It was an absolute honor to be one of the instructors at the 10th Chicago Urban Sketchers Seminar! I was supposed to arrive in time for the opening ceremony and sketchwalk. But between flight cancellations, tornado warnings, and weather events in connecting cities, I ended up spending a night in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and was a whole day late to the Chicago event! However, I got to lead my workshop (Printmaking on the Go!) on the second day, and we had a blast learning about all sorts of ways of making texture on location, and then applied our newly learned techniques to a conglomerate of high rises on One Magnificent Mile. Here are some photos at the end of the workshop:


The Chicago Urban Sketchers team, led by Brian Wright, was an amazing support for me throughout my complicated traveling time and made me super welcome when I finally joined the seminar. Everything was well organized for me to start teaching right away, but they made sure that I got some rest and had a chance to catch up on all the seminar events, the location for my workshop, and group happenings. I've never met any of these people in real life (though I knew many online for a long time), and I felt like my sketching family was there for me. If you are ever sketching in Chicago, Urban Sketchers are a very friendly and supportive bunch of humans with lots of very interesting artistic talents!
Here is my first sketch upon arrival - at the dinner table where people were sketching as much as eating!
And here is Brian's drawing of me - drawing the sketch above :) I scanned the page with my badge and some after class notes too :)
I would also like to mention a team of people who helped organize sponsors for the seminar. All the participants of my workshop got to work on my favorite drawing pads from Strathmore - with a gently-toothed, slightly creamy drawing paper with a sturdy backing for cutting stencils - and I am very grateful. Strathmore "Pass The Journal" collaborative art project started some amazing friendships for me many years ago and my joy from using their paper continues to this day.