Now that Alan is slowly recovering from his surgery I am finding time to get into my studio again. Local artist and TriCity Potter Gay Mitchell asked if she could come and paint any tiles that I have left over from workshops. She has a show scheduled for Gallery Bistro here in Port Moody at the end of November and I believe she’d like some tiles related to the theme of her show. So here’s another reason the get my kiln filled and fired asap.

Gay spent much of last Friday here, happily applying slips to three leather hard tiles before using sgraffito to outline the designs. Meanwhile I had a useful day inserting spouts/bills into jugbird bodies and attaching handles. But I really wanted to get back at my wheel, so on Saturday when the rain was pelting down and Al and I chickened out of a walk, I wedged up some earthenware and threw some little cups off the hump. By the time I’d made the little group I was whistling! Not a huge achievement but it felt so good to be throwing again.

Yesterday I trimmed them all, and a bowl, possibly a donation locally, and dipped them in slip.

Gay wanted to paint more tiles and invited fellow TriCity potter Myrta Hayes to join us so again today I had companions here. Gay found some more leather hard tiles to paint with slips(my plaster-lined storage tote is proving most useful) and Myrta chose to paint two bone dry tiles with underglazes. Meanwhile Al impressed me by managing much more on his own. He’s climbing one flight of stairs, showering and even made his own lunch. I’ll have him taking the garbage out in no time!

Instead of starting to paint the fifteen jugbirds awaiting their colours I had a playful hour or two painting the tiny pots I’d made over the weekend. They say you should take time to play, and I did. Who knows, maybe there’ll be a combination of colours and sgraffito that I will want to use on something else. After that I did paint jugbirds too so now I need to keep on going all this week to get that kiln filled.

I’ve also been making some plates and platters for the Raiders so there will probably be enough ready for them to make a November Raid.

Wondering how the US election will go tomorrow…