New Year - New Tools

A few months ago Jeff and I purchased an extruder a from friend. We have a small extruder but it's quite limited in what you can do with it.This week Jeff finally had the time to mount this larger one on the wall. 

I decided to start simple and extrude a few wall pockets. It was fun to experiment with different stamps and methods of cutting the openings. It was also a nice break from piggy banks.

Getting back to work... but I have the best job in the world!

I often find it hard to get back to work after taking a few days off. In between loading the kiln this week I HAD to touch wet clay... it seemed like weeks since I sat at my wheel (yes I am still sitting). The first day I threw the bodies of oval baking dishes and the next day I rolled out the slabs and assembled them. This time I made some large ones, most of them 12" plus in length. 

I am also working on some more wall pockets. This was a form I played with awhile back and they have sold really well. There are only two left in the gallery and since they are simple forms to make I figured why not do some more? 

In the past I have either glazed these in shino, dusted with wood ash or wood fired/salt glazed. I may experiment with some other glazes this time.

The kiln is at 337 degrees and I am anxious to unload. There are some piggy bank orders in there that I am nervous about. I really don't like to do special orders for that reason! I will get some photos up here on the blog as soon as I can.
Happy Saturday and don't forget to put a bird on it!