Accents painted & done! These mugs will be bisqued & then soda-fired. So they will not get any glaze on the exterior except for a little tenmoku in each stamped impression. The raw clay & colored flashing slips will transform in the kiln due to the firing process creating a nice “glazed” shine & flashing effects. Each one totally different based on where the flames hit it during the soda firing.

Just painting some details with colored flashing slips today. These areas will change colors in an upcoming soda firing kiln. These two should have accents of orange when this slip reacts to the soda atmosphere. Fingers crossed…

Was it just me who was completely surprised by the winter wonderland this morning?! I had no idea we were going to get snow… which was beautiful. The icy roads with absolutely no salt trucks?… not so much.

So tonight during class, I trimmed my demo mugs & put them back under plastic while I did my handle-pulling demo. As I was getting ready for the attachment demo… someone (me) “might have” knocked over my bag of clay & it landed on one of my trimmed cylinders! Great demo, huh?!!! Actually it was good for them to see… things happen… it’s just clay!!!

I was going to call it quits and reclaim it. But thanks to Andrew’s encouragement, I “resurrected it” with a little ball of clay to keep it sitting level. Not ideal… but it might be funny… or it might lead us to something new?! So it has a handle now… it survived class… for now anyways ?!

Tonight was “Mug Night” with my beginning wheel class. First they learned how to trim their cylinders from last week. Then the pulled handles the traditional way. We let them set-up a bit & then they attached their handles… thus creating their first mugs of the session!!!

Pretty impressive for only their second class of the session!!!

Handles attached… we now “officially” have mugs!!!

I’m a firm believer that by definition a “mug” needs a handle!
While some of my students might try to convince me otherwise… I’m not buyin’ it!!!

Another day pulling handles & making mugs!!!
My favorite thing to make… MUGS!

After a long rainy spell, it was nice to have a dry morning with a beautifully clouded sunrise. Great colors moving across the sky… as the clouds continued to move in. And it looks like it may just turn into another gray day.

More fortune cookies have been FOUND!!!
It was another great day for hiking & searching…

According to Nicole who shared these photos : “I was looking forward to this hunt all 2025, counting down the days to the New Year. Thank you for doing this, your work is absolutely beautiful. This year was just my husband and I, we really enjoyed the hunt. Here are our treasures & nature shots… the snow was magical today.”

And for now they’re all going back under plastic so they can dry slightly to leatherhard clay. Then it’s trimming & adding of handles… and soon enough, these will become mugs!!!