Things not to do with glaze

I'm in the process of expanding my PurrPrints designs into a line of pendants and I'm consequently learning the joys (or, so far, mostly the exasperated sighs) of glazing. So I thought I'd share a few glazing don'ts for any other glazing noobs out there.

1) Don't let the piece dry in a vertical position. If you do, you're likely to get some ugly lumps where the glaze has gathered at the bottom of the piece. This, of course, was how I was initially drying my pendants (I'm sooo brilliant, oh yes).

2) If you do get lumps in your glaze, don't try to sand them. Especially don't ignore the advice of a more experienced pendant maker who says "sanding doesn't work so well" and proceed, willy nilly, to try to sand it anyways because darnit you just can't stand those ugly lumps and maybe, even though you've never sanded glaze before, you'll somehow discover a magic way to make it work. Right. Five minutes later you end up with a result that is much much uglier than the lumps (see that nasty spot in the picture? That was what happened when I sanded--a rubbery chunk half came off, and pulled off other glaze with it. Oh yes, I rock, you can send me flowers and chocolates now).

3) When you eventually get your glazing technique down, don't let some weird black substance abruptly materialize in your glaze (or hairs, or dust, or all the other things you suddenly realize are floating around while your piece is air drying). This cat, for example, was not supposed to have spots or a weird black haze.

Maybe I could offer him as a stylized impression of a leopard? Hmmm...

4) Finally, when you (hurray!) manage to get a piece you like, don't forget to applaud yourself, do a little happy dance, and skip around the house singing "it actually worked!" while your cats and spouse stare at you and roll their eyes. Especially don't forget to scoop up one of said cats and give them lots of kisses and then a kitty Greenie for putting up with you. (By the way, those things are like crack to my cats--is it the same with yours, or are mine just weird?)