Hap, Hap, Happy Girl on Joya Court

Day; 92. Sunny, warm, beautiful. Temperature on outside kiln; 65 degrees.
Firings; Just unloading the last image transfer kiln for the Contemporary Clay Fair.

Writing this blog, doing the dishes, laundry, anything at all to keep me from opening the kiln too soon and cracking all the hard-won pieces that are in there. Still a little hot to the touch so I am giving them all another 30 minutes...

Teaching/meeting with student Kris again this morning and reviewing handles and how to make and attach, I think these pieces look pretty good!...

(Back in 5 minutes, I know I said 30 minutes but I want to see what's in the kiln, damn it..)

Okay, unloaded everything and I am a hap, hap, happy girl. Really some beautiful stuff in there. I wish I could keep some it for myself. Someday  I will begin to do that..! Here are my 3 faves for the show;

Very tempted to keep the two noodle bowls, really love them, oh well, I can always make more, but then I never do?! Feeling relieved and proud of the work, especially as it was touch and go 2 days ago. Now to sand all the pretty bare bottoms so they feel like a baby's you know what and then price and pack. Off to new homes go my challenging children in clay.....

Minor Technical Difficulties...

Day; 91. Sunny, warm, spring-like. Temperature on outside kiln; 63
Firings; unloaded glaze kiln after 16 hour firing and 20 hour cooling. Loaded  image transfer in small kiln at 5pm. 8 hour to temperature, will unload in the morning.

Finally unloaded work from the epic 16 hour glaze firing of yesterday! Mostly the results were as expected; the glazes look really good after being very slow fired and held at temperature for so long, more melty and integrated with surface. However,  I was worried about some of them flowing off the pots and onto the kiln shelf and sure enough I had 3 pieces, all the same cornwall stone glaze, firmly glazed onto the surface of the shelves....

This is what happens when you melt glass for several hours at 2,000 degrees F, a puddle of feldspar and silica fusing this poor little bowl and the shelf it was sitting on. Ah well, I was lucky this was the only piece I could not chisel off the shelf and grind smooth. The other two cups I think are going to survive. Good thing I just happened to use this particular glaze sparingly in this  firing. After unloading I inspected the kiln's electrical elements and found one near the bottom which was broken in half, so a large portion of the kiln was entirely cold, it is a wonder I reached Cone 6 temperature at all. Atests to the efficiency and good insulation of these Scutts kilns. I am also very lucky I happen to have two! I can finish the show in the other one while I purchase the necessary repair parts and install them. Saved by the skin of my teeth again!!

Glaze-a-thon

Day; 85. Incredibly windy. Reminds me of the winters I spent on top of Hurricane Hill up against the Continental Divide...Temperature on outside kiln; 52 degrees.

My knees hurt, my shoulders hurt, my wrists hurt.... 8 hours standing on concrete glazing, brief hour out to Galisteo and back to run with the dogs....But Big Mama is locked and loaded and ready to go...

Unfortunately had to load in a wind storm and got it almost completely stacked and had to redo the entire load due to leaves, dirt, dust, having settled on all the pieces. I carefully unstacked everything blew them off and re-stacked it. It wouldn't do to have desert detritus fired onto the surfaces of all my new plates... arggg. But I got it done and took a quick pic of Kodiak The Kiln God overseeing it all.. 3 Hail Mary's and we are off and running at about 5pm on Thursday. About 7 hours to cone 6 temperature ( 2210F) and another 18 hours to cool. I will unload very early Saturday morning. Another Contemporary Clay Fair begins to take shape....

Just in the Nick of Time

Day; 53. mix of clouds and sun, but very spring-like. Temperature on outside kiln; 52
Firings; unloaded 1st image transfer firing, loaded up the 2nd and last transfer firing at 4pm.

Last firing for the Spring Show in the Duke City is under way!! Whew, that was a close one. Ah, who am I kidding all my show firings are close and down to the wire! Some sanding and pricing to do, but all my little lovlies are going here.... on Thursday;





I am really pleased with the results, the best of the bunch in my opinion looks like this;

  I am really loving the white background. This is a new design and I think it sets off the images really well. I just sort of paint the other colors on top of the white and it seems to work.

Today is my boy Oso's very, very first birthday and he went from this last May.....

To this on his first Birthday March 9th......

                                                            Happy Birthday my darling boy!!!