Last night in my Beginning & Advanced Beginning Wheelthrowing class, we did our last class “exchange-trading-stealing” game … this time with a theme of TWO mugs… “matching” if you’ve taken my class before! These bright green mugs… that were “kinda” matching… were my entries into the game… and I believe they happily went home with Kate & Kathleen!

Last night in my Intermediate Wheelthrowing class, we did a little “exchanging-trading-stealing” game… and the theme was FLOWER POTS with a plant inside! We all had a great time sharing our flowerpots & plants. And THEN… Christine pulled out another bag all wrapped up for ME!!! What?!… A late entry into the “sharing game” just for me?!

And it turned out to be this AMAZING cookie creation!!! Sure, she might just know a little somethin’-somethin’ about my OREO addiction?!

Christine is fairly new to the handbuilding… with this being only her SECOND handbuilding project ever. Never one to shy away from a good challenge, Christine took it upon herself to build this amazing flower pot! Even better – working at her new make-shift pottery studio workspace at home in her kitchen! Recently pulled together due to the pandemic restrictions and her ever-growing addiction to clay!

So here’s a little step-by-step process story for you… with special THANKS to Christine for sharing all of her process photos!

It looks like Christine started by enlarging the famous OREO pattern embossed on the cookies… and then cut them out to use them as templates & stencils for the project.

Using the patterns, Christine cut out the logo from a slab of clay. Funny thing… I was right there while Christine was rolling out her slabs on the Lillstreet slab roller.. and had no idea what she was working on! And then she continued to cut out all of the other parts & pieces. Good thing Christine has a nice “damp box” at home to store all of these pieces as she’s working on them.

Using the original stencils, Christine then transferred the pattern onto the large “cookie” circle disc of slab clay. This process makes it a LOT easier to places the pieces later.

After a LOT of scoring & slipping… the textured & embossed “cookie” was coming along nicely… still waiting for the decorative border of little rectangles. A lot of them!!!

So here are the two oversized “cookies” just waiting for the cream filling… the “container” portion of the flower pot!!!

The flower pot portion was created out of slabs as well… looks like this one might be TRIPLE STUFFED!!!

With a little chunk of sponge to support the cookie walls, the flower pot was assembled and allowed to stiffen up without sagging.

Christine then added some slabs to the bottom as “feet” for the flower pot to stand on… and NOT roll around like a cookie on its side!

While the flower pot was setting up, Christine made a small water trip tray to fit under the flowerpot.

When both pieces were finally dried, they were bisque-fired… bringing out the “traditional” terra cotta coloring we all love!

And then a couple coats of underglaze to give it that special OREO cookie color!!!

But then the triple-stuffed “filling” needed to be painted with white underglaze… using green tape to make nice clean lines between the colors.

All coming together… looking more & more like an OREO cookie!!!

And then a couple layers of glazed sprayed on to give it some shine.

And then it was ready to go back into the kiln for the glaze firing. Huge thanks to Dave Trost for being Christine’s “cohort-in-crime” – helping to facilitate this covert project. Apparently there was a lot of hiding & stashing of this piece so that I wouldn’t happen upon it ruining the surprise. A lot was going on around me… and I had NO IDEA!!!

After the glaze firing, it looked great. Christine apologized a bit for the coloring… bringing up that they have made Blueberry OREOS in the past!!! Sure, the traditional dark brown OREO might have been nice, but the blue hue makes it a bit more fun & magical.

Such a wonderful surprise by one of My Talented Students!!!
THANK YOU AGAIN CHRISTINE!!!

So after last night’s pottery class – the last of our Winter session – I walked away with two AMAZING flowerpots made my my uber-talented student Christine! I have some of the BEST students ever!!! Thank You again Christine – you rock!!!

And oh, but wait there’s more… SO MUCH MORE!!!
Or would that be MORE-eo?!!!

Not only did I get Christine’s Chicago flag flowerpot as part of our trading game… l ALSO got this amazing piece that she made as a surprise gift for me!!! Christine has been taken several of my classes and knows my penchant for OREOs firsthand. So she knew that this would be the PERFECT gift for me. And apparently, there was an all-on covert operation going on behind-the-scenes at Lillstreet to get it through all of the firings without me seeing it (thank you Dave – her cohort in crime!) Such an AMAZING way to end our session… with this AMAZING OREO PLANTER.

And don’t hate… but this is only Christine’s second handbuilding project ever!.. yes, she’s one of “those” people!!! I will do a post soon that show’s her step-by-step process in building this masterpiece!!!

After last night’s “exchanging-trading-stealing” game with my Intermediate class, I walked away with this SWEETIE of a flowerpot Christine! She’s been working a lot with terra cotta, white underglaze backgrounds & detailed paintings with colored underglaze. This one commemorates the Chicago flag & Lillstreet 2021. Great class… great planter… great souvenir of our class!!!

Tonight is the final class of our Monday Intermediate Wheelthrowing class. As with most of my classes, I like to do a little “trading-exchanging-stealing” game with my students. To celebrate Spring, the category for tonight is a wheelthrown flower pot with a plant growing inside. This is my entry in the game… blooming right on schedule!

FYI: We were supposed to end last week which would have been perfect for St. Patrick’s Day… but we got postponed a week do to the snowstorms that shut-down Lillstreet for two days! So we missed the holiday, but now they get flowers! HA!!!

After a little more pinching, shaving, shaping & smoothing… I kind of felt like this batch of spoons was ready to call done. They’ll dry now and then need to be bisque fired before I send them through the soda kiln. I’m going to leave this batch “plain”… but already considering the next batch might need some stamping & colored flashing slip accents.

You know my motto… MORE IS MORE!

When we last visited this class demo project, I had thrown these silly little spiky things off-the-hump in class as part of a “challenge”… thanks Christine!

Since then, I started to make pinch pots with the extra clay at the bottom… creating some SPOONS!!! I may have left the clay dry up a smidge too much, as the pinch pot clay was a bit harder to move around than expected.

But after a little “persuasion” the spoons started coming together nicely. I got them “mostly” formed, but then decided to let them sit & stiffen up a little bit more before finishing them.

A beautiful swirl of marbled clay! A small dessert plate by one of my students who has been playing with marbled colored clays! Nice swirl Katie!

Celebrating another MUGSHOT MONDAY with a little fresh air out on my front porch! It’s a little cloudy, but the warmer weather is much appreciated. Thank You Mother Nature!