After packing away all of the Holiday Home Show shelving… which is also my art fair shelving… I knew I was running a little low on the little silver shelving pins. You know how you drop one in the grass and can’t ever find it?! Eventually you run low on them. So I decided to swing by IKEA to buy a few extra back-up pins. I was impressed by how helpful & friendly they were… and then blown-away when they said they were FREE!!!

Guess maybe I should have asked for more?!

Masked & triple-vaxxed… it felt so great to be back to live theater last night! It has been FAR too long. Sure, some last minute free tickets helped too! We went to see the new “revival” of OKLAHOMA! An updated twist on the original Rodger’s & Hammerstein musical.

While there were a lot of talented performers onstage, I think there were also a “few” bad choices along the way. I understand trying to update it a bit… but I was “confused” by the lack of scene changes, the IKEA furniture, the total black-out dialogues, the video close-up projections & the dream dance scene… which honestly, is a little much in the movie too?!

But again, the talent was there… and it felt so great to back in a beautifully classic theater again! One step closer to a small bit of “normal” again.

Words to live by… WASH THE PLATE!
Especially when one of those plates is that handmade stamped green platter hidden in the far back corner!!!

Handpainted signage by my friend Merryn… a young design student & daughter of my college friends! Feel free to follow her artistic adventures on Instagram – @merryncreates

Feels great to be getting back into “production mode”…
starting off with some smaller vases with some smaller stamps!
Gotta start somewhere, right???

Colorful fun… colorful reflections… yummy gummies!

Another one of the benefits of Lillstreet postponing the start of our Winter session by a week… the overflowing buckets of reclaim clay from last session should be taken care of! Fresh new reclaimed clay for everyone!!! Hopefully.

And let me just say…
This pile of overflowing clay would NEVER have happened if my Summer Campers were still around! They love pushing it through the grate… breaking it down into smaller pieces as intended! This pile-up would never have happened in my camp!!!

Looks like Kristy has been getting creative in her kitchen again… baking up a yummy loaf of Cheddar & Jalapeno Bread. Looks so good… and what could be better? Homemade bread on a handmade plate!

Not sure what’s going on with this angry cardboard box at loading dock Sky 15?… but it made me smile… and then run away in fear… all the while giggling?!!!

Enjoying some more of nature’s beauty, colors & textures inside the Crystal Gardens at Navy Pier again today. Such a nice escape during these freezing cold winter days!

After about a month of slowly drying under plastic, this class demo platter from last session was a bit drier than I would like it to be. Things dry over time, right?! Good thing my DiamondCore Tools are sharp enough to trim their way right through the stiff clay!