Cups and Saucers... someone on CLAYART was wondering if potters only made mugs these days...whether anyone was making cups and saucers. I made these last fall for our own use; thought saucers might be nice for a change for people to have a place to put their teabag or teaspoon. These are oxidation fired to cone 7. The spots are from some volcanic ash I mixed into the glaze. I plan to make some to sell as well.

Here is the first teapot I made, apparently 10 months after I started learning pottery. This is going WAY back- the date scratched on the bottom of this teapot is 10/28/81.

The walls are actually quite uniform, but sort of thick; even though it's a large teapot, over 4 lbs. empty is kind of hefty!

Yes, that's a brass knob on the lid, all I had to do was leave a hole.

These were school glazes, cone 10 reduction.

I still tend to make teapots bigger than people seem to want, but they ARE lighter now!

Above are photos of the two vessel sinks I unloaded from the kiln on Valentine's Day; I am SO pleased that nothing went wrong...no cracks, crawling or any of the things that CAN go wrong during the whole process. They have been fired to cone 7 with a soak of 40 minutes, oxidation. I made them thick and sturdy-they each weigh about 16 lbs. The top one is from 13 to 15" inside diameter , and the other is 13 and a half inches ID. The inside depth is 6 inches.

These are the first sinks I ever made and I was helped by several hints I picked up on CLAYART (internet discussion group). One idea was to throw sinks upside down, which I did, and in stages, adding coils as the previous section stiffened somewhat. Another suggestion I used was to fire each on it's own separate thrown base during the glaze firing. Thanks to the people who shared their knowledge.

I don't have plans to make more sinks, necessarily, but I'm going to use the upside down technique to make some BIG bowls!