You may or may not remember the epic fail pumpkin that I had in my 8/31 firing. I attempted to use Mayco Mudcrack at a hot cone 5 and it turned into a muddied mess. I did a lot of research on mud crack and discovered that if its gone pasty (mine has) you have to super stir it to get it back. I decided to try again, but to use the low fire Mayco Co1bblestone instead. This is what we used at the Michael Harbridge workshop so I know it works and it doesn't seem to have the same issues as mud crack has. I am so thrilled with the results.




I peeked into the kiln at about 300 degrees. I don't normally do Cone 06 firings and I don't actually have any low fire clay. These are all on Laguna B-Mix, but since they aren't meant to be foodware or be outside I decided that it was ok that they aren't actually vitrified. I was so excited to see the results. Five pretty pumpkins waiting for me!




The pumpkins are all the same combinations. Mayco Foundations Black x3 dried completely then two coats of Mayco Cobblestone. When the Cobblestone looks dry to the touch then you start adding on the colors. I went fairly traditional with these pumpkins, but I think the next set I do will be different colors.




The color is all Mayco Stroke and Coat. I did the pumpkin vertically two segments at a time. The primary color on the body of the pumpkin is Jack o Lantern. There are also highlights and lowlights with Java Bean, Just Froggy, and Sunkissed. The stem is primarily Just Froggy. This is all one heavy coat.




I wanted to do the pumpkins all over so I glazed the bottoms and then stilted them in the kiln. Even though they are heavy since it's low fire I wasn't worried about them warping in the kiln.




This pumpkin is the refire. It doesn't look quite as good as the others, but if you look below at what it looked like before - it's AMAZING. I did the same application as the pumpkins above over the mess that was below, but I sprayed a bit of starch on it first and let it dry. I find the starch helps the glaze stick. Also if you are going to refire a piece remember that it takes forever for each layer of glaze to dry since the clay is already vitrified.