The warmer weather has brought two of my favourite insects to our flower border.

To capture the wing movements of the hummingbird moth, I had to use 6400th second.

Click on the pics!

Christine wanted to see the Christmas lights in Bourges - such as they were.

The rue Moyenne is decorated in blue and silver this year. Not exactly the Champs Elysées!

Two old boys with a better idea than walking in the freezing cold.

 One of the south face entrances of the Cathedral of St Etienne.

Looking out over the town.

This is so much fun!  Click on the pictures for the fine details.     

We have just returned from a pleasant week exploring the mountains of the Haute Savoie - which Christine has described in her blog.

I'm showing a few of the new photographs in our pottery gallery that we took while we were away.

Sorry, Iris, you've been moved on!

With the season well under way, I've finally made enough stock to see it through. It's now time to relax and start the brain thinking about certain projects. I'm longing to do some photography work and, since the winters here are long and wet and cold, I am preparing a folder of pictures which I will work on when we are confined to barracks. This is just one part of a huge willow tree which was struck by lightning, split in two and burnt. To me it looks like a Spielberg monster.

I am now in my creative mood and on Monday will start to work on individual porcelain pieces. Ten bowls are required for a Paris exhibition in November as well as a huge amount of Christmas stock. If anyone is interested in the exhibition, please e-mail me.

I have lots of ideas running round my head and I'm really looking forward to going into the workshop and losing myself in my throwing. I'll be using my celadon glaze as well as my sang de boeuf. Anyone who regularly reads my blog may be happy to know that I've found a supplier of the frit needed to turn the latter blood red. Bingo!

The matt red slip that I'm still working on remains fairly elusive but on this occasion I don't really mind because the effects I'm getting while trying to achieve it are rather pleasing.

Photographs will be posted soon.

Having just bought the latest Tamron 18-270mm lens for my Canon 40D, I was keen to try it out when the Tour de France passed near our village today. On too many occasions I have taken the wrong lens and regretted not having a one-suits-all lens.

This lens is fun to use, very fast, and lives up to its reputation. However, under today's circumstances the quality was not as good as a bagful of lenses would have given but i felt much freer and more relaxed and could concentrate on the photographs themselves.

Today was really good fun, waving to the publicity cars, being showered with gifts, albeit made in China. People were out in numbers, enjoying the parade before the real spectacle.

Remember that these guys have already pedalled 80 kms in one hour 45 minutes. They look as fresh as though they were out for a picnic.

Suddenly they were all gone, followed by their teams' cars carrying spare bikes. God knows how much money these represent what with all the security (see below) and the four helicopters overhead.

Cool cop - look, Maman, no hands!

All in all I had good time, am pleased with my lens and came home the proud owner of four caps, one carrier bag, two fridge magnets, some cloths for cleaning specs, a newspaper and a bag of jelly sweets. What more could a Scotsman ask for?

Click on the pics!

We saw something on TV the other day and thought that it may be possible to do a little cartoon on our blogs , well I have been playing this morning and here is the first one .

This is our grandaughter who is now living in Canada , I am sure that Christine will pick this up and no doubt find a theme to put on her blog.

These cyclists came through our village today. I was told they would pass at about 3 o'clock. By one minute past, the whole group, including back-up vehicles, ambulances, breakdown vehicles, gendarmes and helicopter had gone. It was that quick!

I managed to get 13 photographs and those who know what I'm up to this year with my photography will know what these are all about.

Yet another technique that I want to play with this coming year.

It's only taken all weekend to do this !!!

Last week I was invited to photograph Roz Herrin. This lead to the photographing of her collection of Salt pots.
More on this later.