Prep for the Wood Kiln

I got to make a bucket and a half's worth of wadding material. Just a few ingredients (mostly fire clay and sawdust) and some water does the trick. Dry ingredients are added to the bucket, a handheld electric mixer dry-mixes it, and then I add water and mix the rest by hand. An added bonus was that my hands were nicely exfoliated after I was done. 

Action shot

Finished product: not too wet, not too dry

Then we make balls of the stuff and with the aid of some wood glue, the wads are stuck onto the bottoms of the pots.

I patched up the shelves and dunked the stilts into the kiln wash. No sticking here!

Kiln wash onto the stilts

Then came the cone packs. These are placed strategically inside of the kiln (different spots that are in view when a brick is removed) to monitor the temperature. Each cone is a different temperature; once the kiln reaches that temperature, the cone will bend. 

These look like little warrior, porcupine ships to me.

Unfortunately, because we didn't bisque fire them, they burst in the wood kiln.