Most Recent Firing

A good firing- better than these hasty iphone pictures; I had to remind myself of all the questions I had while glazing and firing- was this glaze thick enough? that glaze thin enough? did I make any mistakes weighing out the glazes? were pots in the right place in the kiln? the firing too slow? too hot? not enough reduction?....the list goes on. When everything comes out looking good, I'm less inclined to pause and recall what I was trying to achieve; when stuff goes wrong,there's more to think about.
I find it very useful every now and then to count and price pots from a kiln; I haven't done it for a while,so took half an hour this morning to do the maths. The kiln contained 90 pots with a theoretical value of 6000 shekels [around 1000 quid for UK readers],and there's another kilns-worth glazed, loaded and ready to fire- the rest of the last month's work. Average price per pot- around 70 sh. Cost of gas- 200 sh.- 2 shekels per pot. Average weight per pot- around/less than a kilo [estimate]- cost 6 shekels.
It's a living.
I'm not sure when I'll fire the kiln next- Sunday is Tisha B'Av,not the most propitious day; Monday,you may recall, I'm giving a short workshop on porcelain at Bet Benyamini in Tel Aviv [are you going to be there?},then Wednesday Gunnmarit and I thought we'd go and check out the Bezalel graduate ceramic show in Jerusalem...

Bisc Like This

If you didn't know; you can pile them high so long as the foot rings sit nicely one above the other, and, of course,without the sides touching. A dozen or so seems fine. I don't stack plates like this for bisc- three high,rim to rim,foot to foot. Unloading a glaze kiln today. Hot.

Summer Brush-fire, Hassidim,Keren HaYesod,Tsfat

This year's grapes: coming along nicely.

Lugs

Aptly named

Saving the Planet

We're doing our bit- our new raised vegetable bed, currently providing the occasional cucumber,with tomatoes and a slew of other vegetables on the way.

Crack Clinic

Sydney brought me some cracked mugs from his most recent firing [not made by him, in this instance]; after detailed examination,and having tossed around a few possible causes, we came to the conclusion [my recent experience with cracked bowls coming in useful] that the bottoms were too thin.