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So my roommate, LL, has collected mismatched pottery for a number of years.  We use the crap out of it in our apartment and man that stuff is durable!  I'm typically the person who will break a glass or two per month so when I first started using her pottery (it's our daily plate/bowl/mug collection) I treated it like a newborn lamb.  Now I throw it in the dishwasher, drop it in the sink and hit it against it's neighbors in the shelves quite often.  She's always said it was meant to be used and if it breaks, oh well.  Whatever, I've given three of her dinner plates to her as gifts so if I break something, I earned the right.

This shared (new for me) love of pottery found us both in a pottery class this fall through the local public schools.  This was actually LLs second class and her goal for the end of the class was to have a few plates we could add to our collection (and a bunch of random pieces that make killer Christmas presents).  My goal?  To make a couple of pasta bowls for B's Florida friends that we recently visited.  That's it.  Two pasta bowls.  Simple enough.

I quickly discovered that pottery and dental hygiene cannot exist in the same place (WAY too much stress on the same muscles and tendons and it took about three days to recover after every class) and that I definitely should not quit my day job.  It should be noted that I am very critical with my art...Type-A perfectionist, blah blah blah ( LL reminded me of this approximately 34 times during our short 8 weeks).  Here are my creations....er, accidents...in order from "Most Likely to Succeed" to "Take It Out Back and Shoot It":

"Manhoover" When this bowl is set in your palm , your thumb can rest in the indentation, allowing  adequate manhoovering of food.  This is my fave, note the Ginkgo leaf embellishment :) Still, it was supposed to be a pasta bowl.

"Nubbins" This is a tiny little bowl with two swirly nubbins, a.k.a. handles, on either end.  Purely decorative in nature, a.k.a. totally useless.

"Desperate Housewives" This is my Bree bowl (get it?? haha), even though I hate Brie cheese.  I asked the clay to be a pasta bowl and this is what it chose instead.  Clearly a blind person was choosing the glaze because it turned out like an ugly speckled Amazon tree frog.

"Tie-Dye-Esque" See the pink and turquoise swirls?  That's really the only redeeming quality of this uber small bowl.  I like how the glaze turned out though so I'll let it live another day.

"Salvaged" I added the swirls on the sides because otherwise this was just one damn ugly cylinder.  This was the second piece I made, one of two cylinders that were supposed to be mugs but turned into pencil holders.  Parents like pencil holders for Christmas, right?  It's like kindergarten art class all over again, except I'm old enough to know if they think it's crap and are just trying not to hurt my feelings.

"Shrek" This completely useless small bowl was supposed to be pink with green but the pink is hiding so instead it just looks like some kid with Bird Flu sneezed on it.  I'm pretty sure it's not even sitting upright.  Goodwill, anyone?

"Penny" This little penny (and not in a shiny new penny kind of way, in a dirty New York subway penny kind of way) was supposed to be rust with a pretty magenta over-glaze.  Well, it just looks like rust.  This was also an attempt at a pasta bowl, believe it or not.

"Homeless" This dirty-looking espresso mug monstrosity was actually praised by my pottery instructor.  Clearly she was just trying to make me feel better about it.  This little-mug-that-could looks like it was jumped by a gang and left in the ditch to die.  Maybe if I sell this espresso mug creation to Starsux, I could be a millionaire!  Or maybe not.

"Yankee" And last, but definitely ugliest, is my second pencil holder (which was also supposed to be a mug).  This was a gift for B and since he loves the Yankees...don't judge...I was going to glaze it white and have blue dripping down the top....you know, what Jeter looks like when he bleeds. Well, some A-hole switched the lids on the glaze buckets and this piece was an unfortunate victim.  It would've been a great gift, instead it looks like a half-toasted marshmallow.  You're supposed to turn the stick for even roasting, fool!

So I think at last count I should've had three coffee mugs, three pasta bowls and three cereal bowls.  Instead, I have two pencil holders, one Brie dish, one espresso mug, one cereal bowl, and four useless small bowls.  Yeah, definitely not quitting my day job.  One bright spot: LL got us a couple large plates and even a couple small plates to add to the collection!  Huzzah!