La Maiolica - making a mug of myself in a colourful manner

On tidying up files and considering doing a blog posting I found a lot of old drafts that had never been completed.  This one, while poking fun at my own ineptitude (brush skills don't come to you without a lot of repetition) hit a bit of a sad note.  You see Gigi Cosi of La Maiolica in Fremantle passed away suddenly in October and I suppose nothing there will ever be the same now.  I consider myself lucky to have attended classes with his wife Cate there as it was a technique I always wanted to become familiar with.  The odd thing is that the two mugs I decorated in that class are the favourites of my sons, is it because of the shape or because of the jolly but not fabulous decoration displaying my developing skills?  I think it is because they are familiar and comfortable for a good old hot chocolate.

This week at La Maiolica class the design below is what we were to copy (loosely) 

 and this is what I managed (carefully hiding the total mess on the other side).

 Then we did a goat design like this ... note the carefully broken up areas and banding, the beautifully placed motifs and fine lines - yes well mine worked out not much like this example.  

Check out http://mudcolony.blogspot.com.au/ maybe if you are a potter/blogger you might like to link into the Mud Colony.