Good news, at last

[offcntr]

We planned to unload the glaze kiln Wednesday night, so we could both attend our book arts meeting Thursday afternoon. Which meant I was down at the studio at 7 am to start the kiln cooling. Cracked the damper, opened up the burner ports, pulled the ceramic fiber strips off the door jambs (as best I could reach. Tea had every folding table and flat surface in the kiln room covered with stacks of bowls for his next firing). Took a pic from my phone camera through the top peep. That's the edge of a pie plate, glaze is mature and well-reduced. Promising... except I think this is one of the ones I glazed after I mixed up the new batch.

I literally phoned in the rest of the cooling, asking Tea to pull out the damper further, getting Jon to crack the door. Got there a 7 pm, just as he was preparing to leave, and got him to help me pull out the car.

Which was beautiful. Everything turned out fine, minimum of oxidation, only one soup bowl with a cracked rim and a baker with bubbled black stain. Whatever was wonky about the ball clay doesn't seem to have affected the glaze at all, so I'm fully stocked again, and can start preparing for Clay Fest.