I've wanted to try my hand at a number of things over the years but the time was never right. You know how that goes. I would like to learn how to line dance or ballroom dance. Maybe I could learn how to paint. My mom showed me how to knit and crochet way back when. Sister Barbara does some amazing stuff with gourds, needlepoint, quilting. Now that I am retired I have the time. So when Cindy was reading through a publication from the rec centers here in Highlands Ranch telling about various things we could sign up for I was interested. Now was my chance. I signed up for Hand Pottery For Beginners.
I was all excited about my first class. We meet 4 Mondays for 3 hours. I didn't know what to expect. Remember how in grade school we made little pots by rolling out cylinders of clay and then connected those cylinders in such a way that they became a pot? I expected we would be doing that since I am a beginner and this was hand pottery. I was wrong.
There were 9 of us - 8 women and myself. Each of those women already had experience and many knew each other so I got a lot of individual attention from Amy, our instructor.
It was fun. We were shown how to roll out clay with a great big press that would really be nice to have when rolling out lefse. Once our clay was rolled out we were shown how to put patterns in the clay using various things. One woman used pine needles and small pine cones pressed into her clay. It was beautiful. Amy showed us how to drape clay over a small balloon to help shape it. We used various tools to work with it also. I ended up making 2 bowls.
Next week we will fire them I believe. At some point we will learn how to glaze them. I know I'm missing a step or so but I will write about that after next week's class.
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| Bowl 2 shaped in bowl |
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| Bowl 1 shaped around balloon |
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| Giant press |
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| Hedgehog one of the women had previously made |
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