My Mug!

Once upon a time, I went with my family to a quaint old mining village turned Lutheran family camp up in the mountains above Lake Chelan.  I only mention it because at Holden Village, they have a pottery studio.  And on that trip with my family, I made a mug in that pottery studio.  However, our trip came to an end before my mug had been fired.  Luckily, I had made a few friends while we were there, and I left some money with one of them and asked her to mail my mug to me when it was finished.  Well, I never saw that mug again, and I have always wondered how it turned out--I'm sure it was the mug to end all mugs.

Fast forward 15 years--this time it's me bringing my little family to Holden Village (hence the car trip that inspired me to make these little guys).  And there were lots of wonderful things that we did while we were there, but you can bet that when that pottery sign up sheet was posted, my name was on that list.  I had a mug that had been 15 years in the making that I WOULD be bringing home with me this time.

No pottery wheels were involved this time, just handbuilding, which was plenty challenging for me.  

I was pretty proud of the final result:

That chevron pattern was made by rolling a piece of rebar on the clay!

I used a leaf stamp to fancy up the handle.

I even stamped the inside--and the bottom has the date on it.

Until I got it home and had my first cup of coffee in it.  And it dribbled coffee on my shirt.

If there is coffee dribbling on my shirt, it should be because children are bumping into me, not because I am drinking from a defective mug.

You can even see in the last picture that my glazing was not as complete as it should have been in the bottom edges of the mug.  Um, obviously, since it leaks.  Hey, it was hard to get inside those corners!  Both for joining the clay and painting the glaze, apparently.  

At least this time the mug made it home with me--that's a step in the right direction.  Maybe 15 years from now I can go back and make a mug that doesn't leak.  

My potter friend told me to buy this stuff and only apply it on the outside of the mug.

The all-caps "CAUTION" has me worried.

I have the glue, but I'm nervous that it will poison me.  

Does anybody know if there are any other ways to fix a leaky glazed pottery mug?  Or if this glue is perfectly safe and I should just fix it and start drinking my coffee out of my glorious mug already?