Old dogs, new pots

This is a picture of our dog Ginger, who died this summer. She was a great little trooper. Now she sits up on the shelf with our other three girls, Sidney, Kippy and Maggie. (They were all cremated and they are in little white boxes.) I have been trying to think what type of dog I would like next. My heart longs for a big one, like a grey hound or a Great Dane, but I would like to be able to take it to the studio and not frighten customers, so smaller would probably be better. I have an idea that the big dog longing has to do with always wanting a horse while growing up. Maybe after the fall/holiday rush we can figure it out.

It's officially the start of a new week. I had a couple of really good, productive days at the end of last week and over the weekend. I had a very good firing with brie bakers and some leaf pieces, and a few large, carved vases. So far the new white clay seems to be working pretty well. It has a tendency to some small surface cracks, but I think it must be the nature of a dense, fine particled clay. I did use soft brick under some of the larger pieces to minimize the heat difference between the top of the piece and the bottom, where it was sitting on the hot kiln shelf.

I had a very nice dark brown handbuilt curved front bottle that I am pleased with. The handbuilding process is working well. I have been using these great curved picture frames for the forming of the front and back sections. I would take a picture, but brown/black shiny surfaces just do not photograph very well to show detail.

The kiln is now firing with another load in an effort to get a bit ahead of the shows and get some more work to galleries.

I know that electrical element changes and a bit of brick work are needed soon and I am just holding on to get the last squeeze of juice out of the elements before I have to call in the kiln guy.

Will try to follow with a few shots of the latest stuff.