What happened to September? Alan and I were ‘across the pond’ for three weeks and now we’re just recovering from the dreaded jet lag. We spent time with my family members in London, Salisbury and Berlin and added a super bus tour through Spain and Portugal. You can imagine how many photos I took there! I hope to share selected best ones over the next little while but first I’ll post the photos Al took of Raiders’ plates just before we left. The poor artists have waited a long time to see the results of their work.

I posted photos of some of their plates in my last blog at the end of August. They were fired along with all the pots I took to England. These are all the rest.

Philippe’s three squarish plates have subtle colours  underneath greys. I do like his use of wax resist.

Tamara put interesting shapes on the underside of her platter and used ceramic pencil to draw similar but quieter designs on the topside. Her other pieces are little dishes.

Her mother Michelle painted a delicate pastel plate and a chartreuse boat-shaped dish.

Mina has another square plate to add to her collection. This one has colourful splashes on a dark background.

Pierre has two more large round platters for his series.

Cindy has chosen to use grey and orange, with some spots added, for her two charming round plates.

Kate spent lots of time painting the underside of her platter so I needed to show that. The front is a contrasting warm pink. Her tiny dish is another in her current spotted series.

And Marlene has only one finished from this Raid. She has left another to be completed later. Others have done that too so I expect that this blog will alert Raiders to our return from travels and we’ll start to plan the next Raid.

Meanwhile I need to prepare for a workshop I have been invited to give to Semiahmoo Potters’ Guild later in October. Plus, to my great delight, I was phoned by Lisa at Shadbolt Centre on the day we arrived home. She invited me to join a soda-firing workshop this Fall. Along with many others I had put myself on a waiting list for a soda firing and they have decided to offer an extra workshop. When I fished out my clay to start throwing again yesterday I had to choose whether to start with stoneware or earthenware clay.  It had been a month since I sat at my Shimpo.