First firing done - how long do you all wait before touching a new piece?

I use mine, always have. My first piece was a lumpy little mug with a wonky handle and a glaze job that pooled weird on one side, and I drank coffee out of it every morning for about two years until I chipped the rim. Weirdly that made me like it more, not less. It earned its shelf spot through service instead of just sitting there looking pretty.

The thin spots near the foot are the part I'd actually think about. Thin glaze over clay that hasn't been tested for food contact is the one thing I'd hold back on, especially for anything acidic like tomato sauce or citrus. A little test bowl for dry snacks or utensils is a nice middle ground while you figure out whether you trust that glaze. If it's a commercial food-safe glaze fired to the right cone, you're probably fine even with thin spots, but I'd still keep a first piece away from daily dishwasher abuse just because it's fragile and you'll be sad if it breaks. For me the milestone thing happened naturally anyway. I made a better bowl the next month, and a better one after that, and the first one became the reference point I compare everything to. It can't be a milestone and a workhorse at the same time unless you let it, and honestly letting it is more fun.

I land on the other side of this one. My first piece, a handbuilt coil pot from maybe six years back, sits on my dresser holding earrings, and it has never touched food and never will. Not because I think early work is fragile or precious, but because I like being able to pick it up and see exactly where I started. That lumpy coil seam is a baseline I can measure against every time I pull somthing new off a shelf at the studio where I rent now. The thin spots near the foot would settle it for me personally. Thin glaze on a well-fired piece is ussually fine for dry use, but if the surface feels rough or pitted at all it gets harder to clean properly, and I just don't trust my beginner glazing enough for daily food contact. A spoon rest or a catch-all bowl by the door gives it a job without me second-guessing it every time I wash it.

I do get the appeal of daily use, and the coffee mug story above is genuinely sweet. But my thinking is you'll make plenty of usable pieces in the next year. You only get one first one, and it doesn't have to earn its spot by being useful. Mine earns it by being honest about where I began.

Both of you have more sentiment than I do. Back when I started we did everthing on kick wheels and fired in an old updraft kiln that ate half the load anyway, so my first bowl cracked in the firing and the question never came up. Still got the shards in a coffee can in the garage, which is its own kind of keepsake I suppose.

On the thin spots, one thing that helps is holding the piece up to a strong light. Thinnest areas of glaze will show it right through. Rubbing a bit of glaze on thicker at the foot before the next firing is an old fix, and honestly the unevenness is how you learn what the glaze wants to do.

Mine's a spoon rest and it's the best job in the house honestly. Gets used constantly, never needs to impress anybody, and the glaze flaws don't matter since nothing sits in it long. Something about a piece having an actual job feels better than display anyway. One thing I'd add on the thin spots, run a finger along them after a few washes. If the glaze starts feeling rough or chalky there, that's your sign it wasn't fully melted and you'll know going forward.

Still working up to my first firing myself, been doing handbuilding at a community center for a few months and my stuff is all still waiting on the shared kiln schedule. So take this with a grain of salt, but I like the idea of a piece having a job. I was thinking of giving my first bowl to my sister, that way it gets used but I don't have to watch it every day. One thing I keep wondering though, how long did it take before you could tell the glaze was holding up okay? Like is this a weeks thing or a months thing?

With the mug guy on this one. My first piece was a small planter and it's been sitting on my windowsill growing basil for three years now, thin spots and all. Funny thing is the thin glaze patch near the base actually darkened a bit from the water, so it shows its history even more. I figure if a piece can survive me overwatering herbs, it's earned its keep. Curious if anyone else has given thier early work to a plant instead of a shelf.