Yesterday was a great…

Yesterday was a great class day. First, I taught my first class of the semester, for which I am always more than a little high (hi, students! and no, not high like that!) on the excitement, especially at the start of fall semester, which feels so full of possibility. I talk too fast and I'm nervous, and especially in a writing class where I often try to expose myself quite a bit on the first day to encourage them to do the same, to push themselves, it's definitely sort of scary standing up there in front of sixteen potentially judgemental young adults, talking about sex and being bisexual and unmarried by choice and fighting with my parents and not liking my baby and writing through the fear, trying to give them a sense of what the semester will be like so they can decide whether or not to take this class, with me, whether it's going to be a good thing for them or just boring or terrifying or what. I love that, although I think I may have scared some of them too.

And then in the evening, I took my first stained glass class. (And yes, I am taking all the appropriate pregnant-lady precautions when working with lead/flux -- mask, gloves, fan at my station, and my doctor assures me that it will be fine for a once a week two-hour class at the very end of my pregnancy. I don't think I would take this class in the first trimester, when the organs and such are forming, and if I were a professional stained glass artist, working on this full-time, I might take a break from the soldering part for the whole pregnancy. But as is, it's fine.) Yesterday we cut glass and learned technique and I'd done all of it before from a book, but it was so much better with a teacher talking me through the correct way to hold the cutter and the soldering iron -- much less frustrating and much better results and I love school. I love learning stuff. I really really do. I hope I continue to take classes in one form or another for the rest of my life. Also, access to a grinder makes stained glass cutting so much easier!

There were other nice things yesterday, including a really delicious lunch at Marion Street Cheese Market, which is now my new favorite place to eat in Oak Park, and it's a good thing we didn't buy the house right next door, because that would kill the budget right there -- as is, being only four or five blocks away is going to be a serious temptation. And I picked up some fall clothes for Kavi, because all of hers are in storage -- two pairs of leggings, a sweater, and a jacket, which will hopefully get her through the next three cool and rainy weeks. And a couple of tank tops and boyfriend sweaters for me at Gap, because they're having a buy-one-get-one-free sale, which is a pretty good deal for new clothes, I have to say. And my five pairs of comfy flat shoes came in the mail from Zappos, so in the next entry is my brief review, as promised.