But wait - There's more!

This is actually a pretty small amount of pottery from one class but I had to miss two weeks of it and I'm not sad about them. 

I love the stuff I made in my Wheel 2 class. 

I do want to plug the MSCR pottery classes to anyone in Madison WI. 

I learned so much! 

As I mentioned in an earlier post, my awesome teacher helped me with bowls. My challenge has always been that they collapse. She gave me some pointers and I made some bowls that worked! 

This is the biggin'. Isn't it pretty? 

Drip drip. Great glaze. I don't know from glaze but I feel like this one is dreamy.

 I made three little-ish bowls to practice the curve and I dig them, deeply. I had lots of fun glazing them too.

These innards...they show my rookie status and I'm totally comfortable with that. 

I, for sure, used too much glaze but I think they wear it well. Luckily they didn't drip all over the kiln shelf.

I practiced the curve on these vases. I love making lil bud vases. 

And again, my magnum opus. Because you should look at it again. You GET to look at it again. 

Hi pretty.

Rotund

I knew when I took this pot off of the wheel that it was the best thing I'd ever made. It's so balanced and rotund and I love the proportions.

So, after I took the picture, I cropped the rest out so I could just look at it and vibe.

As far as pots go, it's a little one. This would be really impressive if it was BIG. But, I'm easily impressed, so it's fine with me.

I love the glaze, which is a fake ash glaze. Please don't ask me to elaborate. 

I can't. 

It looks like avocado skin.

The inside is a lovely blue but the neck is so skinny that you can't see much of what's going on in there.

All that's left is adding a flower. 

I will soon and I'll post that to IG: @jenniferdyes...on the off chance that you didn't come here from there.

 

Silly whistling bird wearing a hat

It's a teapot in the making!

It's a silly one, I know. I made a closed form and then added a cylinder. 

Those are just some techniques I wanted to try after seeing a very sophisticated teapot on Pinterest that looked (to my rookie eyes) like it was made that way. 

My instructor thinks it was hand built and I believe her. That teapot was the inspiration for me to try these techniques out, I wasn't really trying to re-make it.

 

No surprise that in my hands, the attempt at a beautiful, organic inspiration turned into a silly whistling bird wearing a hat. Maybe the ash glaze will make it more elegant.

Time will tell. I keep checking my email to see when the glaze fire will be finished. I'm trying to be patient but that's not my strong suit. 

Will keep you posted!

EDITED TO ADD THE FINISHED TEAPOT:

Yes, Of Course

 Landscape entitled: Office Trio

I love these three goblets. I hand built them and used underglaze to make them pretty. 

Yes, of course they are blue and white. 

After auditioning them in as wine goblets, I decided that they belong in my office instead. 

They hold (in order from left to right) paper clips, stickers, and push pins.

Yes, of course if you visit me at my cubical I will offer you a sticker. 

And yes, of course I am going to make more and this time I'll make at least one that is big enough to hold a decent pour.

Understanding the Curve

I just finished a Wheel 2 class at the Madison School and Community Recreation (MSCR). 

I left my pots glazed and awaiting firing.

The teacher was really talented. I think I finally got the hang of bowls. We'll see when I try it by myself. Once I started feeling like I was understanding the curve, I tried it on some vases.

I love making these bottle/vase shapes but they often collapse at the shoulder when I'm throwing them. 

But hurray! The tips she shared with me worked for making a happy, rounded shoulder as well as a happy. rounded bowl. 

 

I isolated this one from the photo because I love it sooooooo much. 

When I took it off the wheel, it was glowing and I felt music playing. 

I've never had the experience of achieving proportional harmony before. 

I want to hug it! 

I glazed it with an ash glaze and I hope it was the right choice. 

I'll let you know.

Having feelings

 

I have some feelings about these cups. 

• I feel annoyed by the glaze. It's not what I wanted. I was trying some things and none of them worked.
• I feel thrilled with the way they feel in my hand. They are light and comfy and the shape is really lovely.
• I feel grumpy about the handles. I succumbed to peer pressure and tried to pull handles. It's not my normal handle and the fact that I never pull handles really, really shows. 
• I feel like making more of these. As much as I'm dissatisfied by the way they look, I'm learning things about where I want to take this shape next.
• I feel weird about bullet pointing my feelings but here we are.

Moving on to the things I just got from a wood fire kiln I was allowed to put a few pieces into.

Here's my drama queen:

I love it so much! The texture, the toastiness of the raw clay, the little dots in the glaze.

Just YUM! 

I put the wadding on the side which warped the heck out of it. But that's cool. What's not cool is that it leaks! Just a little bit but that's all it takes. Such a drama queen!

This one leaks too. That's fine with me. I expected it to leak. I made it on a balloon, which was kind of precarious. The glaze bubbled up in a weird way inside. I would prefer the outside looked like this EXCEPT for the fact that the outside looks like this:

Which is lovely and varied and organic. So lovely. I used shino glaze on all the pieces and regret nothing.

This one is fine. It's fine. Whatever. It's what it is. I do love the raw clay and I really enjoy making the messy overlapping wee slabs of clay. It feels like patchwork and I do love me some patchwork. It's an odd shape - I used the bottom of a quart mason jar. I've done it before and honestly, I like the other one way more. I'll share a picture another day. That one is being used as a planter in my office cubical. This one doesn't know what it is.

These know what they are. They are mugs. They are magnificent. They are so gorgeous that the camera can't catch how delightfully metallic the glaze looks. I only lined it and used a titch of glaze around the rim. The rest is all from the wood fire.

Here's the whole wood fire gang. They are buddies...I assume. 

They haven't said otherwise.

Too Many Teapots?

No such thing! 

I really enjoyed my Teapot Class that I took at the Midwest Clay Project in Madison WI and I learned a ton!

This was my first attempt. The body warped slightly so the lid is not a great fit and the pot weighs a ton! Otherwise, pretty perfect. I love the kooky looking spout, she's generous! The glaze really classes it up. 

As I made this, I pictured her as a flawed but perfect grandma: She's big and soft, wears floral house dresses and slippers during the day and smells like cigarettes, but she lets you watch Cartoon Network all day and she always has those individual cups of vanilla fudge ripple ice cream that come with little wooden spoons that she bought just for you and you just know she loves you fiercely so she's all good. 

(PS - neither of my grandmother were like this, I think they'd want you to know that).

Don't tell the others, but I think this one is my favorite. The lid doesn't fit well but I LOVE the glazes and I think it's a stylish pot. Although I don't have a story for this one...sorry. My brain tends to come up with stories when I'm doing something with my hands but it can't be counted on.

Here's pot three.  Do you recognize her? It's Mrs. Potts. from Beauty and the Beast! That is, it's Mrs. Potts if you haven't looked at a picture of her in decades. I just realized that when I went looking for a link for reference. I didn't make her on purpose, it just happened (I think it's the hat, er, lid) so I glazed her in pink. I actually don't really like the way the glaze worked, it's kinda whiter where it's thin. I wanted a more solid pink, like how you know who looks in my imagination.

 

I made this one just to try out this ginger jar lid. It's...fine. I like the glaze but I made it look weird around the opening. I'm not going to show you, you'll just have to take my word for it.

This is the last one. Don't you love it? You love it! I love it! 

It's a rat-ephant in a beret!

The story: He's always wanted to go to France; he never has but pretends that he has. It's OBVIOUS but no one ever calls him on it. He's a little insecure and quite vulnerable, you can't help but feel for him.

But so frickin' cute! I used extra spouts that I made just on case for his front legs. I was originally going to give him a regular tea pot foot but once I put those ears on him, he came to life.

This was my inspiration, believe it or not. He took a turn.

One last piece of trivia, which I didn't know. When you made the spouts, they look straight but they have been spun around a lot on the wheel. But after being fired, they can kind of warp in one direction. People with more wheel experience can probably correct for that (I assume). I think it's fun. Some of my spout's issues may be that I put them on a little cockeyed-ly but they look a little like their noses are out of joint.

I learned so much and I will have more pots to share very soon!

Because there's not such things as too many teapots.

More Mugs!

Holy Cats - I love making mugs!

And I'm crazy about this turquoise glaze and the way the naked clay looks on these!

The black lining will hide the coffee stains better. I don't remember what I did to get the brown on there. I never take notes but I do dig it.

 

 Last night I stirred up some old indigo vats just to see if they would wake up. 

They had been sitting, I kid you not, for at least a year. 

This is the second iron vat that I've made, let sit for a few days and then gotten no color from. But then, after waiting a year (!), I've found the blue. I don't think this is typical for an iron vat.  

I'm glad I didn't give up on it. 

This is after just a short - less than a minute - dip. Really good color!

This is from the henna vat, not heated up, just stirred. I really love indigo dye. I've been playing with some other dyes too but I think I'll always come back to indigo.

I've been making lots of pottery lately. I recently joined in the @mscrmadison wood fire. I love the way the raw clay got toasted. I’m looking forward to my next chance to experiment. I’d like to change up how I glaze stuff for a wood fire. I think I'll use the glaze more as a liner. I also want to brush something with soda ash water to see what that does. I’ll also make bigger things. I’m sure there's more I can focus on. It’s such a treat to learn new techniques.🔥 

This is my favorite glaze. It's the drippiest and I like the organic-ness of it. 

I think it looks the most like rock.

I do really like how the toastiness looks on the textured surface of the clay, 

but I'm not nuts about the glazed bit.

Awesome one! Great color and toastiness. 

I took it to work to hold my tea strainer, it's the perfect size.

Some butts.

Wadding on the sides for these. I really like the dots they leave

Wadding dots seem wasted on the bottom.

Three wood fired mugs and one mug butt (last photo below). I was surprised at how much these mugs shrank but I love them so much. They are heavily featured in our coffee and tea rotation.