While we do get some pottery done in my classes, we do like our sweet treats too! And last night Jen brought a huge bag of “freshly-picked-that-morning” apples to class for all of us! Heirloom & organic from her family’s farm… two varieties… and so many we all left with a bag full! So nice, so yummy… thanks Jen!!! They might just wash down some of the cookies & candies we’ve been eating in class lately! HA!

Last night in class we had some pre-Halloween sweet treats! Yummy mummies from our own “Star Baker” Martin… lemon verbena shortbread complete with his own homegrown lemon verbena!!!

Plus the creamiest-ever peanut-butter buckeyes by Barclay!
A yummy way to kick-off our on-going holiday of Halloween treats!!!

Last night in my pottery class we had some sweet treats again! One of my students made these AMAZING cupcakes as a “test run” for a Halloween Party next week. She was being so hard on herself as she hated how the chocolate ganache & white piping didn’t drag together with a toothpick to form cute spiderweb designs as planned. However… they were full of ooey-gooey chocolatey yumminess! And it didn’t hurt any that there was a hidden marshmallow frosting center inside!!! She hated them so much that she asked me not to mention her name in connection with said cupcakes?! Okay… but her name starts with a P… and rhymes with Riya! HA!!!

Well, it looks like “Birthday Week” may have continued into “Birthday Two-Weeks”?! Tonight in my pottery class, one of my students Laury brought in “belated” birthday sweets… homemade OREO Rice Krispie Treats! While another student Katie found some imported mini-OREOs as a belated gift! Thanks you two… I have the BEST students ever!!!

Here are the same bowls from this week’s class demo on how to make bowls on purpose… and then turn them into “not-so-basic bowls.” We did a bunch of altering & slip painting in class… but then you know I come from the school of MORE IS MORE. So I “may have” done a bit more stamping & detailing in my studio this weekend. Allegedly…

And while we were having a “bowl party” in class last week… it was oddly appropriate that Chris brought “party-size” OREOs to class! Possibly the biggest package of OREOs we’ve ever seen in class!!! … burp.

Once again, my favorite class demo every session for my Beginners & Advance Beginning Wheelthrowers. We start by talking about how to make a “bowl on purpose instead of a cylinder gone bad.” No flat bottoms. No corner edges. No accidental flare-outs. No indented beginner’s ledge. Just nice and smooth ALL the way through the interior of every bowl, every time!

So I made one sample bowl and explained it all as I was throwing the bowl. Once they had all asked their questions, they went back to their wheel to give it a try. Meanwhile, I kept throwing a bunch of bowls. The goal is to have plenty of bowls to “play with” during the second portion of the class…. altering, fidgeting, decorating, making it “theirs” and not just some random round bowl that the wheel kinda made for them!

After awhile, we re-grouped for Part Two of the demo… and we let the fun of playing begin!

Bowl #1 – The original plain bowl… yep, they ALL started kinda like this one.

Bowl #2 – Four Fluted Edges… just a quick pinch & twist with two fingers in four places.

Bowl #3 – And if four fluted edges looks cute… maybe Eight Fluted Edges would look even better?!

Bowl #4 – A flared-out flange…just a smidge over a inch wide. Just bent out over a steady finger on the outside of the bowl at the grooved area.

Bowl #5 – And if a thin flange is nice, maybe a much wider flange would be cooler… kinda like those restaurants when you get this hug impressive bowls with a small scoop of ice cream in the bottom for $50!!!

Bowl #6 – The we combined the techniques… a thin flared flange, with four fluted twists.

Bowl #7 – A simple “denting in” with the side of my wood knife… showing that a round bowl does NOT need to stay round!

Bowl #8 – The we started splitting the rim… using the pointed end of my wooden knife. After splitting the rim, I pinched it back together in eight places.

Bowl #9 – Another split rim, but this time with eight fluted edges to give the rim little undulating waves pattern.

Bowl #10 – Split rim but then dented in at four places with the side of my wooden knife, and then dented out in four other places… kinda creating a little bit of a squares “lotus” feeling!

Bowl #11 – Another split rim pinched together, but then “bulged” outwards bit between the pinched areas.

After altering the rims of the first half, we moved on to using colored decorative slip as a surface decoration technique. I tried to encourage them to “play” more with their clay… and to decorate their pieces more… colored slip being just one simply technique.

Bowl #12 – I covered the interior with a solid layer of white slip. And then dragged the rounded end of my wooden knife through the slip to reveal this spiral as the wheel was spinning.

Bowl #13 – Another full layer of white slip.. . and then we did a bit of “finger painting” with a simple squiggle of my index finger through the slip as the bowl was rotating.

Bowl #14 – While adding the layer of white slip… I started just “plopping” the slip on with a wide paintbrush. And we were all kinda enamored with the random texture that it was creating. So we left it! Might be a tad too subtle for my liking… but…

Bowl #15 – After adding another layer of thick white slip, I did a bit of chattering… rhythmic tapping…. with a rounded plastic rib. Tapping the edge of the rib through the clay to reveal the darker clay body. The speeds with which you tap & spin the wheel both affect the pattern that shows up.

Bowl #16 – Thick white slip with the rounded edge of a plastic rib dragged through it upwards to create these lines. A little “clean-up” in the center… and it was all good.

Bowl #17 – After using a lot of white slip, we then talked about mixing & blending… so we did a simple ombre’ blend of black & white slips. We left it smooth & plain… however… I kinda feel like I might do some decorative carving through the slip after it dries to leatherhard.

Bowl #18 – For MY last demo bowl, we did another ombre’ blend… and then dragged a tool through it to create a spiral… cuz’ everyone LOVES a good spiral!!!

And then the tides turned…

I had one last bowl to decorate, and a classroom full of eager students. So I flipped the game… and told one of them that that THEY had to decorate the final bowl!!!

Bowl #19 – I gave my last bowl to Priya to decorate… and she kinda panicked at first with too many options & too many people watching!!! But then she did a simple layer of black slip over the interior… and made a very fine & tight spiral drag through it. We all LOVED it… well done Priya. And now she gets to keep & finish that bowl too!!!

So there they are, all of my class demo bowls!!!
Remember, they all started out very much the same… simple & round. But after “playing” with some fun surface decoration techniques… they all look different now! And for now they are all in my studio… and there’s a “very food chance” that there “might” be a bit more stamping & detailing on these before I call them done. MORE IS MORE!!!

Pretty proud of my Beginners from class last night… when they tackled trimming & handles for their first mugs of the session! It’s only Week Two & they already have new mugs!!!

Pretty plates for a tasty potluck… Monday night we celebrated our last class of the session with a yummy potluck. I brought the chocolate mousse cake, while Kristen made chocolate chip cookies! Food always tastes better on handmade pottery!!!

Can’t say that I’m all that into Super Mario Bros. …
but I am really into OREO’S!!!

So… more sweet treats to share with my wheelthrowing class tonight!