Four More Tall Vases

Today was a really beautiful sunny day.  So, I decided that it was a great day to make extra large vases. Each piece takes two thrown pieces put together.  A sunny day is neccesary so that by the time I have thrown the eight pieces, the first set is ready to be attached together.  I sold the two vases that I had in my dining room to the Seaworthy Gallery in Hattaras, NC.  Two of these pieces will go in my dining room and hopefully at least one will be good enough to enter in the juried competition at Mint Hill Arts in June.  The piece on the far right was fun.  Hopefully others enjoy it as much as I do.

Wednesday I worked at Ruby's Gift in NoDa.  The owner has moved my pieces to a new shelving unit.  It's nice because the shelves are farther apart, allowing room for large platters & bowls.  I removed some pieces that had been there awhile and brought in some new.  The dragonfly design is new to the store.  

My first show of the spring season is coming up in a month.  The NC Pottery Festival will be April 15-17 in Greensboro.  After that I have 3 more shows at 2-3 week intervals until June. In the next week I will just be stocking up on regular items, then I will finish up glazing for the first show.

Dinner Plates

Very excited to finally get my own dinner plates.  I have been saying for about 2 years now that I wanted to make myself a set, but it seemed like there was always something more urgent to be made.  Even after throwing these about a month ago, I debated on how to glaze them and finally went with this glaze because it goes with my current kitchen and dining room.  I have a canister set, utensil holder, appetizer plates and cereal bowls already in this glaze. The pattern on each plate is different. There were 11 thrown and 2 are still waiting to be glaze fired.  I wanted at least 8 to turn out and was pleasantly surprised to have all 11 turn out.  That never happens to me.  Usually a few warp or the glaze has problems.

Today I made some mugs.  I always get asked at shows if I have mugs and my usual answer is no.  This is mostly because I do not drink coffee or tea and I just do no feel any joy at making them.  But, I decided that it was time for the challenge and to see if I could make mugs I am happy with.  Time will tell.  I also tried a basket pattern made with a lemon zester, that I saw on John Baumans blog recently.  I look forward to trying this on other pieces.

New Style Vases

Last week I made these two vases.  They are very different from my usual style.  Today I made some soap dishes.  I unloaded the glaze load from yesterday  and reloaded with a bisque load.  Tomorrow I have to pack some pieces up for shipping.  Later this week I would like to try some large vases, like the ones done at the Potters Conference. 

NC Potters Conference 2011

This weekend I attended the NC Potters Conference.  The topic was about Porcelain from Jingdezhen, China.  Each potter has a specialty (throwing, trimming, decorating, etc.)  The average pieces are very large.  I will have to try a few of the shapes seen this week, perhaps even making a large vase.

I went down to the conference with 3 others from my guild.  One of our group was able to design a pot for the thrower to make (left).  We all helped come up with the design and Verna was able to have the piece afterwards.  He threw about 6 pots that were designed and did an amazing job of quickly making the designs to scale.

The underglazer was amazing and painted beautifully.  The plate (right) was one of his pieces.  I came home with the yellow vase.

Casserole Dish

Yesterday everything I made had many steps. I haven't made oval casserole dishes in a while and thought that I would try again. I did some square cutouts for designs on the sides and handles, which was fun. I also made some vases, bowls and candy dishes. Today I made brie bakers, which is fast & easy.

To me nothing is more stressfull than packing up a shipment.  Today I packed up the order for the Seaworthy Gallery.  It all packed up "seamingly" nicely in 4 boxes.  I really hope that there was enough bubble wrap used (2 rolls).  I need to finish typing up the packing lists and take to the post office later.

Circle Bowl

Oh alright, I'll go.  I'm going to the NC Potters Conference after all.  A really nice lady from my guild can't go, so I am going in her place.  Masters of Jingdezhen Porcelain is the topic and I was not sure how much I could use in my own pottery making.  I have decided to go there and just have a purely educational experience.

Yesterday I made this bowl and I like how the cutouts look.  It will make a good candy dish or potpourri dish.  I would like to make one that is large for a centerpiece on a coffee table.

Teapot & Vase

This week I have been trying to make more fun pieces, so I made this teapot and vase today.  The teapot is similar to the red one shown alone the right hand sidebar.  Hopefully it comes out ok.  The last two had a twisted handle that would separate from the pot during the glaze fire.

Today I sent out the application for the NC Pottery Festival in Greensboro in April.

Sand Dunes

Today I unloaded a glaze load.  The piece to the left is a piece I threw months ago but couldn't figure out what to do as far as glazing.  I ended up placing a blue in the grass etching and the Redwood over it all.  The grass is green.  It looks a little like the dunes at the beach.

The photo below shows the finished order for the Seaworthy Gallery in Hatteras.  She will be picking it up in the next month.  Glad to get all the pieces finished so that I can concentrate on other things.

Yesterday I worked at Ruby's Gift in NoDa.  I brought in some more heart dishes, since there were only a couple left in the basket.  At the end of March I will rotate the merchandise.

Pedestal bowls and Creamers

Yesterday I tried to make some of the pieces that were demontrated at the workshop this past weekend.  The photos above are my attemps and the photos below are theirs.

I struggled with both.  With the pedestal bowl (Neil Patterson) I had trouble with the closed form. Only 2 out of 4 attemps made it.  With the creamer (Sandi Pierantozzi) everything seemed wrong. I have some thoughts on how I could incororate the darts into another version.  There are a few other things I want to try, but it will have to wait until later in the week. 

Today I will be glazing.  The order for the Seaworthy Gallery has a few more pieces, so I thought that I better get them finished.  Then on Wednesday I gallery sit at Ruby's Gift in NoDa.