I WAS RIGHT!

 The firing was perfect! Nearly. There were 4 pieces that were a little dry & will need to be refired but everything else was peachy-tan, with a little grey shading where the soda landed heaviest...so glad I made notes of all the settings! 

I've been kayaking all afternoon & my arms are like fettuccini, so I won't be putting up my photo set up, and these pots are all on their way to various stores this week. I did take a couple a shots this morning...you'll just have to picture a whole kiln coming out like this: 

Thanks for sharing in my joy, my dear readers who have heard me bitch about so much stuff over the years! It's always nice to have good news to report. 

Notes on Today's Firing

 

        

Just getting this info down while it's fresh. This was one of the fastest firings of this kiln yet & i just have a good feeling about it, so in case it turns out amazing I want to record exactly what I did.

Pilots on at 10 pm
Burners proper on at 4 am (then I went back to bed)
Color in the kiln by 7 am when I got up for real
^05 down by 9 am
9 falling up top by 1:30; started spraying soda
Finished soda around 2:15
Kiln off just before 3. 

Burner/blower/damper positions as in this post. Back pressure as seen above, if the video works. It doesn't always. :( 

In other news, I saw my good friend Tim Cichocki today! He dropped by to pick up some pots of mine for the upcoming firing of his groundhog in Norridgewock. That's happening at the end of July. 

Also today: got an email from the state - I've won a small grant to rebuild my art fair display from the ground up. I've repainted & freshened it up a number of times but at a certain point it's just lipstick on a pig. Time to get a fresh new pig. 

 

 

 

New Teaching Studio: Work in Progress

 

I am often asked if I teach classes at my studio. The answer is no, I don't - I'm really not set up for that - but I do teach at Portland Pottery. That's an hour away for folks in Central Maine, so I often direct people to Kennebec Clay Works. Their membership rolls are almost full, though, but now we have a new option! 

Work in Progress in Lisbon opened in May. The owner - my friend & the longtime studio assistant at Portland Pottery - is Teresa Pennington. WiP is offering memberships, one-on-one instruction, and beginning to intermediate classes. There's also a little gallery that sells Teresa's work. 

Check it out next time you're in Lisbon! 

Burning Question

So, a weird thing happened this morning. 
I candled my bisque overnight, but when I came out in the morning to turn on the burners proper, I found flame coming out of the primary air intake of the pilot. I had never seen this before & immediately turned off the gas - that's kinda my go-to move whenever anything unexpected is happening with the propane. I wish I had taken a photo to illustrate this post, but oh well. Probably anyone who would know the answer already knows what the primary air intake looks like.

The only difference I could observe between the pilot that was behaving normally & the one that was doing this unusual thing was the primary air intake was open a little wider on the odd one. That one was also a little harder to light last night. I don't remember opening or closing either of them but who knows? 

I spun the disk to close the intake a little more, so it matched the other, then re-lit the pilots. Nothing unusual happened after an hour, so I went ahead & lit the burners. 

Anybody have any ideas why that happened? I'm not gonna blow myself up, right?

Lego Studio!

My friend Sondra's grandchildren made me this little Lego studio, complete with kiln & wheel & a little Lego potter! Adorable. 

This real potter had an amazing day: 9 hours in the studio. That is so rare for me! Usually the first half or more of the day is taken up with household stuff: cooking, cleaning, errands. Sometimes I don't even get in to the studio until 4 pm. I'm going to try to do this more often - get in early, spend all day - because it really is my happy place. It's really, really hard for me to prioritize creative work over caretaking, but there has to be a balance. 

Although to be fair the world is full of happy places for me. Woods, ponds, my hammock, my big chair by the window, complete with cat(s). 

Anyway, today I threw & trimmed, sliptrailed & pulled handles, ground & washed kiln shelves. . Tomorrow I will throw & trim & sliptrail, & hopefully mix some glazes. It's been so rainy lately that stuff is taking forever to dry but I am hoping to load a bisque on Thursday, fire Friday.