The last few days

I have actually been a bit more productive lately. I guess with the heat starting to become more bearable and less humidity in the air I have more energy. I was able to load a bisque on Friday night, in anticipation of being able to fire a glaze load this week, but the last element in the kiln that had not been replaced yet, finally shuffled off it's mortal coil (pun intended) last week, the element is on order, but did not arrive on Friday, so hopefully tomorrow (fingers crossed). I also threw a bunch of the square plates, and trimmed them up. They have all had the slip/shellac treatment and are now drying under wraps. There were a couple squared off teapots. They are actually quite round, but the bottom comes out quite square and then I cut out feet at each corner. I should record the process and post it one of these days. I also took a few pictures, and will take more, of finished work and posted to Etsy (see last post). I updated my facebook account finally. I think I was the last person in the FB universe to update the new (to me) settings. It seems I am an antisocial networker.

I glazed the fire bowl and am again, just waiting for the element so that I can fire it. My fingers are really crossed with this one as there are a few things that could go wrong, and as it is a custom piece, it is marked for death by that fact alone. I just have to take deep breaths and pray to the kiln gods. I should have made 2 to be on the safe side, but I did not.

Here are a few pics of some of the pots that went into the bisque, including some of the square shellacked plates with various designs. I am especially fond of the leaf pattern and have begun working more along that line. It takes way less time to do than the trees, as the spirals take a really steady hand and a lot of patience. I also like the 1 big spirally thing with the stripes running behind it. It kind of reminds me of a seedling just poking it's head out of the ground. Apparently I am thinking of all things natural and organic when I am doing these. I don't really start with anything particular in mind, but I always seem to end up with these kinds of designs.

Glazing, Firing & Drinking Irish Whiskey

Kiln is fixed! I should be ok to fire this weekend. So glazing/loading tonight and if I can fill the kiln, then I will fire it off tonight as well. That should not be an issue as I always have stuff kicking around that has been glazed, but not fired, and then there is that whack of stuff that needs to be re fired from the last time a kiln element blew.


So, that will be my evening. I don’t want to have to unload a kiln of mugs the same day that they are picking them up. That would be too nerve wracking.

We are having our 2nd semi annual studio clean up day next Wednesday. We have been in the space for 3 years, and have had difficulties cleaning and maintaining it. Because it is a privately owned recreational studio, with all different kinds of people, cleanliness can be an issue. Some people don’t feel that they should have to clean up things like wedging tables, plaster tables, the floor around their wheel etc as they pay to come here to get away from cleaning at home. They feel it is the ownerships responsibility. Others are just plain forgetful, and others are just lazy (I probably fall in that category to some degree)

One person can not maintain the space on their own. The floors are unsealed concrete and they do not clean up well. If this was a city run operation, then there would be a budget for cleaners etc. The bonus for coming in to clean the studio is that we will all be going out to the Dog & Duck for a wind up party for the Water Valley Celtic Music Festival. There will be some of the musicians from the festival in attendance and I am sure the music will be great, as usual.

In the discussion surrounding this clean up / wind up “party”, Dave, our fearless leader, was regaling stories from our trip to Ireland to anyone that would listen. Apparently I am an alcoholic, at least in his version of events (which get distorted with every telling). Yes, I was seen taste testing various scotches, bourbons & Irish whiskeys at the Middleton Distillery near Cork (they used to make Jameson’s there) and was a bit flushed in some of the post distillery pictures. You can’t visit and not do that. I learned several things that day. I learned why I don’t like scotch, and why I actually do like Irish whiskey best. I do not like the taste of burnt dirt (aka smoky peat). I also like it because it is triple distilled, unlike bourbon (aka corn whiskey) which is traditionally only distilled once.

Yes, I was also seen lifting a pint or 2 of Murphy’s Stout and Guinness on occasion. But to hear Dave tell it, I was sloshing everywhere we went. BTW, I like Murphy’s better than Guinness, but I don’t believe you can get it here in Canada, at least not this far west, but then I have not looked that hard either. I have to say, that with the amount of food we ate, and most of it being in the form of soda bread, spotted dick, more bread, breaded fish, chips, potatoes etc… it’s a wonder anyone can get drunk in Ireland. When we were at Marcus’s for the salt firing and other pottery related demos etc, we started our day with oatmeal, at 10:00 we stopped for a tea break that usually included scones, spotted dick, other assorted bready items etc. Then there was lunch, and the 2:00 tea break and then dinner at about 6. By then, I had consumed my carbohydrate allotment for the year. I should mention that just before we went on this wee adventure, I had been on the Atkins Diet which contains absolutely no refined or processed carbs of any kind. I fell off that carb wagon very fast. It didn’t hurt much as bread is soft and apparently I was drunk anyway.

A Potters Nightmare / Girl Interrupted

Sunday/Monday

As I mentioned in one of my last posts, I am in a bit of a time crunch to get some mugs finished that I have been commissioned to create. I backfilled all the handles on Friday and left them loosely covered over night until I could get back to them on Saturday after work. I left them uncovered in the sun on Saturday afternoon for about an hour and then put them uncovered on the plaster to hopefully wick out more moisture. On Sunday, I got to the studio bright and early (9am) & put the mugs outside to dry again for several hours. If a non potter were watching me, they probably wondered what the heck I was doing. Every half hour or so I would wander outside, pick a mug up and press the base of the mug against my cheek, shake my head and put it back down. This is the only method I know of to tell if there is any moisture left in the clay. If it is cold, it is probably still wet & my cheek is the body part I rely on to gague the level of dampness. I nervously began loading the bisque kiln at bout 2:00 and set it for a 2 hour delay and a 2 hour preheat, so it wouldn’t start until 4:00. I went home and that night I sweated bullets in my sleep worrying about the mugs. Could they have been a little too damp? Will the handles and bottoms get blown out by the moisture being boiled out too vigorously? All the worrying was for naught. I checked them on Monday, and all was well, now I am a couple days ahead of schedule. I was originally going to wait until Tuesday to fire the bisque, but now I can glaze instead and take my time to get that part right instead of rushing through it and then I can load on Friday night and unload Sunday. Even thought these are very simple mugs, I am really happy with how they have turned out so far. The handles are perfect (in my opinion). They are not too big, and not too small, they are juuust right. I also had a few shellacked pots in there that have the layer of coloured terra sig slip. I am eager to see how these come out in the glaze, especially since the process is rather time consuming. I want to know that going cross eyed from all the dots and squiggles was worth it. I am not 100% sure how they will end up glazed, but probably in the translucent Amber as I love the way it reacts with the rutile in the sig).

Tuesday
I taught my Tuesday class last night and the kiln was on from a firing that one of the other instructors had loaded and fired. It should have been done a long time before that. About a half hour into the class, the computer on the kiln started beeping indicating that it was not heating fast enough, and it shut off at 2140 F when it was trying to reach 2175 F. I have a sneaking suspicion that this load only reached cone 4. So that means that my load of mugs etc will not be fired in that kiln this weekend as I had planned. Now I will be madly glazing on Friday night in order to pack it all up and take it to Ceramics Canada on Saturday to load in their kiln. I got the feet waxed on the mugs and a few other pieces, so I’m a little bit ahead.

Dodging Murphy's curve ball

It might just work out in the end, but its gonna be tight (just like OJ's glove). The kiln is getting a new element today (fingers crossed) and then my stuff will be re-fired tonight. So Friday I will be unloading that kiln, then pricing and cataloguing everything else. it's gonna be a long Friday night.


I must say that even though everything was just a tad bit under fired, the glazes looked OK. I still want to refire though, the feet felt a little dry and the glazes were not 100%. The gloss liner glaze was satin, the translucent brown had a purple/bluish haze with little depth, the black and rutile slip on my bas relief stuff did not develop as nicely as it has in the past (begins to react with the glaze and forms a milky opalescence where the glaze pools) and again, the F96 brown clay was still quite orange. I always worry with a refire that the glazes will run off the pots and stick to the shelf. They had already started to flow the first time round, and now will be subjected to a full firing again. Luckily, most of my feet are quite substantial. I love a nice fat foot. However, I have several tall jars and vases that have flat bottoms and the glaze stops quite close to the bottom. Everything should be ok, but you never know.

So, if all goes well, I will have everything priced and packed on Friday night. If I don’t sell anything, then on Sunday I will be posting a whole bunch of stuff on Etsy, so look out...

Long Weekend Shennanigans...

This past weekend was the Victoria Day long weekend. I spent Friday night and all day Saturday at the studio, as well as a split shift on Sunday (sounds a bit sweat shopish). I was at the studio from 9:30am to 1pm madly glazing, then I went open housing with a friend of mine who is thinking of buying a condo. Her rent will be going up and other life situations have brought this to a head and now she is thinking of moving, so I went to a new condo project with her and then we drove around for a bit looking and then stopped for beer and food and then I was back to the studio at 4:30 and glazed and loaded the kiln until 9:30pm. I wouldn’t normally spend so long on the glazing at one time, but I was hoping to get one more load out of the kiln before the Mad Potters sale on Saturday. I took Monday off. I slept in for the first time in a really long time, got up, didn’t shower, barely got dressed. Dealt with the ribs that were defrosting in the fridge (I cooked them up and had a mid afternoon dinner out of them). The air outside my condo was heavy with the scent of the lilac in the front yard that is just starting to blossom, and the small tree outside my patio that I don’t know the name of, but it must be a cherry of some type. The pink/white blossoms are all out and I am sure some of what I smell outside is from that.


I did not think about the pots in the kiln at all on Monday, I just vegged out. I got an e-mail this morning addressed to all studio members and the title was Kiln Stuff. Hmmm. I read on and it looks like one of the elements went again. As this is not my kiln, I can’t really comment on how it is maintained, but when the elements start to go, it would probably behoove you to change them all out at the same time. Not so here. In an attempt to not have to buy all the new elements at once, they are being replaced as they die, which has been about 1-2 firings in between every replacement. I think so far 3 of the 6 elements have been replaced, so this would now be the 4th that needs changing.

This is of course interfering with getting ready for the sale. I had a few things in this firing that I really wanted to put out on Saturday. Maybe it will get fixed today and then no worries, but then again, maybe it will get fixed on Thursday, which would mean very hot pots on Friday. I will be in the studio tonight to teach so I can take stock of the situation and find out if it might be fixed in time for a refire on Wednesday. I had a lot of my bas relief shellacked pots in there. Approximately 14 teabowls, a tall jar with wire doodads on the lid, a test piece for Dave using some Alberta slip, a couple of large platters and other random tall stuff. I had a few glaze combos in there that I was anxious to see as well. Oh well, just another case of Murphy rearing his ugly head again.

I won't be taking these pots to CC to refire, just not enough time. I have a lot of stuff for the sale, that is not the issue, I just wanted some of these pots too.