Raku

First of all, I have been very lax with my posts and I realise it is a whole month since I have written one. It is far too late to wish you all a Merry Christmas but not too late to wish you a very Happy New Year and a successful 2010. Thankyou to all who read my blog, I have made some great new friends here in blogland. And now for something completely different......

A lady across the road from me holds a weekly ceramics class and I have been going for about six weeks. My first attempt was a coil pot which is now in the back of a cupboard! Just before Christmas we did something called Raku which originates in 16th century Japan. I cut out some heart shapes in clay, then a few days later we went along for the firing process. I drew a patttern on the hearts, then painted over with a slip and glaze.

Then they went into the kiln.

I was rather nervous taking them out once they were fired.

They were then plunged into sawdust which was set alight

and came out of the drums looking like this.

The glaze is then peeled off to reveal........

Our bathroom is now almost finished. We knocked a separate toilet and bathroom into one room. It still isn't that big and we toyed with knocking through to one of the bedrooms as well but decided against this. I still have to put a blind up at the window and 'dress' it with some nice bottles etc. as it still looks a bit clinical.