Kilns cooled, unloaded and now I am home, sore, and very very tired

Ok, Here we go. As you could see from my last post, I was away this past weekend firing the salt and soda kilns out at the Shaw Centre at Medalta in the Historic Clay District of Medicine Hat.
We (Me, Lorraine, Kathy, Claire, Keli, & Sumaya and her little guy and husband) left Calgary early Thursday morning, and we arrived at the centre just after noon, and began glazing etc at around 1 ish. I made waaaayyyy too many pots, but I had lots to choose from. We ended up loading just after 6 and then the kilns were turned on low over night to help dry out the wads so they wouldn't freeze and then explode in the firing. Thursday and Friday were the COLDEST to date this year. I believe we got down to -28 over night on Thursday. In fact, when we left the centre, my car's power steering froze and I had to drive to the hotel without any power steering and that is quite a feat when the roads are all rutted with snow and ice, and it's dark and in a city I'm not familiar with.
Friday was firing day, and we were at the centre by 9am turning on the kilns, but as salting would not happen until cone 9 or 10, we had a few hours to kill and Aaron, the artistic director, took us on a tour of the Medalta museum, and some other areas that have not been restored/preserved yet, and some parts that are under construction for the new museum. The Medalta factory had been in operation since the very early 1900's, where they fired beehive kilns and produced functional stoneware items for everyday use, and then began making semi vitreous white ware etc. At 2:30 or so we charged the soda kiln with 2 pounds of soda, and then sprayed 1 pound of soda and then added another 4 or 5 pounds of soda over then next 45 minutes. Salting began around 4 pm in the salt kiln, and I believe we were all done and buttoned up around 5:45.
On Saturday, while the kilns were cooling, we toured the Hicroft factory with Aaron. Hicroft was another pottery in Medicine had that was in operation up into the 80's. The factory is in an as is condition. When it closed down, nothing was moved, or sold off, so all the old machinery is still there, the slip pits still have dried slip in them, there are aprons on the hooks and time cards still by the time clock.

The bag wall on the right hand side of the salt kiln fell over and will need to be rebuilt, but that was expected. I had a pot on that bag wall, so it was pushed against the kiln wall and was blocking one of the salting ports, even though I had to chip it off, it still looks great.

Inside the soda kiln before unloading

Inside the salt kiln before unloading

close up of the ware carts after unloading

Keli and Sumaya's salt pots

My salt pots

Kathy and Lorraine's salt pots

Lorraine and Claire's salt pots

My soda pots

Sumaya and Keli's soda pots

Lorraine and Kathy's soda pots

Close up of the back side of the salt kiln. Very crusty...

The same for the soda kiln, but not quite as bad

interior of the salt kiln

Interior of the soda kiln

To tired to say anything...so here are some pictures

vacuuming shmackuuming....gotta make pots!

TGIF! What  a week. I have been super busy at work, and my personal life, such as it is, has been suffering. Not that I’m complaining, gotta work to pay the bills.  

On a good note, the 2 days I requested at the end of the month were approved, and I can now go to Medalta to fire up the salt & soda kilns. I will be making up a flashing slip, a few stains, a terra sig, and a nice opalescent liner glaze, and a couple of stains to augment what Medalta will already have down there for us to use. I am very excited, and it is only 2 weeks away! I am keeping my fingers crossed that the weather will remain mild. It can snow all it wants on the 28^th, just please stay dry until then.

The Studio had a pot luck a couple of weeks ago, and apparently I was nominated in absentia to provide the entertainment and comic relief. A few people brought their spouses, and many of the attendees were students from nights that I don’t teach so Dave asked me to throw a demo. He then had me do another demo of his choice. The only proviso was that I had to be blindfolded. The sighted pot I threw never made it, I got too cocky and it collapsed after throwing a rather dramatic spiral into it that the thin walls, and rather bulbous form could not support. On to the blind pot...no issues, was able to get a rather well made bowl off (nothing complicated). Just goes to show you, throwing on the wheel has very little to do with the eyes, and a whole lot to do with touch. The food was fantastic too, it always is.

If I can, I will be firing a glaze load or 2 this weekend. I need to get stocked up for the spring. I have a couple of sales this April, and wouldn’t you know it, it is already almost half way through Feb and that means I only have 2 months to make sure I have everything I need, plus keep the galleries stocked up. Tonight I will wash my bisque, wax my feet, and let the pots dry overnight before I get at the glazing (sounds like a very strange spa experience to those that don’t know what I’m talking about)

 

Bloated ... And not from beer

I fired a glaze load on the weekend and I finally got a look at the results on Tuesday. It appears that I have a case of bloating. Most, but not all of the pots look like they have small pox. This has never happened to me before. The only change that I made was to hold at top temp for 15 minutes, and the elements had just been replaced. I will fire again shortly and eliminate the hold and see if that solves the problem. I am not really impressed.