Looks like Julie is kicking off a little Teapot Tuesday with a stamped & soda-fired teapot… and a couple “vintage” mugs from a few years back!!! A sweet little Tea For Two!!!

Monday’s maple keys… still green on the trees! Looking forward to when they finally dry-out and turn into fun little helicopters!!!

Looks like Pammy is kicking it back on the sofa, warming up with her new stamped mug she picked up this weekend in Peoria! A sweet “juicy” blue soda-fired mug for another Mugshot Monday!

One of the best parts of having friends stop by your weekend pop-up pottery sale… is when they bring you sweet treats from their candy shop!!! The best homemade chocolate fudge from Maurie’s Sugar Shoppe in Eureka, Illinois… right across from the Courthouse! Thanks Keith & Julie… you guys are too “sweet.”

I woke up to a lot of clouds this morning… but after yesterday’s rain, it felt like I had a little “window of opportunity” to see a bit of sun on my morning ride. It broke through the clouds for a few fleeting moments before going back behind them… most likely for the rest of the day!

Once my slip & plate were on the drier-side of leatherhard, it was ready for my class demo last Thursday night. I had already trimmed the bottom of the piece… but now I needed to shave off the top layer of white slip.

The “plan” for sanggam is to shave off the top layer of slip and leave it filled in the stamped impressions! Like I said… this is my first time really trying this technique. And what better place to do it than in class as demo for all of my Thursday night students?!

Turns out that my T2 Arc Trimming Tool from DiamondCore Tools was the perfect too for shaving off the white slip! It’s nice & sharp, and the curved edge seemed to fit in all the right placed without shaving off any gouges or lines!

And now that I have all of the pattern revealed, I’m planning on smoothing it out a bit with some sandpaper after to dries completely… with my mask on of course!!!

After stamping the pattern into my platter, I filled all of the stamps & covered it all with a thick white slip.

It took a little while to get it all filled in… as the thick slip wasn’t filling the indentations easily. So I had to “press it in” with the paintbrush – kinda tapping & squishing it in before smoothing it out.

Once the stamps were filled in… I smoothed it out, and added a second layer of slip to ty and cover the pattern completely.

Last week in my SURFACE DECORATION TECHNIQUES class, we tackled the traditional Korean technique of sanggam.

SANGGAM : The delicate technique of sanggam involves etching the desired motifs on the dry clay body and filling in the carved space with black and/or white slip, after which the translucent glaze is applied and the vessel fired.

I wanted to pre-prep my demo piece in advance, so I started by stamping a pattern in a platter made with brown stoneware. I used a few of my pre-existing handmade stamps. To be quite honest… this is my first time ever trying this technique, so I wanted to keep it kinda simple. Maybe more like a “mandala” kind of stamped pattern. I tried to keep it pretty clean & organized… with some “deep” stamps to help with the white slip that was still to come!!!

Looks like Pam’s mom is having a great Mother’s Day… complete with her new ikebana flower vase that Pam picked up this weekend at the PLANT & POTTERY SALE! It was great to see my pal Pammy down in Peoria… but c’mon, how cute is her Mom???

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY to all the great Moms in the world…
to those still with us, and to those who are not.
Take time. Share stories. Make memories. Life is short.