I’ve rolled out a slab of “ash” white stoneware clay purchased from Mile Hi Ceramics.  I’m going to give my new lino cut a try.

I found that I get a better print when I used a rubber mallet to set my lino-cut in place – otherwise it slipped a little when I ran the rolling pin over it several times from different directions.

After I printed the clay and before I lifted the lino-cut, I trimmed away the excess clay from the slab.  I cut my linoleum pretty precisely before I carved it.

Voila, my print – see the bottom center?  this is before I realized that I should use the rubber mallet to get a good print.

Here, I’ve got 4 sides of my poppy lino-cut printed and a large slab for the top and bottom.  If you do your math, you’ll see that i actually printed 5 sides, even though I only meant to do 4.  I turned the fifth one into a tile.

This could be why I printed out 5 sides instead of 4.    It was after 8 pm after all.

A funny thing happened a few weeks ago.  About a month ago, I ordered a Bevel-o-Matic tool from claystamps.com after reading a tool review on Emily Murphy’s Pottery blog.  After 2 weeks, I didn’t receive an acknowledgment or the tool in the mail.  I had used the Paypal link on their website to purchase, so I followed up with an email and canceled the transaction.  About a week after that, I received an email from them apologizing and telling me that they’ll put one in the mail for me and that I should send them a check after receiving it.  I wasn’t quite sure I’d see one or not, but lo and behold, a Bevel-o-Matic tool arrived a week later.  It seemed so refreshing to me that the owner would trust me enough to send before receiving payment.  So, I am definitely one happy customer and promptly stuck a check in the mail.  By the way, it works like a charm!

I worked on 2 boxes simulataneously.  These are larger than the porcelain ones I’ve made in the past couple of months.

Here, I am dutifully adding clay coils to the joints to strengthen them.  I tried not adding them to a couple and experienced some cracking.  The glaze covered the cracks up, but I was worried the whole time while they were firing.

Walls are up – only have to add the tops.

Vine printed box is now drying and setting up.

Here’s the poppy printed box.  I think I like the way this print turned out.  I suppose the real test will be after glazing.  I’d like to see the glaze break nicely over the raised and recessed parts of the boxes.

Meanwhile, I am attending a one day hand-building workshop with Annie Chrietzberg tomorrow.  I hope to report back on Monday with all the wonderful things I learned at her studio!

Have a good weekend,

~Cynthia