contrary it is about fasting and prayer.  Anyway, not the point.

I hate the push to find gifts for everyone, I think it takes the fun out of randomly finding a great gift for someone randomly. So the solution?  Long ago my circle of friends, based on being poor, decided to not exchange Christmas gifts.  So that leaves me with my family and I don't do extended family.  So that makes life easier, less meaningless pressure.

I debated posting pictures of the Christmas gifts but only a few of my friends even look at my blog yet alone my family so no worries there.  I have no pix right now of the tea pot I have in the works.  Laura agreed to show us how to do a tea pot, and I had a prior attempt that was a disaster.  This time, well it's a tea pot. Tomorrow at 2pm I add the pieces togther. That will be my mother's gift. We'll see if it all comes together.

I also glaze tomorrow, as all the we pieces will be bisque fired and ready for me. So after all the crazy of trying to get the wood burning stove in the studio, it worked out. And I was able to make half of my Christmas gifts in my studio.

So last note for the year...
I think I am going to try to put a few pieces in the gallery for sale and see what happens. Oh and I read the minutes for Cup & Bowl, there was a list posted of featured artists... I am in October. Thanks Linda!!  Surprise!!  LOL.

A good look at the Soda Glaze

Ok, some of this I have already posted, but now with new pix. There are a total of three bowls that were soda glazed.  You can see the unglazed sides and see an orange hue, this is the effects of the soda. On the glaze surface you can see some sparkle look to it, this is the soda effect as well.  Also the way the colors shifted making the glaze, well unrecognizable to us (as no one remembers what was put on the bowls) is also a soda effect.

Lastest Completed Projects

So here are Christmas gifts that are all fired.  The bowls and plates were made out of the reclaim clay. 

Projects in the works

You can see wet pots here.  Some is marbled, and those are not trimmed yet.  On the table are bowls that have been slip decorated with a blue slip (yes it looks pink, but it fires blue).

So these are Christmas gifts, still need to be glaze fired as of this post.