The Kiln Has Cooled...

...and my pieces have been unloaded. I was pleasantly surprised at how well they turned out. You experienced potters, keep your opinions to yourselves and let me enjoy my perceived success! I could hardly wait to photograph them. In fact, I ran outside inbetween rain showers to take these shots.
I took three semesters of pottery classes in college, but didn't really learn anything. The instructor was one of those watch me and now you're on your own kind of guys. My pieces in college were clunky, chunky, and lopsided. I've been taking classes at a local art gallery and have the best teacher in the world! She's really good and takes the time to work with me and show how to improve. My new work is still a bit lopsided but I'm getting better!

The slab vases, pictured above, I built during the tropical storm that hit us a few weekends ago. It was time well spent, since I couldn't really go anywhere during the storm anyhow. I learned a lot from reading this tutorial I found on how to do slab construction. I was worried to death that I did something wrong out of ignorance and they'd blow up in the kiln, but apparently all was well. Whew!