When people find out that I only have one copy of a lot of my molds, they always ask what I do if one breaks. My answer has usually been, " I hope I never find out!" Of course it was bound to happen eventually. On Monday I was finishing up an order of cat tiles, and I accidentally broke my only"napping cat tile" mold.
My first impulse was to freak out, but instead I decided to brainstorm possible ways to solve the problem. I thought about the commercial slip molds I see at the ceramic supply store and how they are sometimes made up of two pieces held together with a giant rubber band. I didn't have a giant rubber band, but I did have a bunch of normal sized ones, so I used a bunch of them to hold the mold together temporarily. Then I *very carefully* made another tile from the broken mold by gently pressing the clay in with my hands (I usually use a rubber mallet.) It worked! I cleaned up the tile and made a mold from that. Whew! I didn't want to discontinue this tile over a silly mistake and now I don't have to. The new mold should be stronger than the old one- I have improved my plaster casting methods since the early days. One of these years, I should really make back ups of all of my molds! One of these years...
