My Camera is in Newfoundland, but I am not...

I loaned my camera to my sister and her husband for their belated honeymoon trip to Newfoundland so they would have 2 cameras instead of just 1. Therefore, no pics for a bit until they get back. I am currently house/fish/plant sitting for them and am apparently also in charge of feeding and bathing all of the neighborhood sparrows. I put out water and seed for them the first day , I was not sure how much to put in the feeder, so I filled it up. I came home in the afternoon and it was gone, all of it. They are little flying pigs, and are now on a one scoop diet.
This is the Heritage Day long weekend, so I will naturally be spending it at the studio. Dave is working at the Canmore Folk Festival as Instrument Security, so I am going to be opening and closing for open studio time,  as well as teaching on Monday night.  I also need to bisque the last of my pots for the salt/soda firing and pack them up. I am also teaching a couple of hand building classes on large(ish) soft slab vases next week, so I need to get all the slabs rolled out so they are suitably stiff for construction, as well as a few examples of finished pieces just in case. Nothing like trying to build a large vase when you slab is all floppy. It is kind of weird about this hand building class. I don't normally hand build. I am not sure why I said I would demo this. I have no patience for hand building. Too much waiting for things to dry in my opinion. But, throwing is a skill learned over a long time and if you are a new student it can be frustrating when all you can seem to make are lumpy dog bowls. Hopefully this will get them thinking tall and make them feel like they are accomplishing something. I may include some basic "printing" techniques with underglazes and how to incorporate texture with found objects and bisque stamps etc. This is definitely stretching my envelope.

3 down, 7 more to go

I have 7 more teaching nights to go now. I don’t get home before 10 pm most nights, and that is starting to be a bit of a drag. I had one new student last night; she seemed very thoughtful in how she approached the clay. I helped her make her first bowl, but her second one (without my help) was pretty successful. It may have taken her half an hour to make it, and the walls were a bit on the thick side, but relatively even, and her bottom was not paper thin. She didn’t manage to get anything else thrown, but she also did not struggle with the centering process as much as others do, so that was a bonus.

I loaded a glaze last night as well, and I will load another tonight. I will then hopefully be able to fire a load of lustre on the weekend. I need to get all my pieces ready for the Turning the Tables show, and it is creeping up pretty quick. The gallery is only allowing work to be dropped off on Nov 10^th at 10am. A bit a bit inflexible, but that’s ok, I will get the CCAA president to deliver it for me, but that means I can’t fool around, I will need to get it to her by the 7^th at the latest. Maybe after the CCAA Christmas sale on the 7^th...2 birds, one stone...

Tonight should be a cake walk. Thursday night is pretty much a class of very independent potters that have been coming for quite a while, and most of them leave really early. Last night I didn’t get to leave until 10pm as there were people still there madly attaching handles and glazing. Speaking of cakes, I also going to unload the very first cake stand that I have ever made. I don’t make a lot of cakes, and if I do, I usually eat them before they would ever make it onto a stand :). I was inspired by Kristen Kieffer’s cake stands (kiefferceramics.com). I WILL take pics tonight If I can get a peek into the kiln, it will be too hot to unload tonight, and let you know how it turned out.

I also have 3 pieces loaded that are not mine, but belong to the 2 people that I taught a private pottery class to for their anniversary. It was a one off class, and they really wanted to keep what they made, so I offered to fire and glaze them, I hope they turned out alright.