WELL, now, Weebly went and changed the format for doing things!  What a revolting development!  Back to the learning curve anyway.

SO, where was I (mentally) before getting so rudely interrupted...

Ah yes.  Did the local 'Artist's Studio Tour' last Saturday, sold one piece, possibly got a few people to come join the Mudslingers, but otherwise a day hanging out making pots in someone else's garage!  Ah well, got a bunch done, so no worries there!   I've been selling pretty well on Etsy, so that helps.  Weather has changed and its definitely getting to be fall, so of course the outdoor painting jobs are ... not.  Oh well!

This little pot (its about 4 inches across) is up on Etsy now, click on the picture to follow the link and see more photos.  I was playing with glazes again, this one is a layer or two of milk and honey with ancient jasper over, and it came out pretty cool, I think.    

This is a custom ordered bonsai pot, made with a very nice grayish stoneware clay that I don't normally use.  Why?  Because the clay affects the color of some glazes in a rather surprising way!  This clay has a fair amount of manganese in it, which gives it the grayish cast, and it has done some strange things!  This is the clay that turns one of my favorite turquoise blue glazes into a sort of charcoal gray.   The first pot that happened on almost got smashed, it was so far from what I was thinking it would be.  Instead I set it aside and when I came back to it later I decided it really wasn't bad and to go ahead and list it anyway.   Its getting a lot of attention, but still hasn't found the right home.  It will some day I'm sure!

The customer for this pot is thinking of a cream white glaze, and I've been doing samplers (aka kusamonos, since I can sell them pretty easily!)  of what some of the glazes I have will turn out on this clay.  The pot is about 11 inches long by 8 inches wide and almost 3 inches deep.  The clay is still wet in the photo here, but thats pretty close to the color it will be fired without glaze.

So, now, for the variations!  

This glaze was the one I was hoping would come out closest to what the customer sent as an example, but...  The clay gave it a bit more pink than I was expecting, so instead of being a cream white with areas of tan, its more peach!  A nice color, really, but not what I was thinking of!  Click to see the Etsy listing, you can see the color best there!

This is the one that actually fired up the closest to what the customer sent, its a glaze I've only used a couple times but its nice!  It fires up a slightly warm white, its got some interesting surface variations without being too distinctive, and its a nice satin finish.  All of which make it nice for bonsai!  I'm going to have to use it more, thats for sure!  I'll link it to the Etsy listing when I get the listing up!

This one was sort of just to round out the bunch, I wasn't sure what it would come out looking like but I figured it was probably NOT going to be quite right.  This one is a nice satin finish, semi-transparent, but a cooler color.  I've used this one with other glazes as a bit of 'frosting' and with copper carbonate for some really fun greens, so I'll just have to put it back in the cabinet for a different project.  

This one is a bit bigger than most of the recent ones I've been listing, and OHHHhh this glaze is fun!  Its a new one that is a reactive blue/black with some crystals in it that melt and form the tan and green streaks when they melt!  Its very glossy, which isn't my favorite at the moment, but the colors are soooo worth it.  The only real drawback is because the crystals don't melt and seal completely the glaze isn't rated as 'food safe'.  At least I think thats why its not food safe, its 'non toxic' I think! *shrug*  Oh well, its still nice!

This is one of the little red clay kusamonos, its about 3 inches (75 mm) on the longest axis, and 2 1/2 inches (60 mm) on the narrow axis, and stands 1 5/8 inches (41 mm) at the tallest point.  Another click to go to the Etsy page!

A new orchid pot.... this one has 'copper patina' glaze, which is a lot of fun!  (click the photo to go to the Etsy listing)  This one is 4 1/2 inches (115 mm) across and 5 inches (125 mm) tall.

Well, here's MOST of the load anyway!  I forgot when I was setting this up that there are a bunch of little red kusamonos with just the iron oxide on them!  A good half dozen little ones and a couple 'bark curls' like the ones in this pic.  These are all the ones with glaze.  The three large orchid pots in the back are custom orders, and the big slab bonsai tray in the center is a custom.  There's a few more pots to go with the slab, but tracking down boxes for the orchid pots is tomorrows project!  

A few new glazes in this mess, the blue scoopy sitting on the slab is a new color I'm really liking, then the brown bark curl sitting on the slab is another, but its very close to some we already have so its not too exciting.  Its a nice transparent brown though that looks great over texture though.  The others are variations on things I've already been doing.  

Oh yeah, click the pic for a bigger version!

Oy vey, looooong day today!  Started early with a job interview - got into this nasty habit called 'eating' somewhere in the past... few years ...  and have to figure out something to keep things going while the pottery is taking off.  So far its been odd-jobs and a few hours here and there on top of the pottery, but come rainy season... um, odd-jobs probably will be washed away.  When 'full time with bennies' comes wandering through, then dances the can-can for a while while  you hem n haw, I figure its probably a good idea to take a shot at it anyway.  

So, after the interview, I hauled a bunch of half dry pieces down to the art center and cleaned them up, then started glazing some bisqued stuff.   EIGHT HOURS of glazing and loading the kiln, so its full with kusamonos and pieces of 3 different custom orders.  So, I should have pics of new stuff in a few days!