One way to make your special day even more special is FREE ICE CREAM!!! Sure, it might be a lot… but no one ever said you couldn’t go to more than one location, right?! I called this “dinner” on my way to the studio to teach class tonight… I feel sorry for my students when all this sugar kicks in… this might be a bumpy ride!!!

Jeni’s #1… on Wells in Old Town!

Jeni’s #2… on Southport

Jeni’s #3… on Clark at Wrigley

I tried my best to “save” some of the demo bowls from last week for my Tuesday night class… so I could continue the demo with decorating some of them with my students. I tried to wait… I tried to keep a few... but I just couldn’t. The bowls were starting to dry out and I didn’t want to wait too long… I hope they understand that I had to stamp without them! I’ll still bring them to class to show them what I did while they were gone!

I just had something new “pop-up” on my calendar…
and I’m hoping it will “pop-up” on yours too!!!
More details to come…

Goopey-gloppy fun! Another wonderful pile of reclaimed clay. Lots of scraps, trimmings & dried clay reconstituted into new clay!!! Now I just need to let it sit here on my plaster bat for a few days to help suck out the extra moisture… and then it’s just a LOT of wedging until it’s back to good re-usable FREE CLAY!

It’s early October… but it’s never too early to make another batch of holiday star ornaments, right?!

Another culinary treat from my friend Julie. This time some sort of chocolate torte with a raspberry glaze. Looks pretty yummy on a blue sgraffito platter! Thanks for sharing your masterpiece Julie… now if she could just share a slice of that torte too?!!!

A trio of textures along the Chicago Marathon route. I was watching the runners on the Chicago River Bridge… which they cover with red carpet so the runners don’t need to run on the rough metal grates. Although I do question that idea… as I saw six people go down when they tripped on the red carpet!!!

Always a special day when the Chicago Marathon works its way through the neighborhoods for 26.2 miles of fun! The weather may not be ideal with some gusty wind & a little drizzles of rain, but all of the runners were off to a good start. So fun cheering them on close to the start as they crossed the Chicago River for the first time. Fun to see the Elite Runners, the parathletes, the “normal” runners… and even cheering on the last one! Give it your all… you got this!!!

And remind me again why I felt compelled to add long swim & an even longer bike ride BEFORE my full marathon last weekend?!

Always good to have a little early morning sunrise “affirmation” along the Chicago River… made me smile! Thanks.

After a week of clouds & rain… a week of IRONMAN recovery… and a week of blisters healing… it felt GREAT to finally get back out on my bike this morning! Sure, it was cloudy & windy… but so much to be outside playing along the lakefront again!