My students ROCKED it out tonight. It’s only their second class of the new Spring session… and they’ve already finished their first mugs!!! Thrown, trimmed and handled!

Voila’…. MUGS!!!

While not quite part of the Monthly Holiday Ornament Challenge, I have been working on another batch of my wheelthrown ornaments for my next soda kiln.

Classic. Cloud-free… and COLD!!!
I had to put all of the Winter layers back on for this morning’s ride!
So what happened to Spring???

Spring might finally be here…. although you sure couldn’t tell yesterday…
Soon enough there will be flowers all around. Waiting to be picked and brought indoors.
So I’ve been making another batch of wall pocket vases to fill with Spring flowers.

Cereal & blueberries never tasted so good…
as when they are in a handmade stoneware bowl.
Thanks to Gerry & Rosene for sharing a quick shot of their breakfast this morning!

After yesterday’s “freakish” snowstorm, it was so nice to see the sun shining this morning and some beautiful forsythias blooming along the way!

A beautiful morning for a brisk 8K run through downtown Chicago. Chilly with a bit of a breeze, but with the right layers it was quite nice for me and 23,500 of my fellow runners. What a difference a day makes… can you even imagine if the run was during yesterday’s crazy blizzard conditions?!

The toughest part is deciding what clothes to wear… and how many layers you can take off and pack away into Gear Check. The morning is cold. The breeze is chilling. You know you’re going to warm up when you start running. But you also know you have at least a half hour to stand out there and wait. At this point, Tracy and I were pretty sure we had made the right decisions.

Here’s the view of the Starting Line as we wait for our turn to start. I was in the second wave, Corral G… which means we had plenty of time to wait.

My friend Kristin was doing her first “official” run… we’ve been “training” at Spin Class together. So it was fun to see her there in my same Corral. We ran the last half of the race together which was a lot of fun. She did a GREAT job today!!!

And THIS is what you get when you ask someone to take your picture at the Finish Line… apparently the nice lady had extremely large thumbs?!!!

Such a difference a day makes… clear skies and NO SNOW!!!

Some of the Shamrock Shuffle “swag” back at my lace…. some sweatier than others!!!

On my way home, I stopped off at Ann Sather’s for some I-deserve-these  “reward” cinnamon rolls!!! Always fun when you know you’ve already burned off those calories!!!

After a beautiful sunrise, followed by some Lake Effect snow, I went out to the Kane County Flea Market with my cousin Kim and friends Gerry & Rosene. We were faced with crazy gale force winds, blizzard-like white-outs, moments of sun, followed by hail, then more wind and more SNOW!!!

What’s going on?…. well at least we all found some great rusty “treasures”!!! My cousin Kim had just about had enough of the cold weather… while I found it QUITE entertaining!!! So crazy… on, off, snow, sun, clouds, wind, on, off, etc.

This morning was surprisingly cold. After a few warm days, I must admit I was caught off guard… but ready for a beautiful sunrise. The large clouds moving in made for some great sunrise drama.

Unfortunately, those same large clouds took over as the sun disappeared for the day.

And now… just for the record… it’s SNOWING outside!!! What? Crazy, right?!!!