Spent some time in the studio today making hodge-podge different shaped kinds of pieces. I'm trying to find forms that I really like. So, I just experimented some...
Made these four cups and also two plates of different sizes.
Looking down...
Side view...
Also put ben gareen blue cone 5 glaze over Ron's creme cone 5 glaze on these two cups made from earthen red clay. Greg, the master glaze teacher tonight said that the ben gareen blue will run over the creme, which is exactly what I want to have happen. Here they are...
The day got better when I came back home and learned that I have several potential orders. :)
And, I decided to splurge and get some food as I've been trying to eat out of my pantry instead of go to Harris Teeter. I'm trying to spend little $ these days, being out of work. It's exhausting and not fun. I made this for dinner. Only ate half, but it seemed to taste better in a handmade piece. :) This is on a
Ron Philbeck dish.
And, before I forget, here are the finished raku pieces.
This had turquoise luster, blue green, and superstition glaze.
The superstition glaze is on the inside. Great colors!
Here's the other one... this pic doesn't do the piece justice. This is the one that I sprayed alcohol on... check previous Raku post for more. The bowl has more color than this pic.
All of this said, I think I really like working with the earthen red clay and slipware these days.
They're using this to make brushes. Yes, you too can buy moose, bucktail, and elk hair to make your own brush. The two on the bottom I flipped over so you could see that the hair is still attached to the hide. Gross! Oh well... Always something happening in his class. And in addition, I heard great stories about carp lottery, cow chip bingo, and oh, I forget the last story already.
Becky and I worked on our own projects... for her it was adding terra sig to birds. I added slip to some yunomis and began to work on a plate. 
Becky was using a process she learned from Jim Whalen. I wonder what her brush is made out of? :)
Meanwhile, I was interested in learning new techniques to apply slip. I remembered Ron's teaching about newspaper. Becky helped me out too... First, paint some slip on. 
Next, apply a design shown on wet newspaper. Hard to see in this pic. Then paint another coat of slip on top and then remove the wet newspaper carefully. 
A great effect, adding depth to the design. Now, I'll sgraffito ontop of this slip. What fun! 
The small bowl is mine.... bright orange-red and VERY hot- about 1800 degrees ready to travel to a bucket with newspaper in it. It was a raku day and before the bowl went into the kiln I put glaze on it.
I used a combination of these glazes... (hardly overlapped); the design on the inside middle is superstition raku glaze and the rest is in blue green or turquoise raku glaze.
Then they were placed into the raku kiln.
And they got very, very warm! Here's a peek of the pieces in the kiln as the pots were heating up. After the kiln reached 1800 degrees the kiln was opened and I used metal tongs to take the bowl to the metal bucket. 
Even waiting a few seconds turned all the pieces that were once red into various colors... I had heard that was a good thing, so I waited.
You can barely see the bowl in there---
Not the best pic. I think I didn't put enough glaze on it; so I decided to let it fully cool and then apply some more glaze and re-fire it. I'll have to take a picture of the re-fired bowl... it looks much better now. More vivid colors. Will post that later.
Here's a better pic of it, looking very small next to John and Joe's pots. We also tried a second type of raku- I think it's still called raku. 
First, I sprayed a copper wash on another bowl. Spraying it helps it to be applied evenly. 
Then it was fired in the raku kiln just like the other bowl. Then, after it was removed, alcohol was sprayed onto it. Here's John doing that to his pot, which of course, immediately caught on fire. WE don't understand how this all happens yet (as this was our first try at this), but as you can see, some color came. The pot was on a wheel and was rotated too as the alcohol was sprayed on it. 
It was a great kodak moment too. Then the pot was put in sawdust and turned and turned until it cooled. When I did this, I realized one of my gloves had a small hole and my thumb was burned a little. :( 
Here's my bowl getting sprayed with alcohol, along with Becky's two pieces. It was hard to know just how long to spray alcohol onto it before it's time to put it into the bucket full of sawdust and turn it around. So, we just did what we thought was good. Some color on my bowl in this pic below... 
Here is my bowl again in the bucket.
This is a bit blurry, but this is the pot face down in the sawdust. I haven't taken pics yet of the two finished raku pieces, but will post them tomorrow. Sorry! You can also find more about this type of firing at Bruce Odell's website 