Barley Hollow Pottery Musings about converting clay to things people can use

We’re closing in on Christmas and the days are flying by. Just this morning, I opened the kiln after a glaze firing. Everything worked well. (I think that means I’m not trying enough new stuff!) Several of the new pieces were already spoken for. The rest will be available at the Farmer’s Market on Dec. 17th, if all goes well. Check back here as we get closer to the 17th to be sure.

This load included several pieces dipped in Lustrous Vert, a rich, glossy deep green. I’ve had several pieces with this before, but this is the first big batch, and it worked pretty well. The kiln fired just short of cone 5. The last firing with Lustrous Vert was slightly over cone 5 and the Lustrous Vert dripped from several pieces. This time, the application of the glaze was lighter, which probably made the difference.

There was one larger jar which was dipped in Indigo Float. It finished great. And as usual, the Indigo Float dusted the shelf about an inch around the pot. It would be interesting to know why this happens.

All things considered, it was a good firing. I’ll take photos and post them this weekend. And speaking of photos, I’m starting to use ZangZing more for photos. I’m planning to put all the Barley Hollow pottery pictures there from now on. I’ll post a link here when it’s set up. If you haven’t tried ZangZing, you should. It’s a nice photo sharing site, and at the moment, it’s free.

My plan for the rest of the year is to try to get one more throwing and firing cycle in before Christmas. Free time is nearly non-existent, though, so, effectively, I may not have anything more before 2012. If so, we’ll have it at the Farmer’s Market, or possibly an informal open studio. Check back here to see if there’s any news.

We’re planning to participate in the Farmer’s Market on Tuesday, November 29th, from 6:00pm until 8:00pm. This is a special sale as part of Kinston’s Holly Day event. Come out for the tree lighting and all the great entertainment and stop by the Farmer’s Market and say hello.

This weekend, I managed to get a little time to spend in the studio. I threw a bunch of bowls and some other forms, including a couple knitting bowls.

Mrs. B. told me about the knitting bowl and showed me an example. It’s a medium sized, more spherical bowl with a small slot cut in from the rim. The knitter’s yarn is stored in a ball in the bowl, and it feeds out through the slot. In the photo below, there are a pair on the top shelf.

Also in this weekend’s work, a set of 4 matched bowls, about as close a set as I’ve thrown to date. I’m crossing my fingers for drying and firing.

Here’s a snapshot of the weekend’s production…

There’s also a lidded sugar bowl. I haven’t thrown many lidded items lately, so it’s about time.

I did some studio maintenance, too. In the last glaze firing, I had some glaze drips on the shelves. The indigo float dripped off of the big blue bowl, which didn’t surprise me. It does that sometimes when I apply glaze by pouring on a large item. Indigo float tends to make big bulging puddle drips that pop off the kiln wash easily. I also had some unexpected drips from the new Vert Lustre, which dripped and soaked through the kiln wash and into the shelf. It didn’t pop off nicely. I chipped off what I could, but ultimately had to resort to an angle grinder to remove it, also removing a bit of the shelf at the same time. I’m not worried about what’s left on the shelf, but I’m concerned about the change to the shelf itself. May be time for a replacement. I then did a fresh, heavy coat of kiln wash on all the shelves. We’ll see how it holds up.

I’m hoping to get a bisque load fired before Thanksgiving. We’ll see.

This morning, we opened the kiln after at cone 5 glaze firing. Included in this load were 15 mugs which will be used as prizes in the upcoming NC SuperClassic. They were glazed in different colors, including the newest addition to my dipping collection, PC-41, or Vert Luster. They all came out really well, so I can breath a sigh of relief. Also in this load were a couple really big (for me) bowls, and a monument for a cat. Photos will be on Flickr soon.

OK, so you’ve seen my notes of joy at having this site back in operation. Here’s what happened and what’s worked.

I started out with WordPress, and liked it. I like it so much, I decided to run my own on my own hosting that was running the static Barley Hollow web site. That was fun, but before long, it took too much admin time, and it stopped being fun. So I decided to move back to WordPress-hosted, but still kept the static site.

I’m a web developer in real life, and the BarleyHollow.com site was looking pretty rough. It had some nice features and some fun content, but it looked terrible – not good for a professional’s site. So, I decided to roll in all into WordPress, and do away with the organic mess that was the static site. The only problem was what to do with the email. I’m fussy and like to have email with the domain name in use.

Google Apps to the rescue with free – yep, free – email and more. So I set up a Google Apps account and worked through the WordPress and Google support files and got the DNS set up properly. It wasn’t hard. It just wasn’t simple.  But it was worth the time. For a small fee for the domain name in WordPress, I have a custom domain, email, hosting and first-rate blog software. It’s a really nice arrangement. I would recommend the approach for any non-profit or hobby group. Google Apps is amazing, especially for free. Coupled with WordPress-hosted WordPress, it’s a very nice solution.

So, that’s the story. It’s taken more of my free time than I’d like, but I’m very happy with the result. I’m going to get back to writing about making pottery. If you have any questions, let me know. Cheers!