April 8

I felt really productive today!  I made four bowls, which I think look good, and like a set.  I’m going to make two more backups tomorrow.  The bowls are going to look even better when I trim them and get them exactly how I want them tomorrow.  I also trimmed two serving bowls, which I made on Saturday, and two plates that I made on Friday.  I’m feeling a whole lot better about my project today.  I think it’s looking really good, and I just can’t even wait to start glazing.  It’s going to be really hard to stay focused on throwing and not decorating once the pieces I’ve made come out of the bisque.  Just the plates made it into this bisque firing.  I need to do all the throwing first, though, so that I can make sure that everything gets bisqued in time for me to do all the glaze work.  I really like going to my English and world religions classes.  I feel like I spend so much time alone in the studio.  I always feel like I’m alone in there even if there’s a class (which there always is).  I’m just over in the corner in my own world, so it’s nice to go to my classes in the academic center and have some actual human communication for forty-five minutes.  Then it’s back to my cave.  It kind of makes me second-guess my goal of becoming a potter.  Seeing Lindsey on the other side of the studio making paper beads with all our friends and smitty.  But I do really enjoy ceramics.  I wish I could move my wheel and all my supplies across the Braitmayer into the art studio.  It’s kind of a nice way to take a break, though, just to wander over there sometimes.  I keep a little pour-over coffee maker in there and we have a little kettle and hot plate so I can make coffee or tea and sit on the sofa.  I’m going to get to spend more time in there once I start glazing, too.  I’m going to do blind contour drawings of my advanced art major friends.  I think it’ll be good because I can go in there and do the drawings during block 8 when they have class and then the rest of the time I have will be filled up with painting them in the underglazes.  I just need to push through this first part where I’m throwing and trimming one hundred percent of the time.