A week of new.

Well it has definitely been a week full of new things. To start things of I found out earlier in the week that I had a credit with the local pottery supply. I had taken a bag of clay back a while ago because it was contaminated by ??? dry crud ???. They had immediately made it right, but apparently the gentleman who owns the clay company told them to refund the whole order. It wasn't much, a hundred pounds, but it was enough so that when I went down to pick up a bag of ball clay so that I could make up slip and they told me I decided that I should get clay for throwing as well.

So I am trying out a new clay. It is from the Laguna Clay Company, and it is VERY red. It is their SB red, and to be honest I was a little surprised at how bright this stuff is. It is a beautiful red/orange color that is really really staining. Seriously, my hands look like they have been using that diy bottle tanning and it doesn't wash out.

I of course had to test it out on the wheel so that I could get a feel for it. I am not sure about it yet, it is grittier than I am used to. And it is stiff, really stiff. I can't throw with it right out of the package, and even after wedging if it sits for more than 5 minutes before I use it, it is stiff again.

So I made some covered jars to test it out. That is the old clay on the right so that I could have a comparison.

I do like the color when its wet though. I know that it probably won't fire to that color but it is nice.

Especially with fresh slip on it.

I really like it with fresh slip.

The other new thing this week and the one that I am really excited about is...

I got a new (to me) kick wheel off of craigslist. It is a Brent model J which retails for about $1500 new. I got it for right around 1/5th that price. It is older and it doesn't have a splash pan but it still in really good shape. Of course I am going to build a splash pan for it, I think something like the ones on the leach treadle wheels but... there was no way that I could wait for that before I threw on it.

I forgot how much I enjoyed throwing on a kick wheel. It is definitely a more.... natural/comfortable/grounded/??? pick one, feeling. Plus it definitely will allow me to throw bigger than my old wheel would. I am not giving up my little tiger wheel however, still going to do my trimming on it.

Also I did get a bisque firing done this week. I didn't manage to get pics of any part of the process but I did get the big vases in there so at least they are not in danger of getting broken easily. Wednesday was forecast to be in the 50s so I decided to load and start the kiln Tuesday night so that most of the cooling sould be done during the day on Wed. I started the kiln on Tuesday night at 11:30 and had planned on being up all night with it so that it was finished around 8 in the morning or so. Well things never go as planned and it ended up taking 13.5 hours to finish out. I think the largest portion of the problem was in the packing. With the tall vases in the kiln there was really no room for anything else so it was fairly loose. I also couldn't put any shelves in there so the heat use wasn't very efficient even after I dampered it down to about an inch. But like I said, they are out of danger and since at least one of them was for an order I do feel better about that. I had originally planned to fire the glaze firing on Friday since it was going to be in the high 60s but they started forecasting high winds for Friday, and the rain didn't actually stop until after midnight so I couldn't get the glazing done before then, coupled to the fact that the kiln took so long to reach temp and would likely have started cooling during the cold part of the night I decided to not take the chance on loosing any of the pieces to rapid cooling. I feel like I made the responsible decision, and perhaps even the right one, but it is still eating at me a bit as well.