A glimpse inside the soda kiln after firing with my 3-DAY SODA-FIRING WORKSHOP. A lot of different pots by a lot of different potters. They all had a great time & did a good job loading their kiln… and now they can enjoy the soda-fired “fruits of their labor”!!!

Back to my 3-DAY SODA-FIRING WORKSHOP… and last Wednesday night when the workshoppers got to finally unbrick their first soda kiln! The excitement was palpable as the door came down brick-by-brick. Revealing their work after being transformed by the soda-firing process. So much fun to watch them find their pieces in their very first soda-firing!!!

Sadly, not all of the woven projects survived the THROWDOWN night…
as this one ended up in the swampy bucket of reclaimed clay!

By the end of Thursday night’s class, my LILLSTREET THROWDOWNers had some amazing woven bowls & plates. Some of them were still a bit to wet to pop off of their forms, and some tried too soon… but we all loved the results & they had a great time trying a new process. I think they felt they could do it… especially when I told them that my Summer Campers have done it too. And if the kids can do it… these competitive adults can do it too!!! And they gladly accepted the challenge!!!

This week in our GREAT LILLSTREET THROWDOWN class, they did a little “Time Warp” again… and then started working with their warp & weft. Yes.. it was Weaving Night!!! They were challenged to make a plate, bowl, vase or whatever form they wanted to… but the “majority” of it had to be woven clay. Oddly, I “assumed” this would be a coil rolling challenge… but almost everyone went with sliced slab ribbons?! Most of them had never done weaving before… so it was a fun challenge to watch as they had to do a lot of problem-solving along the way!

Okay, so I’ve been a little busy lately… and somehow missed posting about our LILLSTREET THROWDOWN challenge from last week. They were tasked with building a creamer & sugar set. They could wheelthrow or handbuild it… but a half-hour in, they found out that they needed to incorporate BOTH techniques into their project somehow! And then later, with just a half hour left, all of them racing to finish…. they also found out they needed to make a tray to hold it all together!!! They were all surprised to find out that they could make all of this in just 2-1/2 hours… when normally it would take them days or even weeks!!!

So apparently THIS is what happens when you do a platter demo for your Tuesday night wheelthrowing class… you don’t wire it off the bat… you run it upstairs to your studio to get it out of the way… planning to wrap it in plastic after class… back to more teaching & helping people in class… get busy… get distracted… hoping to remember the platter… but you don’t?!!! A few days later… finding it… and it looks like this!!! HA!!! Who knew?… well, all of us! But it happens… luckily, “it’s just clay”!!!

Another bright & sunny day… made even brighter with another orchid re-blooming today!

Clear skies with just a couple wisps breezing through. Another quiet & warm morning along the lake… still chilly, but not too cold. Feels like Spring might be on its way!!!

Last night my 3-DAY SODA-FIRING WORKSHOPpers finally got to unload their very first soda kiln. Always a great treasure hunt… with this being their very first peek into the kiln! So far, so good… more to come…