This weekend is the Andersonville Arts & Design Weekend. And I have been invited to be the Guest Artist for the weekend at City Olive. The festivities begin tomorrow… so I went in tonight to deliver my pottery and set-up. It’s a fun collaboration & mixture of fine olive oils & fancy foods alongside of my pottery.

Andersonville Arts and Design Weekend at City Olive
5644 North Clark Street, Chicago, Illinois 60660

Friday, October 10th, 2014 – 11:00am-9:00pm
Saturday, October 11th, 2014 – 11:00am-5:00pm
Sunday, October 12th, 2014 – 12:00pm-5:00pm

Karen has a beautiful store full of wonderfully edible & foodie-favorite surprises. For this special weekend, there is now a wide selection of pottery to choose from as well. All completely usable… food-safe, dishwasher-safe, microwave-safe, etc. So be sure to stop by City Olive for some fun this weekend. And to grab yourself some of my pottery – especially if you couldn’t make it out to any of my Summer Art Fairs!

Here’s a quick preview of some of the pottery “up for grabs” at City Olive this weekend…

I hope you can make it in this weekend. If you do, be sure to say “Hi” to Karen for me…
and tell her that your heard about it from my blog. Thanks.

So I sort of feel like I’m “cheating” on my Tuesday pottery class, but…
look what one of my Holiday Elves brought in for snacks.
Yep… “Breakfast of Champions”!!!

One of my Holiday Elves at the “glitter gig” brought in a bag of pears from her Uncle’s house. Apparently, his tree is producing a bumper crop so she brought some in to share. Of course the one I pull out has a face. Go figure… kinda hard to eat your food when it’s looking back at you!!!

I stopped into a new grocery store this afternoon to pick up some quick lunch. I was struck by their beautiful displays of fruits & vegetables. Someone has taken a lot of time & pride in their produce displays. Sure, I got told that taking photos was not allowed inside the grocery store… but I just kinda laughed it off like they were kidding and kept taking pictures. They weren’t kidding. But look at the great shots I got of their beautiful produce. Although it was killing me… and I so wanted to start turning some of the pieces to hide that pesky little sticker.

 

Last night in my Beginning Wheelthrowing class we had more sweet treats.
More “specialty” Oreo’s… two seasonal “favorites”… both were yummy!!!

And more homemade macaroons by my new teaching assistant Cynthia.
Of course they were all gone… all the more reason I had to bike again this morning!!!

Tonight was the first night of my new Beginning Wheel class for the Fall Session.
I, of course, brought my standard Oreo’s.

Meanwhile Cynthia, my new teaching assistant, may have won the “Best TA Ever Award”
in the first five minutes by bringing in four flavors of homemade macaroons!

Chocolate with salted caramel filling.
Vanilla with lemon curd filling.
Chocolate with raspberry filling.
Vanilla with white chocolate lemon ganache filling.

Now everyone loves Cynthia… my Oreo’s never had a chance!!!

So now Cynthia has set the bar pretty high.
I hope she knows we now “expect” her to keep up the good work…
we’d hate to have to take away her “award” so soon!!!                       Hint, hint.

Yesterday was my first adventure to the Sandwich Fair. Friends have been talking about it for years… tempting me with stories of animals, rides and food!!! So when my friend Cory suggested that we go for Opening Day, I was in!!! So I drove out to Sandwich and met Cory, and her daughter Deni, at their house in Sandwich. We went over to the fairgrounds and started our adventure. First things first…

Yes.
We started with Corn Dogs and Lemon Shake-Ups.

Then we started going through some of the Exhibit Halls looking at all of the entries and the prize ribbons that had been awarded earlier that day. It was a bit overwhelming. The sheer number of entries. All of the ribbons. And how everything had been so pain-stakingly displayed EVERYWHERE!!! So much time had been taken to spread things out, keep them organized by category and showing off their ribbons!!! Fruits, vegetables, plants, flowers, baked goods, canned goods, quilts, arts & crafts, photography and so, SO much more!!!

And what county fair would be complete with out some amusement rides?!

Then we tackled some of the livestock barns to see the “living” entries.
There were hundreds of sheep…

And hundreds of goats… none cuter than this one…

And a barn full of chickens…
that surprised me by how many varieties and how striking so many of them were!!!

But then there was the Rabbit Tent. A large tent filled with a ton of rabbits. Practically every breed imaginable. And most of them were for sale. My favorite was this one… dark black on the top, and a warm cocoa brown on the underside.

But could this be any cuter?…

Well, apparently yes.
A gray Lion-Haired Rabbit that looked more like a stuffed animal.

And then we were dancing in dangerous territory…
and I “almost” came home with a rabbit. Almost… but look, can you blame me?

Luckily, good sense prevailed and I avoided the adorable fuzzy companion.
Cory and her daughter Deni however did not. Too adorable… too cuddly… and SOLD.
They got a very cute tri-colored Mini Rex rabbit… very similar to the black cutie I was playing with, just a different color. You could tell very quickly that “at least” one rabbit would be going home with them.

For the record… they ended up with just one rabbit…
and a hermit crab, and a goldfish… but who’s counting?!!!

At some point evening started to set in… and there was still more food to be had…

Part of the Carnival Midway was traditional games. Plastic rings on plastic pop bottles. Ping-pong balls into goldfish bowls. Squirt guns into clown mouths to inflate balloons. But I had never seen THIS one before…

Be afraid… be very afraid…
And yes, that is a REAL mouse being tossed onto a spinning roulette wheel. Whichever hole the mouse decides to disappear through indicates the roulette winner. Yes, a REAL mouse!!! The real concerning part was the crate of mice under the wheel. They said they bring about 60-80 mice with them for the five-day fair. So the question is why?… because the mice get smart and run away?… or die? Neither option is a good one.

But the highlight of any County Fair is always the food.
And I was more than ready to indulge… had had skipped lunch in preparation!!!

And ya’ gotta love a good typo…

So, what did we eat ???.. and by “we” I mean mostly ME…

We started out with Corn Dogs and Lemon Shake-Ups.
Followed by a cinnamon-sugar dusted Elephant Ear.
And then a deep-fried Onion Blossom, deep-fried Pickles and deep-fried Green Beans.
Then I couldn’t make up my mind…

So I had them all…
a deep-fried Twinkie, a deep-fried Snickers AND some deep-fried Bacon with Chocolate.

Washed down with the Vanilla & Strawberry shakes that Cory & Deni couldn’t finish.

And since we still had more fun at the Fair… eventually I was ready for more food. Sure, I might have been in some sort of a sugar-coma-haze, but LOVING every minute of it!!! So we kept the train running on the tracks…

And followed up with deep-fried Cookie Dough.
Never heard of it, but let’s just say YUM!!!

Night had settled in. The carnival was spinning full speed. And we were nearing the end of our time at the Sandwich Fair. We had had a long day, and it was still a “school-night” for Deni… and a late night for her new bunny!!!

As we were leaving… we needed one last treat for the road…
Everyone said that the Cream Puffs were spectacular… but they don’t have chocolate in them…
so I went for the Chocolate Eclair instead… wrapped up to take home.

Let’s just say… it didn’t quite make it home.                 

 

                                                                                                                          burp!

 

Special thanks to my friend Cory McCrory and my cousin Kim Wicks for giving me a lot of beautiful vegetables. They each have wonderful gardens that are producing a lot of vegetables… and this “City-kid” doesn’t have room for a garden. But definitely more than willing to accept “donations” from those who do!!! Yummy, and good for me too!!!

Tonight was great food with a great friend, as well as the big “pass-off” of the collaboration pieces that Cory McCrory has made for “Art In The Garden” next weekend. Everything is now in my hands to put it all together. Cory and her daughter came into the City for dinner at my favorite restaurant. We ate, we chatted, we laughed, we solved all the problems of the world… and we’re both very excited about next weekend’s art fair. We hope some of you can join us to see what we’ve been working on together!!!

I still have some work to do on my end of the collaboration… and I’m going to try to “force myself” NOT to look into Cory’s crate of whimsical wonders until I get my act together .We’ll see if I can resist the temptation of peeking…

You know how I LOVE to hear from my customers – and to see how they are using my work. It’s so nice to see my pottery being used in their homes. Some times in creative ways that I never even considered.

From Allison, one of my “Fans”…
We added silicone feet to the ceramic tile wall hanging board. Now we use it as a trivet!! We took the metal hanger off the back so the feet would fit better. It works like a charm! It inspired me to bake my favorite banana bread today, which complements the trivet beautifully. The only problem is, we need one more to complete the trivet set!!!! We will see you at the backyard garden sale in a few weeks Thank you again for making everything you do!! It looks awesome in our family home. Had to share my photos with you!