Glaze Making

I am working on a stable/safe non-toxic cone 6 studio glaze.   I want to end up with three (Light, Medium, and Dark in values) .... I've been meaning to tackle this for a few years but it has take me this long to gather up the chemicals I feel safe working with.  I have a base glaze from Mastering Cone 6 glazes and the safe levels of the colorants. I'll be leaching them anyway, just in case, of course.   Here's a Vine of the supplies and tools I have gathered on my workbench.




Update: 1st Test glaze is made ... It is crazy how nervous I am about using it in my kiln. Crazy crazy. But excited. But nervous. Oooo...the beads will be beautiful, don't you think? What color will they be? I HAVE NO IDEA .... they might be blue or red or green or a bit of yellow or all of it in various hues. Or it could be brown, muddy muddy brown. I used a base glaze (clear) and added colorants in various amounts. I did write it down though so it can be duplicated (well, as much as I am able to duplicate things) ...

Peek At My Upcoming Auctions on Ceramic Art Bead Market

Here is a collage of some upcoming auctions I hope to make over at Ceramic Art Bead Market. I have the photos all done, I am just working on the descriptions at the moment.  Tonight after 9 pm I am going to tally up all the entries for the bead giveaway and announce over there who is the winner.  Because I used up the first comment with an additional photo of the beads, I am planning to use the number 2 and # of entries instead of 1 and the # of entries over at random.org.  Makes sense, right?

And at some point I will start adding these photos as auction listings on Facebook (ceramic art bead market)

Lets see ...what else is going on in the world of pottery? Oh yes, I cleaned my studio so I can again throw on the wheel. I have a custom order for chowder mugs and I am going to make them about 3.5 inches wide and about 7 inches deep, with nice thick handles for holding. That's the plan anyway.  Lets just see how that goes for me, okay, ha ha! 

Cobalt Blue Delicate Scrolls

I have been attempting a glaze match for a couple of years for my Cobalt Blue Delicate Scroll beads that appeared in the book "Bohemian Inspired Jewelry". The bead that is the second from the left is the original.  The third and fourth from the left are previous attempts. The first bead from the left is the newest attempt.  Fail.  I thought yesterday I had finally nailed it .... but this side by side comparison shows differently.  These are all the same porcelain clay body, too.  Who knew there were so many shades of cobalt blue?

The Three Little Pigs

My granddaughter is somewhat obsessed with this story...so I am too. Here are the famous little ones along with the mama pig AND the Big Bad Wolf !  Mama Pig started the entire story by deciding it was time for her three piggy sons to move out ...while she gave them good advice, only one followed it.

The Big Bad Wolf is deliciously scary to my granddaughter.  She will suddenly announce, "OH NO, the BIG BAD WOLF" then she will scream and begin to run away.  

This is the second set of these beads I have made.

Come Celebrate With Me

I had a bit of a tease yesterday on my facebook page regarding these beads.

They are especially chosen from the batch that came out of the kiln yesterday.

Today, July 7th, marks 4 years since my very last radiation treatment.


My cancer was removed by surgery and as a precaution, I had 25 radiation treatments and 2 rounds of chemotherapy.  That was in 2011.  And today I am still cancer free.  I have one more year before I am declared by my doctors to be in complete remission, but for right now, I am cancer free.  And that is enough.

Please come celebrate with me!  To win these 27 beads, join the Facebook page Ceramic Art Bead Market .  Leave a comment on the giveaway picture that matches the one above, and in a week I'll use Random.org to pick a winner.



 

Bead Load in Big Kiln

These are all the beads which came out of my big kiln this morning. It took about an hour to remove them from the rods and sort them onto this tray.    Beside the tray are the rods ...lots and lots of rods!