There is just nowhere for all this water to go when it comes down in bucket loads.
It reminds me of the summer of 2008 when we had no roof on the studio from our fire.
We were doing this then, every time it rained.
Add in burnt wood and the large amounts of flies and wasp that were draw to the smell.
I'll take this.
On another note, it is wet, but we have a roof!
We are throwing but finding that the pots are taking forever to dry out for handles and such.
Even with leaving things uncovered they are still wet the next morning.
I decided that I would reclaim some of the tile clay that I use.
I am getting tired of walking around all the odd bags of scrap.
They were bugging me.
I stated out by opening them up and seeing what stage of wet or not wet they were in.
I took some of the better pieces that had some moisture in them and cut them up and placed them in a bucket.
I then poured water on them and let this sit over night.
The next day I pulled all the standing water off and placed the clay on plaster bats to start pulling off the water.
As they clay started to set up I would turn it over. Cut it and place the wet side up, turn and do this again until it began to come together.
By yesterday I had 3 large balls of what seems to be clay I can use.
I need to ask my human pugmill if he will do some heavy wedging for me on these bad boys.
I am spoiled since he has more upper body strength than I do.
I would love to have another small pug mill for red clay but I don't see that happening.
What do you do with your leftovers?
I find that with throwing clay, stoneware, we can recycle the wet scraps within a few days.
The hand building or tile clay gives me all these bits and pieces that I bag up but fail to get back to soon enough to do something with.
My bad.
We are calling for more rain today with showers possible for days.....
I could use some sun.
Your flower picture of the day.
This little yellow flower is a doll.
Then covered in rain drops, goodness.
How about another one?
sigh...
At least there are flowers.
M
12 comments:
I could have written the same post. The damp weather is really slowing us down.
We recycle all of our stoneware scraps using basically the same method... and right now it's taken over too much space while waiting for it to become the right consistency for pugging.
Thanks for sharing the flowers... they may be the brightest thing I see today!
Like the pots, my soap is having a hard time drying in all this wet. We've been seeing the hummingbird moths on our butterfly bushes. Happy Saturday!
the yellow flower looks so sweet with the raindrops on it. I assume the aquifer is welcoming all this rain even if we humans are overly inundated.
meredith- thank you! this is so helpful, giving me ideas about reclaiming clay using plaster. I have a bunch of plaster at the bottom of a plastic tote that I can now use to reclaim clay. hmmm. hadn't thought much about that- thanks!
Summer flowers are the biggest thing I miss in the winter. I'll just come back to your blog in December for a reminder:-)
I had to make a choice to just use white clay. My studio is so small, I can't take the process of keeping white and red clay separate. I recycle my clay on plaster too, I have no pug mill, ugh.....
yep, wet and mold and rain-forest-living. Just think of this as our amphibious ancestral time. And how quickly we dessicate (sp? dry out) when taken from out moist moist homes!
Great minds....and all that. I wrote yet another post about drying(?) clay this morning. At least it doesn't have mold on it.
This feels like the way my brother described living in West Africa. They kept light bulbs on in the closets to keep everything from growing fur coats.
Your flowers are so pretty. There is something bout the way color pops on a gray day.
Our day lilies are trying to bloom. Tomatoes may stay green forever.
That constant humidity is so pervasive. Used to make handle-making so frustrating because they wouldnt set up.
Michele- I know you are having the same problems with wet and water we are- time to run far, far away!
Amy- I did think about you when I was posting this. Reclaiming clay can be such a mess.
Hey Smartcat- I did see your post and thought about how great minds think alike!
wet wet wet m...i finally did my teapot handles today they took forever to firm up ended up sitting them in front of the heater and recycles ar egood at the mo in fast roation making a heavy clay body for my tagines xx
Ang- is it wet there too! Goodness we all need some sun.
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