Blog sosAssociates

On March 30, 2024, I decided to attend "330 Day" at House Three Thirty after I saw the interesting activities planned for their special day of celebration! What made the event special is that it was in recognition of the first anniversary of this new community center created by the LeBron James Family Foundation. While the activities of the day were really enjoyable, the thing that made me really interested in attending is the knowledge that this facility has a higher purpose.

It is great that the LeBron James Family Foundation supports this new community resource in Akron!

I wrote this blog post to congratulate House Three Thirty on their first year of serving the community, and to share what I learned. What follows is information from the day, and the photos and videos from my visit, organized under the following headings:

• 3:30 pm on 3/30 - Our Community PROMISE

• Venues

• Family Room Entertainment

• Cabaret Entertainment

We are very fortunate to have House Three Thirty in Northeast Ohio!!

We are very fortunate in Cleveland to have Manabu Ikeda: Flowers from the Wreckage make its United State debut at our very own moCa Cleveland in Uptown Cleveland - University Circle. When I saw Manabu Ikeda's exhibition, along with two other new exhibitions, as part of the moCa Cleveland Opening Night Celebration, I knew I would need to come back a few more times. There is so much to see in the details of Manabu Ikeda's artwork. Fortunately, the exhibition is in Cleveland through May 26, 2024, and moCa Cleveland is always FREE and open to all.

This blog post is about the February 2, 2024, moCa Cleveland Opening Night Celebration, and my March 29, 2024, return visit during a Studio Access with Manabu Ikeda session at moCa Cleveland.

I am so glad that I finally toured The National Museum of Psychology on Wednesday, March 20, 2024!! The National Museum of Psychology is within the Drs. Nicholas and Dorothy Cummings Center for the History of Psychology (CCHP), which is located at The University of Akron.

I think I first learned about The National Museum of Psychology about five years ago. I must have learned about the museum from shared social media announcements when they completed their 2019 building renovations. At that time, I immediately said to myself that I must go to explore this museum, but my visit to the museum kept getting delayed. I had earned a double major as a college undergraduate in psychology and history, with my psychology major being what I considered my primary emphasis, so I was excited to know there was a nationally recognized museum focused on my area of my interest so close to home.

Since The National Museum of Psychology does not open until 1:00 pm on Wednesdays, I first stopped to see the LeBron James Family Foundation's House Three Thirty facility - very impressive. It has a cabaret, museum, coffee shop, taco restaurant, sweet shop, bank, and more. This was my first time visiting.

In addition to The National Museum of Psychology, I also visited the Institute for Human Science and Culture (IHSC), which is on the 3rd and 4th floors of the Cummings Center for the History of Psychology (CCHP).

I was very fortunate to happen to pick a Wednesday (March 20, 2024) that the Summit County Children Services had arranged a special tour, pizza dinner, and informational session at the psychology museum, which they invited me to attend. I enjoyed hearing from the agency staff and from students benefiting from internship opportunities offered by this important agency.

I knew I would enjoy visiting Cummings Center for the History of Psychology (CCHP), and I am glad I finally did visit after the long delay since I learned of it five years ago. Thank you to the Cummings Center for the History of Psychology (CCHP) staff for my visit. We are very fortunate to have this great resource in Northeast Ohio.

An evening of hugs and high-wow-factor presentations! That is what PechaKucha Night Cleveland - Volume 40 was for me!

The evening's festivities took place on Thursday, March 7, 2024. Located on the shore of the Cuyahoga River, the Music Box Supper Club in the Cleveland Flats West, was the perfect spot. I had just been in this entertainment section of Cleveland two weeks earlier for Brite Winter 2024, and I was glad to be back in the area.

I am writing this blog post to try and capture some of the high-level excitement which is PechaKucha, but it cannot be fully described -- it is something that must be experienced in person! This blog post will act as a bookmark for my memory to help recall the feeling of the evening, and for those of you who did not attend, I hope it serves to encourage you to attend a future PechaKucha Night Cleveland event.

It is pretty amazing that PechaKucha Night Cleveland has been featuring creative Greater Cleveland people since 2008! We are fortunate to have one of the oldest PechaKucha Night communities in the world.

PechaKucha is always a good time. Thank you to the PechaKucha Night Cleveland leaders for making these great events happen!! I look forward to attending more!

Today, March 8, 2024, as I celebrate twelve years of creating my sosAssociates.com blog, I am expecting that this year will be much different than last year - which is a good thing. A year ago, I was in the middle of a potentially life-changing situation.

A year ago, I predicted three changes would occur in 2023. They all happened, and were resolved to my satisfaction.

I want to say thank you to the people responsible for all the great things I was able to do in 2023 and so far in 2024. I have big plans for 2024, which I will continue to share in my future blog posts.

Please take time to read some of the 18 blog posts from 2023 and the seven (as compared to only two a year ago due to illness) that I wrote so far in 2024.

A BIG thank-you to the Brite Winter leadership team, volunteers, sponsors/partners, and Ingenuity Cleveland Ingeneers for a great #Brite2024! Some of my family visited the event earlier in the day on Saturday, February 24, 2024. They reported that they had a great time seeing people they knew at the event, but said I should be prepared for the cold. I had also seen on Brite Winter's Facebook page the official #FluriForecast from Cleveland 19 News Chief Meteorologist Jason Nicholas -- it would be cold. When I arrived just before 8:00 pm, I heard several people comment on the cold.

Brite Winter Vision Statement: ". . . to build community while helping us embrace the cold winter months. . . . We embrace our core values of positivity, community, creativity, artistic excellence, and accessibility." Remembering to embrace the cold in a positive manner, and acknowledging that it was not really that cold for winter in Cleveland -- come on folks, it is a full 11 degrees warmer than Brite Winter 2014 -- I dressed for the weather and a great time at Brite Winter 2024!

I enjoyed the musical performances Saturday night! I think many people attending that night learned that it is not cold out in winter in Cleveland on a February night if you keep dancing the night away!

Congratulations, Brite Winter, on a successful event for your 15th incredible year. I look forward to attending your 16th year in 2025, and more beyond.

NOTE from Stuart: On January 2, 2024, I was asked by the University Hospitals Harrington Heart & Vascular Institute Senior Media Relations Strategist to have my story added to The Science of Health blog and the Heart & Vascular Patient Stories sections of the University Hospitals website for February -- American Heart Month. I provided the photo for the story, and approved the story before it was published on the hospital's website.

The reason that I chose to publish this HCM recovery blog post today, Wednesday, February 28, 2024, was because the Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy Association announced that today was HCM Awareness Day.

As we come to the end of American Heart Month 2024, I am glad to have permission from University Hospitals to share their blog post about my HCM recovery story with you on my blog.

We enjoyed the second day of the Cleveland's Year of the Dragon Lunar New Year Celebration at Asia Plaza on February 11, 2024, and then went to the 2024 Year of the Dragon Downtown Akron Lunar New Year Celebration at Akron Civic Theatre on February 18, 2024. We enjoyed participating in both of these celebrations, and wanted to create this blog post to share with you some of what we saw.

We hope this 2024 Lunar New Year Celebration blog post encourage others to go out and explore more of Northeast Ohio!

Welcome to the 2024 Trail Challenge, a guest led program where you are challenged to complete 10 trails in 10 different Cleveland Metroparks reservations on your own in 2024! Explore new trails, move to better health, discover the wonders of nature, and earn a prize.

My wife and co-blogger, Julie, and I have completed the Cleveland Metroparks Trail Challenge in the past, taking most of the year to do it. This year, I decided to do something different, and complete the challenge in one week. I picked the first full week of February (5 days: February 5-9, 2024) to hike "... in 10 different Cleveland Metroparks reservations ..." In total, I hiked five days on 14 trails in ten reservations, and worked out at a gym on four of the mornings. I also ended the week on Saturday, February 10, 2024, by attending a Northeastern Ohio Orienteering Club event where they had developed a new map for the Geauga Park District's The West Woods.

What follows are some trail resources, followed by information and photos/videos from the trails I hiked. I hope this blog post encourages you to get out on our local park trails in 2024!

This, my fifth HCM blog post, is about my being interviewed on January 22, 2024, by Spectrum News 1 reporter Kimberly Perez. It is a continuation of the last HCM recovery blog post, and a result of my cardiologist, Eiran Gorodeski MD, MPH, recommending that I share my story on television. I refer to this as my second "recovery" blog post of my HCM series.

Hiking on the Buckeye Trail, starting two months after my open-heart surgery, was a big part of my recovering my strength, stamina, and balance. When I was contacted to be interviewed by Kimberly Perez from Spectrum News 1 on Monday, January 22, 2024, I thought it was very important to have the interview take place on the Buckeye Trail. I suggested she conduct the interview while we hiked together on the Buckeye Trail to the Bridal Veil Falls Scenic Overlook in the Cleveland Metroparks Bedford Reservation. These Falls are on a beautiful section of the trail that is easy to reach by a short walk from your car.

I arranged for my wife and co-blogger, Julie, to join us to take photos of the interview process. I am so glad that she was able to attend, since she captured the beauty of the area with her photography. The day after I posted photos, the Buckeye Trail Association shared my Facebook post with their 11,000+ Facebook followers.

The temperature was in the 30s when Kimberly Perez and I starting talking while walking down the trail. She used her smartphone to record my answers to her questions, as I told my story of past backpacking trips; my debilitating HCM symptoms in the spring of 2023; and my recovery, which led to my backpacking trip on the Appalachian Trail.

On Saturday, February 10, 2024, at the same time I was heading to a Northeastern Ohio Orienteering Club event, Spectrum News 1 posted their video about me. Please watch the video and accompanying article.

I am already planning more adventures in 2024, which are possible thanks to my successful open-heart surgery at University Hospitals.

I decided to write this blog post for two purposes:

• First, to thank the leadership of Maelstrom Collaborative Arts for their Saturnalia 2024 gathering which took place on Saturday, January 27, 2024.

  . . . kick off our sixth year with the return of Saturnalia, our night to celebrate the art and artsy made at Maelstrom Collaborative Arts!

• Second, and the more important reason, is that Saturnalia 2024 represents a return to normality, and kicks off the realization of more great art events in the future!

  Our last Saturnalia party was December 2019! Obviously, a lot has changed since then . . .
  
  We had such plans at that Saturnalia, plans that did not account for a global pandemic. But despite it all, we continued to make an array of boundary-pushing art.

I support what Maelstrom Collaborative Arts has created, and I was impressed by the friendliness of everyone at Saturnalia 2024. The format of the evening allowed the performers to become the audience for other performers, and therefore encouraged everyone to socialize.

I hope this blog post encourages you to learn more about Maelstrom Collaborative Arts and to partake in some of their entertainment!

I was fortunate to be able to attend the Friday, January 26, 2024, SOLD OUT DigitalC Citywide Network Launch Party -- so much information was shared that evening about what will be happening this year in Cleveland!

I am putting this blog post together for three reasons:

• First, to share a little about the interesting information I learned at the launch event and my past interest in DigitalC's work. Creative solutions to the digital divide issue in Cleveland has always been of interest to me.

• Second, to establish what I publish here as a starting benchmark of expectations. From this starting point, the community can measure the progress of DigitalC's staff as they move forward with the Cleveland digital revolution that they have envisioned.

• Finally, to make this my first step in fulfilling the commitment that all the attendees to the DigitalC Citywide Network Launch Party were asked to make: To support the mission of the organization using whatever resources you have available.

It is my hope that this blog post encourages you to join the people who attended the launch event in making the commitment to support the DigitalC mission.

On June 11, 2023, I ended my third Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy blog post questioning whether I would have a fourth "recovery" blog post:

Well, my idea of writing an HCM (hypertrophic cardiomyopathy) recovery blog post changed from a doubt to a must-do when my cardiologist, Eiran Gorodeski MD, MPH, recommended I share my story with others on television. He had University Hospitals Senior Media Relations Strategist Carly Belsterling contact me on October 16, 2023. After an initial interview with her, I met with TV-3 News Special Projects Reporter Lindsay Buckingham on December 5, 2023, at a special location. Dr. Gorodeski was also interviewed for the news story, and he shared how I have a specific type of heart failure called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy that affects about 750,000 Americans.

In this recovery blog post, I will share an update on the great progress I have made, information about the significance of the interview's location, and then the actual interview that was broadcast, along with its companion article.

On October 29, 2023, I started writing this blog post, but I was delayed in finishing it until the middle of December due to another family emergency and some back-end work on my sosAssociates.com website. I am glad that I have now completed this blog post, since the topic presented is part of a long-term trend I have written about in the past. It deals with the important work of improving the City of Cleveland's (and this region's) waterfront and park systems. The plan presented is very long-term, so I wanted to capture today's ideas, and compare them with the future reality.

PechaKucha Night Cleveland - Volume 39 - Untold Lakefront Stories took place on October 20, 2023, at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on Cleveland's NorthCoast Harbor.

This particular PechaKucha Night Cleveland was very unique!! It first presented the interesting history of Cleveland's Lakefront from a variety of cultural viewpoints, and then showed how the future will build on this past as outlined in the newly updated Cleveland’s North Coast Master Plan.

I also include in this blog post what was recently shared at follow-up presentations that took place after PechaKucha Night Cleveland Untold Lakefront Stories. We are fortunate that so much was shared online from these follow-up events.

The following are the sections of this blog post:

• Past Ingenuityfests Showed Hidden, Spectacular Lakefront Views!

• Images of Today's Lakefront

• October 20, 2023 - PechaKucha Night Cleveland: Untold Lakefront History
  Five Stories Told by Clevelanders for Clevelanders

  I loved the topic, Untold Lakefront Stories, and I enjoyed learning from the five presenters about their good work:

  1) Cynthia Connolly - Chair of the Lake Erie Native American Council
  2) Fran Stewart - Ohio Freedom Path (Underground Railroad)
  3) Keshia Johnson Chambers - Greenbook Cleveland
  4) Ferian Young - Asiatown Migration
  5) Andrew Sargeant - The Whole History

• October 20, 2023 - PechaKucha Night Cleveland:
  First Public Release of North Coast Lakefront Draft Master Plan

• October 20, 2023 - City of Cleveland Beautiful Night Views

• October 23, 2023 - Cleveland's North Coast Master Plan Virtual Draft Presentation

• November 1, 2023 - The City Club of Cleveland:
  Happy Dog Takes On Cleveland's Lakefront Development

• November 11, 2023 - Thank you, PechaKucha International, for your kind words!

• Related Blog Posts

I hope to look back at this blog post in future years after the project is completed and I am standing on the lakeshore enjoying the new lakefront of Cleveland.

Starting in 2010, I would annually announce/celebrate my Twitterversary at the beginning of October with a tweet, and on some years, a Twitterversary blog post. This year, with the owner of Twitter deciding to kill off the Twitter bird, and my being barred from using Twitter in any productive way, my Twitterversary is canceled for 2023. For me, the Twitter that I had known and found useful is now gone.

I am publishing this blog post about the end of Twitter on this, the last day of October 2023, as my way to:

• Thank those who commented about my departure publicly on what used to be Twitter

• Acknowledge the change (mourn the loss)

• Celebrate the past

Now that I have returned from my Appalachian Trail adventure trip, I want to take the time to publish this blog post about my visit to the Norman Rockwell Museum one month ago on Tuesday, September 26, 2023.

I had grown up with some humorous "Four Sporting Boys" Norman Rockwell prints that my mom framed for my room as a child, and which, as an adult, I put in my sons' room. I also was active in Scouting, and thus saw almost all of the Normal Rockwell "Boy Scouts" prints. They were displayed at the church where my troop had its meetings. The first time I visited the Norman Rockwell Museum, I thought I knew Norman Rockwell's artwork, but as I wrote in my thru-hike journal, seeing this original artwork was nothing less than amazing!!

However, I want to be clear that, as I learned on my first visit and confirmed on subsequent vists, while you may feel you know Norman Rockwell's work, it is not the same as seeing the original artwork. Look at the brush strokes -- get close and look at the texture -- take a museum guided tour to learn the story behind what you are seeing. Visit the Norman Rockwell Museum in person!

Every time I have visited the Norman Rockwell Museum, I have learned and seen something new. I hope this blog post encourages you to visit the museum if you are ever in Massachusetts. I look forward to visiting the museum again -- maybe even next year as I hike from Massachusetts into Vermont and beyond, as I continue north on the Appalachian Trail.

The day after attending IngenuityFest 2023: Biologies & Geologies (September 22 & 23, 2023), I left on a trip. Now that I have returned, I want to publicly express here how grateful I am to Ingenuity Cleveland leadership and their community partners for this year's gathering of creative people in Cleveland.

My son, Mike, and I enjoyed exploring the artistically lit caverns of Ingenuity Cleveland's 300,000-square-foot Hamilton Collaborative on the evening of Friday, September 22, 2023. There we found music, art, and much more!!

Then, on Saturday, September 23, 2023, Mike and I returned with our whole family to explore more. In addition to seeing more of the exhibitions I enjoyed Friday night, I spent time talking to people at the community organization booths in the upper part of the building. There is where I learned about the latest new happenings in Cleveland.

Since its founding in 2004, IngenuityFest has featured both technology and art. These are both areas that interest me greatly, so it is no surprise that I have been writing about IngenuityFest from the first year I started writing my blog in 2012.

I have been writing about IngenuityFest since 2012, but I have been taking my family to this great event for even longer. I look forward to attending again next year!

Starting with the 2012 Cleveland Museum of Art Chalk Festival, I have created a blog post every year to capture some of the incredible chalk art created on the Fine Arts Garden's stone pathways in front of the Cleveland Museum of Art. This includes both 2020, when #CMAChalkFestival was online only -- "Social Distancing Style" -- due to COVID-19, and 2021, when "a spur-of-the-moment trip south to take care of some family business prevented me from attending," but my son, Kevin F. Smith, saved the day by attending and sharing photos on social media.

I enjoyed creating chalk drawings at the event in 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017, but have not participated as an artist in recent years.

I am so glad I was able to attend the 34th Annual Cleveland Museum of Art Chalk Festival on Sunday, September 17, 2023 -- my 11th year taking photos and videos of the event. I hope you enjoy what I put together to capture the artwork and the atmosphere of the event.

Thank you, NASA Glenn Research Center, for the NASA Aviation Day which was a free, public event that took place on Wednesday, September 13, 2023, at the Cleveland IX Center. I enjoyed talking to NASA Aeronautics staff members. They shared their knowledge about new technology developments with great passion.

I am sharing my photos, videos, and comments about the day in this blog post, since I appreciated the opportunity to learn about the latest NASA developments for the aviation industry. I also want to thank Tom Kunsman for recommending that I attend this NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) event! I recommend following Tom on social media (on BlueSky), since he does an excellent job of promoting all things NASA happening in Cleveland.

I enjoyed the morning's panel discussions at NASA Aviation Day. I learned about very new technology and safety developments happening at NASA Aeronautics.

Four Transformations for Sustainability, Greater Mobility, and Economic Growth:

• ULTRA-EFFICIENT AIRLINERS
• FUTURE AIRSPACE AND SAFETY
• HIGH SPEED COMMERCIAL FLIGHT
• ADVANCED AIR MOBILITY

After the morning's NASA Aviation Day panel discussions, I toured the NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) display area. People usually associate NASA with space travel, but at this event, the emphasis was on the first "A" in NASA -- Aeronautics.

I truly enjoyed talking to NASA Aeronautics staff — they have such incredible passion for what they do, and are willing to share their knowledge as I ask questions .

NASA events are always interesting. I look forward to attending more of them in the future.

I want to start off this blog post by first congratulating the Cleveland Cultural Gardens Federation leadership and the many volunteers who contributed their time and talent to make this year's One World Day a grand success! Not only did they break a record for the number of participants in the 2023 Parade of Flags, but the Northeast Ohio community came together to support their vision of "peace through mutual understanding" by having a record number of people attending on Sunday, August 27, 2023!

I always have a great time at Cleveland's One World Day, and this year, the 77th Annual, I was fortunate that my wife and co-blogger, Julie, was available to join me in the fun! Looking at my past "Cleveland Cultural Gardens" blog posts, I see that it was ten years ago that I attended this Cleveland muti-cultural event for the first time. Wow, ten years ago! I am particularly impressed by the number of new gardens that continue to be created.

I am grateful to have been able to attend One World Day for these past 10 years, and I appreciate the leadership of the organizers for their work to continue and expand this great Cleveland tradition into the future!

I am so glad that I was able to attend the 10th Annual Buckeye TrailFest at Shawnee State Park, which was held Thursday - Sunday, August 17-20, 2023. As I wrote in my last blog post, Summer Vacation 2023: South Haven, Michigan and Merry-Go-Round Museum, I have been very busy since recovering from my April surgery, but I still wanted to take the time to put together this blog post for two reasons that are important to me:

1. I want to encourage others to learn about the Buckeye TrailFest and the important work of the Buckeye Trail Association in maintaining the longest trail in any one state in this country.

2. The main purpose of this blog post is to thank the organizers and presenters of the Buckeye TrailFest 2023 for sharing their talents to create a successful event. I am very grateful for all their efforts to make a welcoming and educational event for all attendees.

I look forward to more journeys on Ohio's long trail -- the Buckeye Trail -- in my future.

We wanted to share our summer vacation with you, so we created this blog post to capture our experiences in and around South Haven, Michigan, and at the Merry-Go-Round Museum in Sandusky, Ohio. Originally, we had planned a trip to Alaska for August 2023 that we decided to cancel due to the uncertainty about Stuart's recovery following his surgery. We thought it was best to make our 2023 vacation within a day's drive from our home. South Haven is just over four and a half hours from Cleveland.

We organized this blog post around Stuart's photos and videos about different parts of our vacation:

Monday, July 31, 2023 - Monday, August 7, 2023, Michigan Vacation

• Sunset Inn Bed & Breakfast

• South Haven, Michigan

• Waterfront: Lake Michigan & Black River

• Day Three: Wednesday, August 2, 2023 - Kal-Haven Bike Trail

• Day Four: Thursday, August 3, 2023 - Day Trip to Saugatuck, Michigan

• Day Five: Friday, August 4, 2023 - Van Buren Bike Trail

• Day Seven: Sunday, August 6, 2023 - Michigan Maritime Museum

Monday/Tuesday, August 7 - 8, 2023 - Exploring Sandusky & Huron, Ohio

• Day Eight: Monday, August 7, 2023 - Afternoon/Evening Exploring Sandusky, Ohio

• Day Nine: Tuesday - August 8, 2023 - Merry-Go-Round Museum

• Day Nine: Tuesday, August 8, 2023 - Afternoon Exploring Huron, Ohio

We hope you enjoy learning about our vacation!

We were very grateful to be able to go on this wonderful vacation after the events that occurred earlier this year.

A year ago, I learned about and planned on attending the grand opening of the Cleveland Foundation's new headquarters building in 2023. I had learned that the building was going to be much more than the Foundation's home for their staff to work in -- it will also be a resource for the greater community to use! A new role in the community for the Foundation -- very exciting! I looked forward to the opening and to being part of the community celebration.

Next, in May 2023, it was announced that in addition to the new beginning with a new building, there would be a change in Cleveland Foundation professional leadership -- President & CEO Ronn Richard's retirement would lead to the installation of Lillian Kuri as the new leader of the Foundation on August 1, 2023.

Finally, as I attended the Cleveland Foundation 2023 Annual Meeting and open house/tour, I learned about more new beginnings -- a second building!!

In this blog post, I will share announcements that were made before the 2023 Annual Meeting and related festivities, and then write about my experiences at the following celebrations:

• Thursday, July 13, 2023 - Annual Meeting Celebrating Community Service

• Friday, July 14, 2023 - Cleveland City Club Meeting: Honoring Ronn Richard's History of Service

• Saturday, July 15, 2023 - New Headquarters Opening Dedication

• Saturday, July 15, 2023 - Exploring the New Cleveland Foundation Headquarters

• Saturday, July 15, 2023 - Celebratory Performances for the KeyBank Dance and Arts Studio

I learned about another reason to celebrate in the near future:

• THE FUTURE! - Another New Building To Come!!

For me, the timing of the Cleveland History Days 2023 was perfect, since it was two months after my septal myectomy open-heart surgery at University Hospitals, and I was finally able to be active again for the first time in 2023.

With over 50 events happening during Cleveland History Days 2023, I was grateful to the organizations that hosted so many interesting activities. I did elect to skip the the Cleveland "Take A Hike" tours, since I was unsure of myself doing a lot of walking, but near the end of the 10 days of activities, I felt well enough to attend the "Ohio Freedom Path Hike" on Saturday, July 1, 2023. I can highly recommend the Cleveland "Take A Hike" tours from attending them with my wife in the past. I have heard that in recent years they have developed new tour locations and updated old favorite tours.

I was so impressed with all that was happening during these 10 days, that I wanted to capture what I could in my blog post. I hope you enjoy the following and share with others. Remember that even though Cleveland History Days is only once a year, most of the the places it features are available to explore year round!

Please read about the following:

• Friday, June 23, 2023 - Cleveland History Days Opening Ceremony

• Friday, June 23, 2023 - Cuyahoga County – Rediscover The Detroit-Superior Bridge: Community Conversation

• Saturday, June 24, 2023 - Cuyahoga River Rally

• Sunday, June 25, 2023 - Open House at The Historic B&O Roundhouse

• Tuesday, June 27, 2023 - Buckeye Trail

• Saturday, July 1, 2023 - Ohio Freedom Path Hike

• Saturday, July 1, 2023 - Talk at Cleveland Public Library: “The Other Trails of Tears: The Removal of the Ohio Indians”

In this third and final blog post about my December 2022 through spring 2023 experiences with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, I share information about my week on the University Hospitals third-floor in both the Cardiothoracic ICU (intensive care unit), and then the post-surgical telemetry unit. I end the blog post writing about my first week and month at home.

It is interesting how my progress was not linear -- I had bad times after good. My strength and pain came and went away with no logical relation to what I was doing.

After the first week at home (May 4-11, 2023), issues arose that seriously slowed me down. Apparently, my successful first week of feeling energetic enough to walk was not the norm. Very similar to my experience in the hospital, my progress was not linear -- I had bad times after good.

It is hard to explain -- at the same time I felt so much better than I had for the first four months of this year with my hypertrophic cardiomyopathy symptoms, I now had problems caused by the after-effects of the surgery. The debilitating symptoms from having a deformed heart caused by HCM were eliminated by the surgery, but the surgery caused issues!

On March 28, 2023, Cardiologist Eiran Gorodeski MD, MPH., my wife, and I reviewed my options now that CAMZYOS® (mavacamten) was shown to not be a successful treatment for my hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM).

Before the meeting, I identified and researched what I thought were my five options going forward after the CAMZYOS® failed to work for me. I put together a spreadsheet with columns laying out the pros and cons of all five options, along with my questions for the two most likely options. I brought my laptop with the spreadsheet to my appointment with the results of my research.

In reality, I already knew before the appointment that I was down to just two valid options, but I was glad that I prepared for the appointment so that my choices were based on research and not just emotion.

The cardiologist appointment ended with Dr. Gorodeski making a referral for one appointment (on April 7, 2023) with both Interventional Cardiologist Anene Ukaigwe, MD, and Cardiac Surgeon Yasir Abu-Omar, MD, to get their opinion on if I was a good candidate for alcohol septal ablation and/or septal myectomy.

 

As I wrote in my "2022 Reflections" blog post, I was very active last year, but I ended the year having reservations on what the new year would bring.

With all of my activities in 2022, and throughout my life, you would not know that I had a progressive, genetic heart disease that would lead me to have to stop almost all my activities as I started 2023.

Being diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy reminds me again (since I already knew) why I made time in recent years to hike sections of America's long trails (Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail, and Continental Divide Trail) and stay active attending events in the Cleveland/Akron area while I still had my health. I plan to return to my normal, active life after I find a successful treatment.

As you will read in this blog post about my condition, you will learn that despite having hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, modern medicine does offer hope for getting rid of the debilitating symptoms.

Today, March 8, 2023, I celebrate eleven years of creating my sosAssociates.com blog!!

“The Only Thing That Is Constant Is Change -”
-- Heraclitus.

In my 2021 sosAssociates.com Blogiversary: Nine -- In the year of Social Distancing! blog post, I wrote about how the world had changed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. On March 8th of last year, as I published my blog post sosAssociates.com Blogiversary: Ten -- I can't believe this is the TENTH YEAR!!, I was fairly prepared for change -- on February 10, 2022, my dad had moved to the Cleveland area so that my sister and I could care for him. Unfortunately, as we entered 2023, my dad, Stuart O. Smith, Sr., passed away on the morning of Friday, January 6, 2023, at the age of 89.

Now, as I write my 2023 Blogiversary blog post, I am in the middle of another potentially life-changing situation, but I believe I have a good support team that will help me find a successful solution to overcome the current challenge. I hope to write a blog post later this year to document my planned success.

The focus of my blog posts has evolved over these 11 years since my co-writer and wife, Julie Smith, and I started writing our blog posts on March 8, 2012. I enjoy documenting activities in which I participate, and invite you to read my blog posts that cover topics of interest to you.

We want to share the fun we had on Monday, January 16, 2023, where the "City meets the Lake" (Cleveland's North Coast Harbor) on the day our nation honors the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. Thank you to the Great Lakes Science Center and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and Museum for opening their doors admission-free to the public on this special day!

For the past eight years, I have ended the old year and started the new year by creating thank-you tweets as a way to show my gratitude to the many people and organizations that had a positive impact on the lives of my family this past year. I would then compile those tweets, along with others from the year, into a year-end blog post that I would invite you to read.

From mid-September 2022 through the end of the year, my wife and I have had several challenges involving more than one family member, and we knew we would enter the new year with some uncertainty. This caused me to delay the process of creating my annual, new year blog post until the middle of the first month of the new year (Sunday, January 15, 2023).

I want to now share some of my adventures and activities from this past year, and state how I appreciate those people/organizations that enriched my life in 2022. I am also using the blog post to honor my dad, Stuart O. Smith, Sr., and express how grateful I am to have had a great deal of quality time with him this past year.

I want to wish you who are reading this blog post all the best as we begin a new year full of possibilities!

Thank you to The City Club and the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District (NEORSD) for the Tuesday, October 11, 2022, "... unique tour inside NEORSD’s sewer system at Edgewater Beach." The following is about the sewer tour, along with additional information about NEORSD and its water outfall near Cleveland Metroparks Edgewater Beach.

I am so glad that I saw @TheCityClub's September 27th morning tweet, so I could sign up to be one of the 20 participants for the Tuesday, October 11, 2022, tour.

I was glad to read that so many people were interested in the 50 Years of Clean Water Investment event that The City Club had to create a waiting list! For years, I have been interested in seeing what was beyond the Edgewater entrance gate of the sewer. I was grateful to be one of the few fortunate people who were allowed to go on the tour.

I normally spend three full days at the annual IngenuityFest Weekend, but family commitments only allowed me to visit on Saturday, September 24, 2022, for three hours in the evening. I was so impressed with the event, I want to share in this blog post the photos/videos that I and others shared about the weekend. After 2020's IngenuityFest being canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and last year being an outdoor event at the Cleveland Metroparks, it was good to be back at a more traditional IngenuityFest Weekend of creativity at the Hamilton Collaborative location.

I also want to mention that one of the highlights, in addition to the incredible displays and performances, was reconnecting with people that I have not seen in person the last few years. It has been a difficult time for many people, and I am grateful to the artists who are IngenuityFest, and the sponsors that support their work.

Chalk Festival

Saturday and Sunday, September 10 and 11, 12:00–5:00 p.m.
Fine Arts Garden

Children and adults enjoy this annual event where community members join professional artists in using the walkways around the Fine Arts Garden as a colorful canvas. Begun in 1990, our festival is a modern expression of a Renaissance tradition from 16th-century Italy in which beggars copied paintings of the Madonna by Raphael and his contemporaries using chalk on the plazas outside cathedrals. Watching the chalk artists and enjoying the entertainment is free.

I was so glad to be back in person after two years!! In 2020, for the 31st annual Cleveland Museum of Art's Chalk Festival, the event went virtual due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Last year, "I was very disappointed that a spur-of-the-moment trip south to take care of some family business prevented me from attending ... " but "I was rewarded greatly by the Cleveland Twitterverse," who posted their photos online so that I was able to share them in my blog post.

I was so pleased that the 33rd Annual Chalk Festival would take place in the Fine Arts Garden on Saturday/Sunday, September 10 and 11, 2022, rain or shine! These were dates I could attend!!

The following is my eleventh Cleveland Chalk Festival blog post. I really enjoy seeing the creativity each year (which is why I even wrote blog posts for the two years I enjoyed remotely). Please retweet any tweets that have photos of chalk artwork you enjoy to encourage more people to attend and participate in future years!

Oh, Gods of Dust and Rainbows, the second iteration of FRONT International, will run from July 16 through October 2, 2022. Building on the success of the first edition, FRONT 2022 will further the Triennial’s commitment to stimulating new and sustained cultural conversations within the region.

The following blog post is from my tour of FRONT International and CAN Triennial venues in University Circle on several days in July/August 2022, and about the Friday, July 29, 2022, PechaKucha Night Cleveland event. I had planned on publishing this blog post on Friday, August 26, 2022, which is the day I went to the Akron FRONT International venues, but got busy with some family commitments and did not have time to finish writing everything I wanted to add to the blog post.

I have now decided to just publish this blog post "as is" (please read the tweets text to get most of the story) before FRONT International closes on October 2, 2022.

After missing 2020 and going virtual in 2021 due to COVID-19 safety considerations, at the start of 2022, the Cleveland GiveCamp Steering Committee was open to new possibilities as to what form the free tech solutions would be provided to local nonprofits.

Cleveland GiveCamp 2022 stayed with the weekend format of nonprofit teams and standup progress meetings, but new this year was:

• the location -- Hyland
• the month -- August instead of the traditional third Saturday in July
• offering a hybrid option -- a combination of remote and in-person volunteers, which one nonprofit team utilized

In this blog post, I will:

• convey what happened before and during the August 12-14, 2022, Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend
• thank the volunteers and sponsors that made it possible
• share information about the nonprofits served

While the most important activity happens over Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend, when the tech solutions are actually developed for the Nonprofit Partners, Cleveland GiveCamp is a year-round organization plannings and preparing for the weekend of service.

I am creating this blog post to capture my memories of three exhibits that I visited with members of my family on two days in July. Each of these exhibits has a unique connection to me and/or my family:

• "Euclid Beach Park Days" at the Cleveland History Center.
  July 23 @ 10:00 am - July 24 @ 4:00 pm

• The second “Year of the Motorcycle” exhibit at the Crawford Auto-Aviation Museum in the Cleveland History Center.

• On July 29, 30, and 31, Lake Metroparks Farmpark hosted the "Historical Engine Society’s 51st Annual Antique Power" Exhibition.

On Sunday, July 24, 2022, I visited the Western Reserve Historical Society's Cleveland History Center, and a week later, on Sunday, July 31, 2022, I visited Lake Metroparks Farmpark. In addition to the personal connection of these events, it was interesting to compare the motorcycle engines with the engines shown at the Farmpark.

•  Sunday, July 24, 2022 - My Son's Amusement Park Memorabilia Collection at "Euclid Beach Park Days"

• Mark Your Calendar! September 25, 2022!
  Announcing the 17th Annual "Remembering the Sights and Sounds of Euclid Beach Park!"

• Sunday, July 24, 2022 - My Son and I Study the Motorcycle Mechanics at the "Year of the Motorcycle" Exhibition

• Sunday, July 31, 2022 - My Dad and I Study Tractors and Small Engines at the "Historical Engine Society's 51st Annual Antique Power" Exhibition

Dear Stuart,

I am excited to share with you an update and an invitation to celebrate the opening of the second edition of FRONT International: Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art. Prem Krishnamurthy, our FRONT 2022 Artistic Director, has assembled a brilliant exhibition sprawling across 30 venues in Northeast Ohio and featuring a dazzling array of over 100 artists, including art stars like Julie Mehretu, Firelei Baez, Renée Green, Yoshitomo Nara, Jacolby Satterwhite.

Anticipation is high, and the press is calling FRONT one of the must-see art events of the year, along with documenta and the Venice Bienalle.

The title of FRONT 2022, Oh, Gods of Dust and Rainbows is inspired by a couplet by Langston Hughes, . . .

Our preview days are July 14 and 15, and we would be delighted to have you join artists and art lovers from across the country to share a packed calendar of events and programming. . . .

Laura and I  would be pleased to have you as our guests for an open house brunch at our home from 10:00 to 12:00 on July 15 and 16. . . .

Of course, FRONT runs through October 2, and we would love to see you any time this Summer. I would love to hear your thoughts and impressions.

With warm regards,
Fred Bidwell
Executive Director

I am grateful that Fred Bidwell emailed me an invitation to attend the 2022 FRONT International: Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art preview events. It was great to learn more about, and get an advanced look at some of the venues before “Oh, Gods of Dust and Rainbows” opened to the public on July 16, 2022. It runs through October 2, 2022.

As background, I put together both "Preview Exhibition" and "Personal Prequel" blog posts, which cover my interests and activities relating to FRONT International between the 2018 events and the start of the 2022.

The scope of this second FRONT International is so large that the preview barely gave a nibble of the full banquet of northeast Ohio art that is now available for exploration. As I prepared this blog post, I learned more and more, but also realized that there still is much more to learn. In 2018, my wife and co-blogger, Julie, enjoyed visiting and blogging about many of the venues we visited, and we look forward to exploring the new art at the 2022 venues.

This blog post includes both the two days of preview events and the kickoff block party, plus additional information:

• Thursday, July 14, 2022 -
  * FRONT Press Conference - Cleveland Museum of Art

  - Provenance Café and Importance of Accessibility to FRONT Venues
  - FRONT Web Resources
  - Inaugural FRONT Art Futures Fellows

   

• Friday, July 15, 2022 -
  * Director’s Open House Brunch Presented by J.P. Morgan Private Bank - Fred & Laura Bidwell Home
  * Remembering Tamir Rice
  * Friday, July 15, 2022 - Picnic Lunch - University Circle
  * CIA Sparkling Toast Exhibition Preview - Cleveland Institute of Art, Reinberger Gallery
  * FRONT VIP Preview Party - moCa  Cleveland (Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland)
  * CWRU Mandel School & Western Reserve Historical Society Grand Carousel

• Saturday, July 16, 2022 -
  * FRONT BLOCK PARTY - Cleveland Public Square, Gund Foundation Green

I entitled this blog post starting with the words "Personal Prequel," since it covers my interests and activities relating to FRONT International: Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art, between the 2018 events and the start of the 2022 events. It certainly does not include all that has taken place between the years of the first event and the second, but instead is my attempt to capture some of the spirit of FRONT International that I enjoy.

I wanted to make a point to thank Fred and Laura Bidwell for opening their home to announce the plans for the next FRONT International: Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art.

I am writing this blog post as we enter the kickoff week of FRONT International. Please watch and share with others the tweets I share as I attend events, and watch for future blog posts. Also, feel free to tag me on Twitter as you explore FRONT International venues and activities, so I can share in your enjoyment, and retweet.

Over the years, I have attended Cleveland Shakespeare Festival shows at many venues around northeast Ohio, and I have even participated in their "Open Mic Shakespeare" nights at Negative Space Gallery and Mac's Backs Books. While I have enjoyed Cleveland Shakespeare Festival actors' performances at all the outdoor venues where I have seen them perform, it was at the James A. Garfield National Historic Site on July 1, 2017, that I learned of the Garfield connection with Shakespeare. I learned that the Garfield family often entertained themselves reading Shakespeare's plays!

This connection that President Garfield and his family had with William Shakespeare made Saturday, July 2, 2022, even more interesting to me as I enjoyed seeing:

• Moreland Hills Historical Society James A. Garfield Birth Site Park

• James A. Garfield National Historic Site

• Cleveland Shakespeare Festival production of Hamlet

I had a truly serendipitous moment that led me to a very enjoyable time talking to a Moreland Hills Historical Society volunteer, Debbie, at the James A. Garfield Birth Site! I had not planned on visiting the birthplace, but happened to drive by it and decided to stop.

On the James A. Garfield National Historic Site house tour, I took a lot of photos to try to capture the feeling of the house, but you really need to take the tour yourself to experience it.

...The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king.

Congratulations to Cleveland Shakespeare Festival on your 25th season! I am glad to be able to celebrate this accomplishment by attending your production of Hamlet at a fitting location -- the James A. Garfield National Historic Site.

I want to thank the James A. Garfield Birth Site, James A. Garfield National Historic Site, and Cleveland Shakespeare Festival for the interesting and entertaining day. I highly encourage you to participate in the activities of these three organizations.

I hope this blog post encourages you to explore theatrical productions of Shakespeare’s work, and to learn about the 20th U.S. President's life in Ohio.

It was hot in Cleveland on Saturday, June 25, 2022, but despite the heat, it was a great day to explore our city's evolving riverfront at the Canalway Partners 2022 Cuyahoga River Rally. I have written several blog posts about discovering the waterfront along the Cuyahoga River, and how every year the access improves. Thank you to Canalway Partners for bringing everyone together to learn about our river.

Canalway Partners' Cuyahoga River Rally is part of Cleveland History Days, a week-long celebration of our city’s rich legacy.

I am so glad I brought my bike to the River Rally! While I have biked this area along the Cuyahoga River many times, I visited some new trails. The director of Ohio City Bicycle Co-op, Jim Sheehan,  shared some interesting history of the river.

While I already did follow @Cuyahoga_AOC (Advisory Committee for the Cuyahoga River Area of Concern) on Twitter, I was not aware of the "Cuyahoga River Area of Concern" designation by the EPA, which I learned about on the walk. I look forward to learning more about the AOC, and I enjoyed learning about future plans for this part of the waterfront.

It was great to meet Eddie Olschansky who, as the founder of Trash Fish, spends his days cleaning area rivers in northeast Ohio. He organizes volunteers to go out on kayaks and pick up trash.

Near the end of the rally, I enjoyed talking to some members of the Canalway Partners Board of Directors about their important work. It is amazing what has been accomplished in the 35-year history of Canalway Partners.

I want to finish this blog post by not only thanking Canalway Partners for their 2022 Cuyahoga River Rally, but also for their ongoing work to improve the quality of life by developing new resources to enjoy Cleveland's riverfront.

I hope you find the resources I shared in this blog post useful as you find our own fun and adventures along Cleveland's riverfront!

3 of 3: Fun Father's Day Weekend: Sunday -- Amusement Preservation Museum & Old Northwest Territory Primitive Rendezvous

• The fun places my family took me for Father's Day 2022
• Amusement Preservation Museum -- See photos from this incredible collection and watch the videos of the “Swingin’ Gyms."
• 32nd Old Northwest Territory Primitive Rendezvous at Medina County Parks's Hidden Hollow Camp. I invite you to look at the photos closely to see the old-time skills that the participants demonstrated
• Princess Ledges Nature Preserve, Medina County Parks

I decided to create these three blog posts to remind me of the three days of fun I had over Father's Day Weekend. The text is the same at the beginning of all three, so I encourage you to read the tweets within the posts that tell the story of:

2 of 3: Fun Father's Day Weekend: Saturday -- Service Project & The Longest Day of Play

Read tweets below in this blog post to learn about:

• Northeast Ohio Orienteering Club (NEOOC) service project at Richfield Heritage Preserve
  Be sure to click on the links in the tweets to learn about both of these great organizations!
• Cleveland Metroparks  “The Longest Day of Play” at Euclid Beach
• Cleveland United Way 2-1-1 service
• Plastic Free Lake Erie
• Step Forward - Ohio's designated anti-poverty agency for Cuyahoga County with early childhood education programs, adult skills training, and other services
• Especially large waves on Lake Erie on this windy day. Be sure to view the videos of the waves.
• Cleveland Metroparks Euclid Beach concessions serving Honey Hut Ice Cream
• Drum circle and dancing
• Ohio Sea Grant

I decided to create these three blog posts to remind me of the three days of fun I had over Father's Day Weekend. The text is the same at the beginning of all three, so I encourage you to read the tweets within the posts that tell the story of:

1 of 3: Fun Father's Day Weekend: Friday -- Blue Heron Homecoming

Read tweets below in this blog post to learn about:

• Taking my dad to the Blue Heron Homecoming event
• Summit Soil & Water Conservation District
• Free cookout thanks to Lock 3 and Akron City Recreation Department
• Akron Zoo staff showing how to practice good recycling/composting practices
• Cuyahoga Valley National Park

It feels appropriate that the first blog post I am writing since my Continental Divide Trail backpacking adventure in April 2022 is about a National Trails Day^® event -- the Buckeye Trail Association's Biggest Day Hike, which took place on Saturday, June 4, 2022.

It is great that the Buckeye Trail Association (@HikeTheBT) invited everyone to participate in celebrating Ohio's long trail by pledging to travel a segment of this over 1,400-mile trail for National Trails Day^® 2022. This is the third year for the Buckeye Trail Association's Biggest Day Hike, which had the goal of having hikers/biker/horseback riders collectively complete the ENTIRE Buckeye Trail in one day.

Thank you, American Hiking Society and their sponsors/partners, for National Trails Day^®!! It is a great way to bring awareness of all the great trails we have in our country.

It was great to see so many US trail organizations participate in National Trails Day^® 2022. In addition to being a member of the Buckeye Trail Association (@HikeTheBT), I am a member of several other trail organizations.

I hope you find the resources I shared in this blog post useful as you find our own trail adventures. Happy Trails to you!

My co-writer and wife, Julie Smith, and I started writing our blog posts on March 8, 2012. I can't believe this is my tenth blogiversary for sosAssociates.com!!! While the focus of this blog post has evolved over these ten years, the joy it brings in documenting activities in which I participate has continued!

Saturday, February 26, 2022, a day of outdoor Cleveland winter fun -- Cleveland Kurentovanje and Brite Winter!!!

This year, I attended two events where I joined with other people who laughed at the Cleveland cold by attending outdoor celebrations! After years of hearing about Cleveland Kurentovanje (koo-rehn-toh-VAHN-yeh), I finally attended this "Slovenian Mardi Gras" parade and festival in the afternoon. I then continued the fun with Brite Winter, which I enjoy every year.

"... reimagine the possibilities for representing motherhood" - . . . You can't experience the depth of Picturing Motherhood Now by looking at photos on a website. You must see it in person to not only study the artwork closely, but also to read the messages that accompany the artwork. I know that I will need to return again to the museum to see the pieces I missed, and to look again at the artwork I found interesting.

The paragraph above is from the blog post that Stuart wrote after attending the Thursday, October 14, 2021, Picturing Motherhood Now Media & Influencer Event and Members Preview Party, where he knew that he would need to use our Cleveland Museum of Art membership benefit to return to see the exhibition again. This blog post includes our @sos_jr tweets and retweets sharing photos from our visit to Picturing Motherhood Now on Wednesday, January 26, 2022.

Stuart enjoyed his return visit, especially since he was joined by Julie, who brought new insight to this motherhood exhibition.

After our visit to Picturing Motherhood Now, we saw a display about the Cleveland Museum of Art's Motherhood Across Time tour in the area adjacent to the Ames Family Atrium. This tour takes you through the museum's collection to discover other works of art related to motherhood. Download the ArtLens App to learn more about museum tours.

As we have done the past seven years, we invite you to read our #NewYearsDay 2022 #ThankYou blog post in which we thank the many people and organizations that had a positive impact on our lives in 2021. This is our annual greeting as we end 2021 to all who read our blog, wishing you all the best as we begin a new year full of possibilities!

Our immediate family has been very fortunate in these past two difficult years, to be healthy and able to adjust to the lifestyle changes caused by the coronavirus crisis. Our thoughts are with those who have been ill or who have lost loved ones to COVID-19.

2021 was our ninth year of blogging. As the year progressed in 2021, we were glad to finally stop writing our Social Distancing blog post series. but of course we are currently concerned about how the COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact our community. We are also back to very strict social distancing protocols, which we started following again in mid-December 2021.

At 12:00 midnight New Year's Eve, we sent out an email to family members with a link to our 22nd annual family holiday web page. This is a family tradition through which we not only share our activities for the year, but it also becomes a record of our family history.

The following are tweets and retweets shared on the first day of the new year, and related tweets. The retweets represent some of what occurred during the year and others of particular interest. We also created tweets to thank many individuals and organizations that positively impacted our lives during 2021.

Wishing All Good People on the Twitterverse and Those People Who Read Our Blog Posts a Great Year in 2022!

The Cleveland Public Library, for their Ninth Annual Maker Faire Cleveland, did the event a little differently than in past years. Instead of just a one-day maker event, they planned "family-friendly, free events at Cleveland Public Library locations across the city" for a full week! The week-long maker activities culminated in the Maker Faire Cleveland Showcase 2021 on Saturday, November 20th, at the Great Lakes Science Center.

In this blog post, we will share tweets with photos/videos leading up to and including our attendance at the Maker Faire Cleveland Showcase 2021.

A BIG thank-you to Tom Kunsman who made it a point to be sure that we knew about the Showcase. If it weren't for his tweet, we might have missed this year's event.

In addition to the Cleveland Public Library's Cleveland Maker Faire, we also learned about the The Best Buy Teen Tech Center, which is in partnership with The Clubhouse Network.

Thank you, Cleveland Public Library, for the FREE night at the Great Lakes Science Center for the Maker Faire Cleveland Showcase 2021! We appreciate that the Cleveland Public Library plans interesting tech and NASA-related events. We have attended several of them! The library is "The People's University" in Cleveland.

I have enjoyed attending Akron-Summit County Public Library maker events many times over the years. Thankfully, I learned that Akron Makes would be held Saturday, November 13, 2021, when I saw tweets from the Akron-Summit County Public Library and Summit Artspace. If not for these tweets, I would have missed this fun event!

I was very impressed with the kids who demonstrated their Scratch programming. It is fun to stop and listen to kids as they teach you about their programming projects.

It was very appropriate that a lot of the Akron Makes took place in the library's TechZone makerspace, so visitors to the event would also know what is available at the library year-round.

After leaving Akron Makes, I stopped briefly at Summit Artspace to see their Betty and Howard Taylor main gallery. I wish I had more time to see all their art galleries, since I really enjoyed what I saw in the main gallery from the 19th Annual Kaleidoscope Juried Exhibition. While at Summit Artspace, I was fortunate to meet their new Executive Director, Heather Meeker, who was greeting visitors as they entered.

This blog post shares what I learned about the Cleveland Museum of Art's Revealing Krishna: Journey to Cambodia’s Sacred Mountain exhibition before its opening, and while attending the preview on Friday, November 12, 2021. I was fortunate to be able to tour the exhibition before its opening to the public on November 14, 2021, and I want to encourage everyone to visit before it closes on January 30, 2022.

The Revealing Krishna HoloLens tour was more powerful than I expected. I have tried HoloLens before, but the way the museum used it to tell the story of the Cleveland Krishna statue was excellent. It was a very effective use of this technology to further the story behind the artwork!

I also included information about the historical Christmas decorations I saw at the Western Reserve Historical Society's Cleveland History Center while I was in University Circle.

"... reimagine the possibilities for representing motherhood" - I had received an invitation in early October for the Thursday, October 14, 2021, preview of Picturing Motherhood Now, and started reading about and looking at photographs from the exhibition on the Cleveland Museum of Art's website. Based on what I saw, I developed a preconception about the exhibition, which I have to admit was not on target. You can't experience the depth of Picturing Motherhood Now by looking at photos on a website. You must see it in person to not only study the artwork closely, but also to read the messages that accompany the artwork. I know that I will need to return again to the museum to see the pieces I missed, and to look again at the artwork I found interesting.

I was also excited about being able to enjoy the art as part of a social experience -- being with other people at the Cleveland Museum of Art! The Picturing Motherhood Now preview was not completely part of a return to "normal life," since the COVID-19 pandemic is still with us, but it is a great start. The following reflects the excitement of joining with others to enjoy the experience which is the Cleveland Museum of Art.

After commenting on Twitter how seeing the Tony Tasset: Judy’s Hand Pavilion reminded me of FRONT International 2018, I received a reply tweet from FRONT International Executive Director Fred Bidwell saying "more to come!" Therefore, I knew to watch for something to happen soon regarding FRONT International 2022, which led me to see the announcement about the Friday, October 8, 2021, FRONT 2022 Preview Exhibition Opening & Party: Grand Prototypes, Humble Tools at Transformer Station!! This blog post shares what I saw at the preview party and some of what I learned about next year's FRONT International 2022.

The interesting part of this opening was that this is not the final version of these artists' creations, since the artwork is continuing to evolve as part of preparing for FRONT 2022. Instead, the exhibition asks the following questions as part of this evolution: "How can the everyday processes of artmaking be transformative for artists and their communities? How can art catalyze healing?"

This blog post is about the creative and historical events I attended Friday, September 24, 2021, through Sunday, September 26, 2021:

• moCa Cleveland (Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland) and more in University Circle
  
  In 2020 (pre-COVID-19 vaccine),  I stopped going to moCa Cleveland, so in 2021 (after being fully vaccinated), I had gotten out of the habit of looking to see what the new exhibits were at the museum. Therefore, I greatly appreciated receiving the following Twitter direct message on September 6, 2021, from @moCaCleveland reminding me to visit: "Stuart, have you been in to see our new season? Just an fyi we have a new Sr Marketing Director . . . moCa hopes all is well."

• Ingenuity at the Lake
  
  When I first arrived at Ingenuity at the Lake, I did not know what to expect. I ended up really enjoying some of the yard games with my family, and of course talking to people from different organizations providing services to our community.

• 16th Annual Remembering The Sights & Sounds of Euclid Beach Park
  
  My son, Kevin F. Smith, displays his Euclid Beach Park memorabilia collection every year. Learn more details about the history of this amusement park, and how Kevin and my wife, Julie, are on the board of Euclid Beach Park Now.

The purpose of this blog post is to capture the photos we shared on Twitter during our trip south -- Tuesday, September 7, 2021, through Wednesday, September 15, 2021.

With Cleveland GiveCamp 2020 being canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was known from the very beginning of planning for the eleventh Cleveland GiveCamp in 2021 that flexibility would be needed.

Two decisions were made early on to ensure a safe event in this time of a once-in-a-century pandemic:

• First, to move the Cleveland GiveCamp 2021 Weekend from the third weekend in July to the fall. This would allow extra time for volunteers to get the coronavirus vaccination and to have time to learn from others working in office settings what safety procedures would be needed.

• Second, to plan simultaneously both an in-person event and a virtual event, so as to be prepared for changes in the environment.

Cleveland GiveCamp 2021 Weekend took place September 10-12, 2021.

I enjoy attending the Cleveland Museum of Art's annual #CMAChalkFestival every year and sharing my favorite chalk artwork on my "Chalk Festival" blog posts. Therefore, I was very disappointed that a spur-of-the-moment trip south to take care of some family business prevented me from attending on Saturday, September 11, 2021.

I asked people on the Cleveland Twitterverse to share on Twitter their photos from the 2021 Cleveland Chalk Festival, so that I could at least attend an online version of the Chalk Festival.

I was rewarded greatly by the Cleveland Twitterverse and my son, Kevin F. Smith.

As I mention in my last blog posts, I have been "delayed" in my normal activities for much of the summer. Well, the week after I published those two blog posts, my activity level increased dramatically due to the large number of events happening in Cleveland the last week of August 2021.

As I wrote on Monday, August 23, 2021, "If you are in #Cleveland and have nothing to do this week, you are just not trying!"

This blog post is an attempt to capture some of the spirit of the events I attended. The one common element of all these events is that I learned about them from following interesting people/organization on Twitter.  I created this blog post to serve as a reminder for me of the fun I had at these events, and I hope it encourages you to go out yourself to learn about the organizations that sponsor these events.

The in-person events included:

• MidTown Hosts the CLEVELAND WALLS! International Mural Program - August 23-28, 2021

• USS Cod Return to Cleveland Party

• Irishtown Bend Tour Hosted by West Creek Conservancy

• 75th Annual One World Day! #OWD2021CLE

In addition to these in-person events that I attended, this was also the week of online events for the 2021 Cleveland Foundation Annual Meeting Week Presented by KeyBank: It Starts With Community.

This blog post focuses on the interesting places we visited together along the route of the Appalachian Trail after Stuart's backpacking adventure, and then visiting water-related locations in New York state on our way home. After many years of hearing from Stuart about the places we visited along the Appalachian Trail, it was really fun for Julie to finally see them! 

Exploring Appalachian Trail Highlights

While Stuart was backpacking on the Appalachian Trail, he wrote down places he wanted to show Julie after his hike. It is his way of involving her in his multi-year journey north up the trail.

Many of the best locations are not accessible due to difficult terrain or the number of miles from trailheads, so this blog post shows just a few of the places we had the ability and time to visit.

New York Water Destinations

After touring locations along the Appalachian Trail, we spent the weekend traveling through the state of New York, where we visited the Erie Canal and Niagara Falls.

Friday, April 30, 2021 - Hershey’s Chocolate World!

This was our first big outing since receiving our COVID-19 vaccinations. The three attractions that we went to were adapted to encourage social distancing, but this was still the first time being around so many people in an inside venue. It actually felt kind of strange. Everyone was required to wear masks in all areas of the Hershey’s Chocolate World building.

It was very appropriate that we started our journey toward Stuart's starting point on the Appalachian Trail at this "sweet" place, since he has often visited Hershey’s Chocolate World as part of his many previous backpacking trips on the A.T. in Pennsylvania. A chocolate treat goes perfectly with backpacking.

Saturday, May 1, 2021 - Knoebels Amusement Resort

Since Julie and our son, Kevin F. Smith, are on the Board of Euclid Beach Park Now, we knew we had to visit Knoebels Amusement Resort. Similar to Cleveland's Euclid Beach Park, which closed in 1969, Knoebels is a free-admission amusement park. While it is free to enter the park, visitors can purchase individual ride tickets or an all-day wristband. Also, since Julie volunteers as a ride attendant at the restored Euclid Beach Park Grand Carousel at the Cleveland History Center, it was a special treat to see the Knoebels Carousel Museum.

As I write this blog post, I am very busy preparing for an extended backpacking trip, but I still wanted to get this out, since I had such a great time at the Cleveland Museum of Art. I will let the photos in the tweets tell the story, and I invite you to learn more about this special Cleveland Museum of Art exhibition, Stories from Storage, . . .

As you view the photos we shared on Twitter, please note the incredible variety of artwork presented. We highly recommend seeing the exhibition in person, since photos can't capture all the details.

My mother joined me on my return visits on Tuesday, April 20, 2021, and Tuesday, April 27, 2021.

Located in southeastern Ohio, Hocking Hills State Park has received national and international acclaim as a top park to visit. Stunning in every season, the park features towering cliffs, waterfalls, and deep, hemlock-shaded gorges for hikers and nature lovers to enjoy.

We had not been to Hocking Hills State Park In many years, and decided it would make a great getaway location while we are still social distancing. Most of this past year, we have been exploring many northeast Ohio parks and thought that it was time to go to southeastern Ohio.

We remembered the park's unique rock formations from past visits, but we discovered that they were even more incredible than we remembered. We were surprised to learn from informational signage in the park that glaciers never reached this part of Ohio, since we are used to northeast Ohio terrain that has been shaped by the ice age.

My co-writer and wife, Julie Smith, and I started writing our blog posts on March 8, 2012. The years of 2020 (after mid-March) and 2021 (so far), make this a drastically different blogiversary than any other. This is reflected in the nature of how our blog posts changed one year ago, right after our sosAssociates.com Blogiversary: Eight! post, when we starting writing our Social Distancing blog post series.

While our world is so different on this ninth anniversary, I do want to express how grateful I am to have the community resources and family support to ride out these times. My immediate family has been very fortunate in this difficult year, to be healthy and able to adjust to the lifestyle changes caused by the coronavirus crisis. Julie's and my thoughts are with those who have been ill or who have lost loved ones this year to COVID-19.

In 2020, our first adventure out to a public space during the coronavirus crisis was to the Cleveland Museum of Art's #WelcomeBackCMA Reopening. The spaciousness of the museum, along with their coronavirus protocols and site-specific safety measures, allowed us to feel safe while enjoying the artwork.

Now, in 2021, our first excursion of the year was again to the Cleveland Museum of Art. We had not expected to still be social distancing and masking, but here we are, writing another blog post in our "Social Distancing" series.

After the initial reopening in June 2020 for the summer, the Cleveland Museum of Art closed again in fall 2020. On January 18, 2021, the Cleveland Museum of Art reopened again with modified hours of Tuesday through Sunday, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. With the 2021 reopening, we learned of a special exhibition created by "the Cleveland Museum of Art, with love," called Stories from Storage.

We want to send out our annual greeting as we end 2020, and begin a new year full of possibilities! Our immediate family has been very fortunate in this difficult year, to be healthy and able to adjust to the lifestyle changes caused by the coronavirus crisis. Our thoughts are with those who have been ill or who have lost loved ones this year to COVID-19.

As we have done the past six years, we invite you to read our #NewYearsEve and #NewYearsDay 2021 #ThankYou blog post in which we thank the many people/organizations for all the great activities and events we were able to do in 2020 despite COVID-19. While not the year we planned, we are still grateful for those who made a positive difference in our lives. We also enjoy reliving the year by reviewing our 29 blog posts from 2020.

We are excited to start another year! All the best to everyone in 2021!

2020 has been different, with many of the venues we would normally visit closed due to the coronavirus crisis.

We were very pleased when the Cleveland Metroparks announced in May 2020 that they would be offering their fourth annual Trail Challenge, which included 25 trails. In August 2020, we learned that the park updated the list to include 35 trails!

The increase in the number of trails did not change the requirements for receiving the 2020 Challenge prizes . . .

• Complete 10 trails to  earn a 2020 Trail Challenge sticker

• Complete 20 trails to earn a 2020 Trail Challenge mug

. . . but we enjoy a challenge (and enjoy hiking/biking trails), and decided to do more than the minimum. This blog post shares our journey on all but one of the remaining land-based trails. See Stuart's 2020 Trail Challenge tracker sheet with notes on the 33 trails.

My plan was to slowly complete, by hiking and biking, all the sections of the Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" over several years. With the onset of the March 2020 COVID-19 crisis, my plans radically changed, and I decided to complete the "Little Loop" this year. Below is the blog post about the Burton Section, which is the fifth of five Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" blog posts.

This blog post covers my experiences on the Buckeye Trail Burton Section from Friday, August 21, 2020,  through finishing the "Little Loop" on Thursday, November 10, 2020.

I completed the Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" -- approximately 254.3 Miles -- at its Northern Terminus!!

My plan was to slowly complete, by hiking and biking, all the sections of the Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" over several years. With the onset of the March 2020 COVID-19 crisis, my plans radically changed, and I decided to complete the "Little Loop" this year. Below is the blog post about the northern part of Massillon Section and the Mogadore Section, which is the fourth of five Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" blog posts.

This blog post covers my experiences on the northern part of the Buckeye Trail Massillon Section and the Buckeye Trail Mogadore Section from Friday, June 26 2020, through Friday, August 21, 2020.

My plan was to slowly complete, by hiking and biking, all the sections of the Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" over several years. With the onset of the March 2020 COVID-19 crisis, my plans radically changed, and I decided to complete the "Little Loop" this year. Below is the blog post about the Akron Section, which is the third of five Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" blog posts.

This blog post covers my experiences on the Buckeye Trail Akron Section from Thursday, May 7, 2020, through Friday, June 26, 2020.

My plan was to slowly complete, by hiking and biking, all the sections of the Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" over several years. With the onset of the March 2020 COVID-19 crisis, my plans radically changed, and I decided to complete the "Little Loop" this year. Below is the blog post about the Bedford Section, which is the second of five Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" blog posts.

This blog post covers my experiences on the Buckeye Trail Bedford Section from Sunday, November 4, 2018, through Tuesday, April 21, 2020.

The Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" is the over-250-mile part of the Buckeye Trail in Northeast Ohio that goes through the following counties: Lake, Cuyahoga, Summit, Stark, Portage, and Geauga. On Tuesday, November 10, 2020, at the northern terminus of the Buckeye Trail at Headlands Dunes State Nature Preserve, I completed the loop which I had begun on Sunday, November 4, 2018.

I want to start this blog post by thanking the Buckeye Trail Association, and in particular, the volunteers of their Crooked River Chapter, for making the "Little Loop" section of the trail a reality for me to enjoy!

This Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" blog post actually consists of five separate blog posts. First, this post includes information and resources about the Buckeye Trail that were shared at events I attended about the trail.

The other four posts are about each of the four sections of the "Little Loop." Here are links to the blog posts, along with a list of the counties and some of the parks that are part of each section.

When we wrote about completing the first level of the Cleveland Metroparks 2020 Trail Challenge presented by Cigna to earn our 2020 Trail Challenge stickers, we were already working on the next ten trails for the final challenge. We are creating our Trail Challenge blog posts for these three reasons:

• To capture our memories for us to re-read in the future.

• To encourage others to take the Trail Challenge this year and in future years.

• And as we wrote in our last trail challenge blog post:

  We want to thank the Cleveland Metroparks for planning this annual Trail Challenge, and Cigna for sponsoring it again this year! Particularly this year, with everyone in the world facing the health crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic, it has been important for both physical and mental health to have our local parks to visit.

With COVID-19 closing venues we normally frequent, and having to cancel the backpacking trips that Stuart had planned on the Continental Divide Trail and Appalachian Trail, we have been exploring many parks in Northeast Ohio and along the route of the Buckeye Trail. We are happy to share with you our experiences on the second level of the trail challenge to earn our 2020 Trail Challenge mug.

The year is 2020. All my normal activities in Cleveland and my backpacking adventures on the Continental Divide Trail and Appalachian Trail have been canceled due to the coronavirus crisis. My wife and co-blogger, Julie, and I have been writing a series of 2020 Social Distancing Blog Posts about the COVID-19-safe activities in which we are able to partake. These blog posts were added to our sosAssociates.com website, which I built on the Drupal 7 content management system over eight years ago:

At the same time we have been writing blog posts this summer, I have been working behind the scenes on a new sosAssociates.com website. The new website is built on the new Drupal 9, which launched on June 3, 2020.

My goal was to create the new website with the new Drupal 9 version of the content management system, but with basically the same theme and content I had on my current Drupal 7 website.

I am launching my new Drupal 9 website on October 1, 2020, since this is a special date: my eleventh Twitter anniversary.

We had been seeing tweets by @LakeMetroparks mentioning how they had made a special corn maze for 2020. "Double-wide paths" for their "three-acre corn maze at Lake Metroparks Farmpark" would allow for social distancing while in the maze. In 2020, we have limited the events we have been attending due to the coronavirus crisis. With the Lake Metroparks Farmpark making physical safety adjustments for COVID-19, requiring masks when indoors, and moving all activities outdoors, we decided to visit on Sunday, September 20, 2020, with our son, Mike.

In 2019, I wrote that it was a special year, since it was the 30th year of the Cleveland Museum of Art's Chalk Festival. As the coronavirus crisis raged on over the summer of 2020, I wondered if the 31st anniversary of this wonderful event would need to be canceled as we entered September.

On September 1, 2020, I saw the Twitter announcement "Cleveland Museum of Art’s Chalk Festival goes virtual," stating that the event would take place with people sharing their art only on social media on Saturday, September 12, 2020, and Sunday, September 13, 2020.

It is now with mixed feelings that I gather the #CMAChalkFestival drawings for this blog post about the Cleveland Museum of Art's 2020 Virtual Chalk Festival: Love Your Community with All Your Art. While it is very sad that everyone could not get together this year, I am very pleased that the museum encouraged people to share their chalk drawings on social media.

I am glad to continue my annual tradition of creating a blog post with photos from the Cleveland Museum of Art's Chalk Festival.

Take the challenge!

In 2017, we wrote our blog post: Cleveland Metroparks Inaugural Trail Challenge!

. . . so when we saw the Cleveland Metroparks tweet to "Take the challenge!" in 2020, with 25 trails to choose from, we decided to accept.

With COVID-19 closing venues we normally frequent, and having to cancel the backpacking trips that Stuart had planned on the Continental Divide Trail and Appalachian Trail, we have been exploring many parks in Northeast Ohio and along the route of the Buckeye Trail. We have written about many of our park visits in the Social Distancing Blog Posts that we have been writing during the pandemic.

There were originally 25 trails to choose from for the challenge. During the time we were writing this blog post, we learned that the park updated the list to now include 35 trails!

What follows is information about the first ten challenge trails we have completed.

On Saturday, July 18, 2020, I rode my bike on 6.1 miles of Ohio's Buckeye Trail in Lake County, which is part of Buckeye Trail's "Little Loop." The "Little Loop" is the over-250-mile part of the Buckeye Trail in Northeast Ohio that goes through the following counties: Lake, Cuyahoga, Summit, Stark, Portage, and Geauga.

Normally, I would not write a full blog post on one bike ride, but this ride was noteworthy for the following two reasons:

• First, the Penitentiary Glen Reservation has some very unique resources that I want to share.

• Most importantly, July 18th was a special day, and my 6.1-mile piece of the Buckeye Trail was part of a larger effort: The 4th Annual Little Loop Challenge!

A BIG thank-you and congratulations to Buckeye Trail Board Member Randall Roberts for successfully organizing over 50 hikers and bikers in collectively completing the "Little Loop" section of the Buckeye Trail in one day! I really like the event's tagline -- "Together We Hiked It All" --  since it conveys how people come together to reach a larger goal.

Ending my bike ride at Penitentiary Glen Reservation was an excellent decision!

We were pleased when Fox 8 News Producer Rachel Inch approached us to use some of our Facebook photos for their 6:00 pm news story on #Masks4Community on Wednesday, July 8, 2020. Her request made us think about sharing the story of the great work done by the #Masks4Community leaders, partners, donors, and volunteers in one of our "Social Distancing Series" blog posts.

We first learned about #Masks4Community's good work because our @sos_jr twitter account follows (and retweets) @ShanelleLSmith. In addition to #Masks4Community's website -- Masks4Community.com, we also learned more about the program from Steven Litt's article.

In addition to giving out FREE masks, #Masks4Community distributes information about voting and the census in the kits. We are BIG believers in the importance of voting, and know how the census directly impacts the way services are provided in our community. Therefore, we were excited to learn that the #Masks4Community program also supports our belief in the importance of people fulfilling their civic duty!

We signed up to volunteer once a week, starting with the morning shift on Saturday, June 27th. We were not only impressed by the mission of the organization, but also how clearly they spelled out that they followed safety measures for those volunteering (everyone wears masks, washes hands, practices social distancing, and the number of volunteers is limited). We only volunteered because these safety measures are in place.

This morning, Sunday, July 19, 2020, for some reason I woke at 5:00 am -- I now assume that it is because my body is trained to wake up early on the third weekend of July. This is because, for the last ten years, the third weekend of July has been Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend. Little sleep and a lot of work on behalf of local nonprofits is the norm for the over 200 volunteers that provide FREE tech solutions annually at Cleveland GiveCamp.

Since I was awake, I decided to put together this blog post to honor those that give their talent every year, and to acknowledge and mourn the loss of normality in 2020 during this coronavirus crisis. I thank many people in this blog post, but please remember that they represent a much larger number of people who work on behalf of Cleveland GiveCamp to make it possible to serve our community's nonprofits with FREE tech! I created the video at the top of this blog post on Saturday, July 18th, to share on social media -- it helped me remember ten years of success at: "Cleveland GiveCamp – geeks in the home of rock and roll coding for charity."

O - p - e - n - i - n - g - !

Yes, Ohio is slowly opening in the year of the coronavirus crisis, but can only do so with social distancing and other safety measures. As we approached the end of June, we heard that the Cleveland Museum of Art was reopening following "rigorous safety procedures that adhere to the guidance set forth by state and local officials, as well as the Centers for Disease Control (CDC)."

We decided to make this our first adventure out to a public space by getting tickets, but the day before we were going to order our online tickets, we received an invitation from Communications and Media Relations Manager Kelley Notaro Schreiber to the Cleveland Museum of Art's Reopening Media and Influencer Welcome Back! We accepted her invitation and decided to be one of the first to go to the public reopening of the Cleveland Museum of Art on Tuesday, June 30, 2020.

There is much happening both onsite in the museum galleries and online at the Cleveland Museum of Art. While the online resources are extensive, we do have to say that the absolute best way to truly enjoy the museum's art is in person, visiting its galleries! Thus, we were very excited to attend the Cleveland Museum of Art's #WelcomeBackCMA reopening!

After writing three social distancing blog posts about visiting our local parks during the coronavirus crisis, we really did not plan to write anymore blog posts on this subject. However, we have been having such a great time exploring parks that we had not visited before, and revisiting old favorites, that we decided to gather tweets from park visits in June 2020, to create this blog post.

This blog post accomplishes two things that are important to us.

• First, writing this post is our way to refresh our memory of the time we spent together. Time together in the peaceful environment of a park is a healthy way to be grounded, both as a couple and for each of us individually, during these stressful times in our country.

• Secondly, it is our way to thank the park systems for their service to our Northeast Ohio community. Visiting parks (if you also practice social distancing and sanitizing your hands) is one of the very few safe activities you can do during this COVID-19 pandemic.

Please note that we have attended many more parks in June 2020 than those included in this blog post. Beyond what we include here, Stuart has been doing section hikes on the Buckeye Trail "Little Loop" (the Buckeye Trail Little Loop is over 250 miles long in Northeast Ohio), and we have done eleven additional hikes as part of the Cleveland Metroparks Trail Challenge 2020. We plan to write blog posts about these trail activities when we complete them.

WordCamp Kent -- One of the Great NEO Tech Education Opportunities!

Over the years, I had heard great things about Kent.WordCamp.org, but I have never attended their weekend of WordPress training. This year, I was scheduled for a multi-month backpacking trip on the Continental Divide Trail, but due to the coronavirus crisis, I had to cancel my trip to New Mexico. Instead, I have been exploring local parks and attending online activities -- learn more by reading my sosAssociates.com Social Distancing blog posts.

When I learned on Twitter from @WordCampKent that this year their WordCamp was not canceled and would be online, I was excited to attend. I am so glad I registered for it. It was great! Not only did it provide great resources for WordPress development, but it also included some really excellent management workshops.

As we wrote in our other Social Distancing blog posts about exploring our local parks, we continue to be fortunate to have had no illness or death in our family.

We are writing this blog post to:

• First, encourage ourselves to learn about and explore parks that we have not visited before, or further explore past favorites.

• Secondly, capture some of what we learn to share with others now, and to use in future years to remind us of how fortunate we are to have so many great park systems in our area.

We are both sad about activities we love being canceled for 2020, but we want to acknowledge all that we have gained in terms of time together learning about local parks and about each other.

We start this blog post with information about how to be safe in the parks during this coronavirus crisis. We also want to note that we added at the end of the blog post information about camping opportunities in our local park systems.

I have now written several social distancing blog posts during this time of the coronavirus crisis, about how I spend my time -- with park walks and online activities. I have also been attending some Facebook Live events about hiking trails, which I am featuring in this blog post.

During these sad times, I want to first acknowledge how fortunate I am that everyone in my family is healthy, and that I have the luxury of being able to participate in, and write about, interesting social distancing activities.

Secondly, I want to thank the organizations that are investing their time and resources to create these live video events featuring hiking trails. It is helping take the sting out of the fact that I was scheduled to be on a long-distance backpacking adventure at this time. I appreciate being able to join others online to celebrate trail life. Thank you!

The sections of this blog consist of:

• Two #CelebrateTrails events on April 18, 2020, with the Cleveland Metroparks and the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy

• Several Continental Divide Trail #VirtualTrailDays events that occurred throughout the month of April and early May

Looking for humor and creativity on the Twitterverse, and visiting parks while social distancing is what my life mainly consists of currently. There is also a lot of sadness about plans being canceled, but my family has been fortunate to have had no illness or death. I try to support those that I see online that are making a difference in our community.

While no day of COVID-19 social distancing is the same, the typical day often contains the following elements: 

• Absolutely no consistency in mornings

• Forenoon - Twitter online distractions

• 2:00 pm coronavirus #InThisTogetherOhio updates from Ohio Governor Mike DeWine

• Afternoon walk in local parks to help deal with coronavirus-related stress

• Evenings are spent watching online movies

In this blog post, I share my experience visiting local parks, and my online life during these coronavirus crisis times.

On Monday, March 30, 2020, while Julie and I were finishing our blog post, Peaceful Parks While Social Distancing, we got to talking about how we appreciated all the humor and creativity we were seeing on social media while everyone was social distancing. We were impressed by some of the very gifted people sharing their talents, and we liked how some people were using humor to cope with the stress of the current coronavirus crisis.

I decided to grab my @sos_jr tweets and retweets from this stressful time period that I thought demonstrated positive humor or creativity on the Twitterverse, and some tweets that had some personal significance. Please share those that you enjoy by retweeting them, so that your Twitter followers can share in a laugh, or appreciate the talent.

This blog post will share how we used our fantastic, local parks to deal with coronavirus-related stress starting, on Monday, March 16, 2020. An important part of health is mental health -- go for a walk for both physical and mental health!

We include information in this blog post about using the parks safely during this crisis, and resources to learn more about local parks. We have also included tweets about local restaurants from which we got food "to-go," on our way to or from the parks. It is important to support local business where possible at this time.

We want to thank our local park systems for their work to provide a safe place to explore.

 2012 to 2020!!! My Eighth Blogiversary of celebrating the fun of exploring our community!

Julie and I are looking forward to sharing our adventures with you through new blog posts in the year ahead. Each month in this coming year brings new possibilities!

Winter in Cleveland -- a great time for an outdoor party in The Flats!

For the eleventh consecutive year, thanks to the Brite Winter Leadership Team and Sponsors, on Saturday, February 22, 2020, we joined tens of thousands of people laughing at the Cleveland cold by attending this annual outdoor celebration!

Here are our @sos_jr tweets and retweets with photos/videos from Brite Winter, along with videos we found on YouTube. We share this to encourage you to attend future Brite Winter events, and to thank the people that make it possible. We are very lucky in Cleveland to have Brite Winter!

February 20th, 2020, marked PechaKucha 20x20's first annual International PechaKucha Day. I was VERY fortunate to celebrate by attending Cleveland's own PechaKucha Night Cleveland at the Music Box Supper Club!!

I always enjoy attending PechaKucha Night Cleveland and PechaKucha Night Akron events, but this night ended up being special. I arrived at Music Box Supper Club after a very busy afternoon that left my energy low on this Thursday night. I ended up leaving PechaKucha Night Cleveland with a natural high. The creativity of the presenters energized me and made my week!

You should plan on attending future events with friends with whom you want to share the experience that is PechaKucha Night Cleveland!

On February 7, 2020, we attended the PROOF: Photography in the Era of the Contact Sheet opening at the Cleveland Museum of Art. This opening coincided with the #MIXatCMA party that we enjoy attending the first Friday of most months. There was so much to see at the exhibition that we returned to see more the following weekend (Sunday, February 16, 2020).

We enjoyed the PROOF opening so much that we wanted to share it with our son, Michael Smith, on our return visit. We wanted to show him the items we enjoyed on our first visit, and to see the photographs that we did not have time to see. PROOF: Photography in the Era of the Contact Sheet is the type of exhibition that warrants more than one visit.

Stuart had attended the Open World: Video Games & Contemporary Art exhibition with our son, Mike, on October 26, 2019. What made their visit to the exhibition extra special was was learning special insights about the artwork from Curator of Exhibitions Theresa Bembnister.

After the October 2019 tour, Stuart knew he needed to return to the Akron Art Museum to share his experience with his wife and co-blogger, Julie. As we entered 2020, we made plans to go in late January.

We were excited to learn via a Twitter direct message from @AkronArtMuseum that now not only would we be able to see the exhibition together, but we would also be able to go on a "final tour" with Theresa Bembnister, on Tuesday, January 28, 2020. The exhibition is great, but seeing it with the curator who developed the show is extra special.

We had a great day at the Akron Art Museum, and want to again thank Theresa Bembnister for the tour, and Jeneé Garlando for taking time to tell us more about the museum. We look forward to attending future exhibitions at the museum.

We started 2020 by celebrating winter in Northeast Ohio by attending two ice festivals in January:

• On Monday, January 20, 2020, we attended the North Coast Harbor Ice Fest (#IceFestCLE 2020), which included FREE admission to Great Lakes Science Center and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame & Museum for Martin Luther King, Jr., Day.

• On Sunday, January 26, 2020, we attended the Lake Metroparks Farmpark Ice Festival.

The following are our tweets from these fun events, which include our videos and photos. We share them here to say how we appreciate being able to attend these annual ice festivals.

As we have done the past five years, we have created this #NewYearsEve and #NewYearsDay 2020 #ThankYou blog post to thank the many people/organizations for all the great activities and events that we attended in 2019! We also enjoy reliving the year by reviewing our 31 blog posts from 2019.

What follows are our 2019 blog posts, and tweets from New Year's Eve and New Years Day. We also included some tweets from the first week of the new year, which show how we started the new year with fun activities.

We are excited to start another year! All the best to everyone in 2020!

I am a very lucky man! In October and November 2019, I was very fortunate to attend many great events. I am publishing seven blog posts today because I really want to thank the organizers of these events. With so much happening, I have not been able to publish my blog posts on a timely basis, but still wanted to recognize and recommend these organizations.

In the interest of time, these are not my usual full blog posts, so I encourage you to click on the links and watch the videos in the tweets to learn more:

• Akron MakerSpace Grand Opening
  November 16, 2019.
  Thank you to Akron MakerSpace Founder and President Devin Wolfe for inviting me to celebrate the opening of Akron MakerSpace's impressive new space!

I am truly grateful to all those who made these great events possible.

I am a very lucky man! In October and November 2019, I was very fortunate to attend many great events. I am publishing seven blog posts today because I really want to thank the organizers of these events. With so much happening, I have not been able to publish my blog posts on a timely basis, but still wanted to recognize and recommend these organizations.

In the interest of time, these are not my usual full blog posts, so I encourage you to click on the links and watch the videos in the tweets to learn more:

• 30th Anniversary of the NASA Glenn Graphics & Visualization Lab (GVIS)
  November 7, 2019.
  A special thank-you to NASA Glenn Research Center Computer Scientist Herb Schilling for this invitation-only event. Thank you, Tom Kunsman, for arranging an additional private tour of the NASA Glenn Library.

I am truly grateful to all those who made these great events possible.

I am a very lucky man! In October and November 2019, I was very fortunate to attend many great events. I am publishing seven blog posts today because I really want to thank the organizers of these events. With so much happening, I have not been able to publish my blog posts on a timely basis, but still wanted to recognize and recommend these organizations.

In the interest of time, these are not my usual full blog posts, so I encourage you to click on the links and watch the videos in the tweets to learn more:

• Cleveland Maker Faire 2019 and Cleveland Public Theatre "Día de Muertos"
  November 2, 2019.
  I enjoy writing about the Cleveland Maker Faire every year. Thank you, also, to @CPTCLE for the personal invitation via Twitter to Día de Muertos.

I am truly grateful to all those who made these great events possible.

I am a very lucky man! In October and November 2019, I was very fortunate to attend many great events. I am publishing seven blog posts today because I really want to thank the organizers of these events. With so much happening, I have not been able to publish my blog posts on a timely basis, but still wanted to recognize and recommend these organizations.

In the interest of time, these are not my usual full blog posts, so I encourage you to click on the links and watch the videos in the tweets to learn more:

• Cleveland Rising Summit
  October 29-31, 2019.
  I look forward to the years ahead when we will all see how the grand Cleveland Rising vision is carried out!

I am truly grateful to all those who made these great events possible.

I am a very lucky man! In October and November 2019, I was very fortunate to attend many great events. I am publishing seven blog posts today because I really want to thank the organizers of these events. With so much happening, I have not been able to publish my blog posts on a timely basis, but still wanted to recognize and recommend these organizations.

In the interest of time, these are not my usual full blog posts, so I encourage you to click on the links and watch the videos in the tweets to learn more:

• Akron Art Museum "Open World: Video Games & Contemporary Art," Summit Artspace "Poe's Garden," and CVNP New Visitor Center
  October 26, 2019.
  I want to make a point to thank Curator of Exhibitions, Theresa Bembnister, for the excellent tour. Her depth of knowledge added great value to my son's and my visit to the exhibition at the Akron Art Museum.

I am truly grateful to all those who made these great events possible.

I am a very lucky man! In October and November 2019, I was very fortunate to attend many great events. I am publishing seven blog posts today because I really want to thank the organizers of these events. With so much happening, I have not been able to publish my blog posts on a timely basis, but still wanted to recognize and recommend these organizations.

In the interest of time, these are not my usual full blog posts, so I encourage you to click on the links and watch the videos in the tweets to learn more:

• NASA Hackathon! Space Apps Challenge Cleveland 2019!
  October 18 - 20, 2019.
  I want to thank the Space Apps Cleveland leaders (Tom Kunsman, Herb Schilling, and Sarah Dutkiewicz) for inviting me to attend. I highly recommend you learn more about the winners on these special Space Apps Cleveland web pages:
  Global Nominee: Dust Bunnies
  Global Nominee: Hackranauts
  Local People's Choice Winner: Escapees from 318 V2

I am truly grateful to all those who made these great events possible.

I am a very lucky man! In October and November 2019, I was very fortunate to attend many great events. I am publishing seven blog posts today because I really want to thank the organizers of these events. With so much happening, I have not been able to publish my blog posts on a timely basis, but still wanted to recognize and recommend these organizations.

In the interest of time, these are not my usual full blog posts, so I encourage you to click on the links and watch the videos in the tweets to learn more:

• Cleveland Museum of Art "Michelangelo: Mind of the Master" - MIX: Anatomy & Pop-up Drawing Lounge
  MIX: Anatomy - Cleveland Museum of Art on October 4, 2019.
  Pop-up Drawing Lounge on October 23, 2019.
  I have written several blog posts about Cleveland Museum of Art MIX events -- they are always a great time!

I am truly grateful to all those who made these great events possible.

Better World Day is brought to you by Leading Hands Through Technology and Workmen's Circle Educational Center of Ohio. The conference focuses on technology to arm non-profits with the knowledge to continue their fight for a better world.

Blockchain for a Better World
Better World Day
Thursday, October 17, 2019 from 5:30 PM to 8:30 PM (EDT)

Blockchain for a Better World
(How Non-Profits Can Successfully Apply Blockchain)
At our third annual event, we're excited to bring together researchers, technology experts, non-profit leaders and fund-raising professionals to develop innovative solutions that combine technology and compassion to improve our world.

I am grateful that Marc Majers knew of my interest in technology solutions for nonprofits, and thus invited me to this year's Better World Day educational event. This panel discussion and keynote address on how nonprofits can use blockchain technologies took place on October 17, 2019, at the Cuyahoga County Public Library Parma Branch.

On November 11, 2018, I had written a blog post entitled Cleveland Foundation #CtrlAltCLE Convenes: Tech & Digital Equity/Blockchain for Social Good which featured an excellent introduction to blockchain by Cleveland Foundation's Chief of Digital Innovation & Chief Information Officer Leon Wilson. I was excited to learn more from Leon Wilson and the other members of the panel, as well as the keynote presenter.

The purpose of this blog post is to capture some of what I learned, and share it with others.

I had heard about the work of Sustainable Cleveland for years from talking to their staff and volunteers at their booths at Cleveland area environmental events I attended. This was the first year I was able to attend their Annual Sustainable Cleveland Summit. I knew that each year had a theme:

• 2011- Energy Efficiency
• 2012- Local Foods
• 2013- Renewable Energy
• 2014- Zero Waste
• 2015- Clean Water
• 2016- Sustainable Transportation
• 2017- Vibrant Green Space
• 2018- Vital Neighborhoods
• 2019- Engaged People

What I did not fully realize was that the 11th Annual Sustainable Cleveland Summit was the final event planned as part of this ten-year initiative by the City of Cleveland Mayor's Office. At the Summit, the leaders committed to continue the work of Sustainable Cleveland, but they were not ready to announce in what form these activities will take place. I look forward to when these future initiatives are publicly announced.

In this blog post, I will share tweets and videos relating to the 11th Annual Sustainable Cleveland Summit, and the work of Sustainable Cleveland and its many partners.

Weekend Journey: New York & Massachusetts Parks, and Appalachian Long Distance Hikers Association (ALDHA) Gathering

Every year, we go to the Appalachian Long Distance Hikers Association - ALDHA Gathering weekend for workshops on how to backpack the great trails around the world. Normally, we make it a four-day weekend (including traveling), but this year we added some extra days on each end of the trip. These extra days enabled us to see some great New York State Parks with beautiful waterfalls, and more of the park where the Appalachian Trail crosses the highest mountain in Massachusetts.

It was fun to "bookend" our trip to the Appalachian Long Distance Hikers Association - ALDHA Gathering with waterfalls. We write our blog posts to share what we learn about organizations and about places that we enjoy. We hope you will share them with others.

On Sunday, September 29, 2019, our family participated for the fifth consecutive year in Euclid Beach Park Now's 15th Annual Remembering the Sights & Sounds of Euclid Beach Park event. This was a special year for us and for this Cleveland tradition for three reasons:

• For the amusement park, it represented 50 years of memories.

• For our family, it represented a new role for Julie and for our son, Kevin.

• For the Cleveland Metroparks, it represented fulfillment of a plan to honor Cleveland's history while better serving Cleveland's Collinwood community.

We write our blog posts as our way to thank the great organizations in Cleveland and Akron that bring joy to our lives. If you read our posts, you will see that we are very fortunate!

On Friday night, September 27, 2019, and Saturday, September 28, 2019, I continued my annual tradition of attending Ingenuity Cleveland's IngenuityFest and sharing in a blog post some of what I saw there. 

I am proud that my sons, Kevin and Mike, had a booth at IngenuityFest for their tabletop game, perMUTATIONS, for the third consecutive year!

As a graduate of the MNO program at Case Western Reserve University, I was invited to a special celebration on Friday, September 27, 2019. I was very impressed with the evening's activities. The celebration focused on two areas:

• First, the Master of Nonprofit Organizations (MNO) is one of just nine graduate programs ever accredited by the Nonprofit Academic Centers Council.

• The second cause for celebration was the launch of a new Master of Nonprofit Organizations (MNO) scholarship.

I look forward to learning more about the activities of the Master of Nonprofit Organizations (MNO) program as future leaders of the nonprofit sector are developed.

Today is my 10th anniversary on Twitter! I wanted to take this opportunity to thank all the good people in the Twitterverse who have invited me to learn about their lives and what they care about, by sharing interesting activities. And to the cultural, art, civic, and creative organizations, thank you for bringing joy into my life by informing me of new opportunities in which I could participate.

In #MyTwitterAnniversary blog post, I want to wish you a great month, year, and life full of adventure and fun times as I start my eleventh year of blogging and sharing on Twitter! 

This whole year, I have been looking forward to the Michelangelo: Mind of the Master exhibition, so imagine how excited was to I receive an invitation to attend the Media & Influencer Preview of "Michelangelo: Mind of the Master."

Once I entered the exhibtion, I found it interesting to see people interacting and learning about the exhibtion. I also greatly enjoyed talking to others I knew at the preview, and sharing impressions with people who I met for the first time, as we enjoyed the drawings.

On the same evening as the Michelangelo: Mind of the Master preview, I attended the last hour of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History's Think & Drink with the Extinct event. It was a great way to end the evening in University Circle.

I am grateful to be able to attend many great events as a member of both the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Cleveland Museum of Natural History!

2019 is a special year! Congratulations, Cleveland Museum of Art, on celebrating the 30th year of the Chalk Festival over the weekend of September 14-15, 2019! We were able to continue our annual tradition of creating a blog post with photos from the Cleveland Museum of Art's Chalk Festival.

Every year, the chalk art created at the Cleveland Museum of Art's Chalk Festival is outstanding! Please take some time to see the chalk artwork by reading our blog post!

This is the third year that I have been fortunate to be invited to the Print Club of Cleveland’s Fine Print Fair Opening Night Preview Party at the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Thursday, September 12, 2019, Preview Party gave attendees an opportunity to "Be the first to view and acquire outstanding works" and "Enjoy a cocktail reception" before opening to the public. The Fine Print Fair is open to the public the weekend of September 13-15, with FREE admission.

I am grateful to be able to attend many great art events like the Print Club of Cleveland’s Fine Print Fair at the Cleveland Museum of Art!

10th Anniversary Cleveland GiveCamp!

The Mission of Cleveland GiveCamp is to pair creative and technology talent with nonprofits in need.

On July 19-21, 2019, Cleveland GiveCamp marked the tenth year of its tech volunteers serving nonprofits in the Cleveland and Akron areas. We (Stuart O. Smith, Jr., and Kevin F. Smith) want to share with you tweets, videos, photos, and information about Cleveland GiveCamp 2019.

Stuart has volunteered at Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend for all of its ten years, and this was Kevin Smith's sixth year working on the Cleveland GiveCamp social media team.

10 years! It is hard to believe that it has been ten years! It has been exciting to see Cleveland GiveCamp grow over the years and help so many nonprofits with free websites and other tech solutions.

What a day! We attended Cleveland's second Rails-to-Trails Conservancy Opening Day for Trails - Cleveland on Saturday, April 13, 2019, at Cleveland Metroparks' Merwin's Wharf. We knew to expect a great event, but the very large participation of Clevelanders interested in learning about Cleveland's urban trails was beyond what we had expected.

I was fortunate to be invited by Pandata to the April 11, 2019, OHTec 13th Annual Cleveland Best of Tech Awards (affectionately known by its hashtag: #NerdOscars), which is part of OHTec Tech Week. This blog post includes information about the 2019 Best of Tech Awards finalists, and lists the winners.

There was a wealth of information about the Northeast Ohio tech community to be found at the many booths during the reception. For me, it was also a great reunion, since I saw many people from the tech community who I don't get to see as often as I would like.

I first learned about the Cleveland Metroparks Adventure University a year ago. It looked like somethng I would really enjoy, but we were dealing with a family emergency that kept me from attending the Spring of 2018. When I saw on Twitter that the third annual Cleveland Metroparks Adventure University & Gear Swap would be taking place at Baldwin Wallace University on Saturday, March 23, 2019, I was doubly excited to attend. First, I saw that they had exciting organizations participating, and workshops planned in areas that greatly interested me. Secondly, my annual case of "Springer Fever" had set in, and I was ready to learn from presenters about my future adventures. 

THINK & DRINK
Cleveland's brainiest happy hour . . .

Raise a glass with the Museum on select Thursdays and explore our different topics and latest discoveries with scientific experts — and drinks brewed by Northeast Ohio's best breweries — as your guide!

With a short walk in University Circle, I went from photography from 1940–1950 at the Cleveland Museum of Art to the world of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. Normally, these museums are not open late on Thursdays, but Thursday, March 21, 2019, was special!

This post about the Think & Drink -- Fantastic Beasts of the Natural World is the second of two blog posts about my evening in University Circle.

Join Us to Celebrate the Opening of “Gordon Parks: The New Tide, Early Work 1940–1950”

The Cleveland Museum of Art invites you to attend the opening celebration of the special photography exhibition Gordon Parks: The New Tide, Early Work 1940–1950.

A simple email invitation led to an enjoyable evening in University Circle, beginning at the Cleveland Museum of Art and continuing at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. Normally, these museums are not open late on Thursdays, but Thursday, March 21, 2019, was special!

This post about the Gordon Parks photography exhibition is the first of two blog posts about my evening in University Circle.

On March 3, 2019, I heard the exciting news:

OPEN HOUSE Includes Free Admission for All, Beginning March 16

I immediately made plans to attend the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland - moCa Cleveland Open House on March 16th!

It is great that we now have another art museum in Cleveland that opens its doors for all to enjoy without charging an admission fee!

On March 7, 2019, we decided to plan a family day. We first thought of places we had enjoyed in the past, but decided what we really wanted was a day together exploring places we had never visited as a family. Luckily, we remembered seeing a sign for The Warther Museum as we drove down Interstate 77. Every time we drove past the sign, we would say that we needed to find a time to visit The Warther Museum. Julie had great memories of visting The Warther Museum when she was a Girl Scout, and had been telling us for years that we needed to go there someday. She knew we would enjoy seeing the carvings, which included very detailed models of trains.

As we explored Google Maps for other places to visit in Ohio's Tuscarawas County, we decided to make trains the theme for the day, and go to the Dennison Railroad Depot Museum.

We made our plan to visit these two Ohio museums which are located in the City of Dover and the Village of Dennison -- just about an hour and a half south of Cleveland.

2012 to 2019!!! My seventh Blogiversary of celebrating the fun of exploring our community!

Thank you to my great co-writer and wife, Julie Smith! I always enjoy sharing the journey with her. I also want to thank the many organizations that hosted the events/activities I wrote about this year!

Julie and I wrote 47 blog posts in 2018, which is the greatest number of blog posts we have ever done in one year! One of the reasons we wrote so many in 2018 is that we enjoyed visiting many of the venues for the FRONT International: Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art. Julie and I want to give a big THANK-YOU to Fred Bidwell and the other FRONT International: Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art organizers. 2018 was the inaugural year for these exhibitions, and we are looking forward to FRONT returning to Cleveland in 2021!

Congratulations to the Brite Winter 2019 organizers! Ten outstanding years of outdoor winter fun -- music and arts in Cleveland!

On Saturday, February 23, 2019, we had a great time at the tenth annual Brite Winter. We arrived a bit earlier than in the past to have more time to enjoy the outdoor activities.

In this blog post we share two videos that do a great job of capturing the environment, and our 154 @sos_jr tweets and retweets show photos/videos from this outstanding day in Cleveland!

On this 10th anniversary, we want to thank the Brite Winter organizers for the many years of winter outdoor fun!!! We have very fond memories of attending our first Brite Winter when it was just a small event in 2011, and have watched it grow into the huge event it is now!

On Thursday, February 21, PechaKucha Night Cleveland will be live on stage at The Music Box in the Flats West Bank.

Japanese for “the sound of conversation,” PechaKucha features a rapid succession of 8-10 speakers, each sharing new ideas about topics ranging from visual art, architecture, and technology to food, film, music, photography and furniture design through a vibrant 400 second long presentation (20 slides X 20 seconds each). . . .

#PKNCLE33
@PKNCLE

I always enjoy attending (and writing about) PechaKucha Night events in Cleveland and Akron. Therefore, I was glad to be able to go to Cleveland's Music Box Supper Club on Thursday, February 21, 2019, for PechaKucha Night Cleveland - Volume 33.

After Michael Christoff's PechaKucha Night Cleveland - Volume 33 talk, he made the BIGGEST announcement in the ten+ years of the organization:

The next event, Global PechaKucha Night: Waterways, will be an international event spotlighting the importance of water and sustainability.

This blog post can't capture all the exciting implications of the Wednesday, January 23, 2019, Cleveland Museum of Art Open Access announcement!

Open Access at the Cleveland Museum of Art

The Cleveland Museum of Art announced on January 23, 2019, that it is an Open Access institution, using the Creative Commons Zero (CC0) designation for high-resolution images and data as related to its collection. At the Cleveland Museum of Art, Open Access means the public now has the ability to  share, collaborate, remix, and reuse images of many as 30,000 public-domain artworks from the CMA’s world-renowned collection of art for commercial and non-commercial purposes. In addition, portions of collections information (metadata) for more than 61,000 artworks, both in the public domain and those works with copyright or other restrictions, works are now available. 

This announcement that I will share information about in this post is just the beginning. It is only a hint of what is to come.

The Open Access partners of the Cleveland Museum of Art at the event showed some intitial uses for the all the Open Access artwork, but the potential for the future goes beyond what was presented on this first day. As the Creative Commons Chief Executive Officer Ryan Merkley said, "...this is a big deal."

Thank you, Cleveland Museum of Art, or bringing both Renaissance Splendor: Catherine de’ Medici’s Valois Tapestries and Georgia O’Keeffe: Living Modern to Cleveland! I look forward to coming back to the museum to see the exhibitions again with Julie, my co-blogger and wife.

On Friday, January 18, 2019, Stuart returned with Julie to show her these two major exhibitions. Both Wednesday and Friday nights are good weeknights to go to the Cleveland Museum of Art, since they are open later than other nights -- until 9:00 pm. Visiting the museum makes for a very enjoyable evening.

As we have done the past four years, we have created this #NewYearsEve and #NewYearsDay 2019 #ThankYou blog post to review some of the fun things we did in 2018. We enjoyed reliving the year through our 47 blog posts, and also recognize that we have many people to thank for all the activities and events that we attended in 2018.

This blog post includes images that link to our 2018 blog posts, as well as all of our 88 @sos_jr year-end thank-you tweets from New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

The Mission of Cleveland GiveCamp is to pair creative and technology talent with nonprofits in need.

Stuart did not have time to write this blog post at the end of July, since he was preparing for a backpacking trip and writing blog posts about FRONT International, but we still wanted to share our experiences at Cleveland GiveCamp 2018.

On July 20-22, 2018, Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend marked the ninth year of serving nonprofits in the Cleveland and Akron areas. The Smiths (Stuart, Kevin, and Mike) want to share with you the following tweets, photos, and information about Cleveland GiveCamp 2018.

Stuart has attended Cleveland GiveCamp weekend for all of its nine years, and in 2018 served on the Cleveland GiveCamp Steering Committee for his eighth year. He continues to manage both the ClevelandGiveCamp.org website and the @CleGiveCamp Twitter feed year-round, and serves on the Social Media Team during Cleveland GiveCamp weekend. This was Kevin's fifth year working on the Cleveland GiveCamp social media team. Mike returned this year to work on a Wordpress project for Hope for Kids Geauga (HopeForKidsGeauga.org) at his seventh GiveCamp. Cleveland GiveCamp continues to be one of the largest GiveCamps in the nation.

I was very fortunate to receive an email invitation to arrive early for the November 29, 2018, Cleveland Museum of Art's preview event. There is a lot of interest in the newly opened exhibitions at the Cleveland Museum of Art! The tickets for the weekend following the preview ended up selling out, and the night I attended brought in a good-sized crowd of Museum members to see the two major fall 2018 exhibitions:

• Renaissance Splendor: Catherine de’ Medici’s Valois Tapestries

• Georgia O’Keeffe: Living Modern

In this blog post, I will share what I and others observed and shared on Twitter (including photos of the artwork), along with some other comments and resources about these two exhibitions. I like that the museum is featuring both their Renaissance Splendor: Catherine de’ Medici’s Valois Tapestries and Georgia O’Keeffe: Living Modern exhibitions together, and offering special combined ticket pricing for the public (museum members get free tickets and their guests get discounted tickets).

Traditionally, on the weekend after Thanksgiving, Cleveland kicks off the holiday season! On Saturday and Sunday, November 24 and 25, 2018, we took part in some great holiday celebrations!

We wrote this blog post as our way of saying thank you to PlayhouseSquare and Cleveland Play House for Holidazzle 2018, and to Downtown Cleveland Alliance and Cleveland Public Square for Cleveland Winterfest 2018.

We also want to mention the great Cleveland Foundation skating rink on Cleveland Public Square! The Foundation has been sponsoring a winter skating program since 2016 as a great addition to the year-round programming that takes place at the Cleveland Foundation Centennial Plaza.

In addition to Holidazzle and Cleveland Winterfest, we have included in this blog post tweets with photos and videos from this year's TubaChristmas Cleveland. Julie performs in TubaChristmas concerts in either Cleveland or Akron every year.

On the afternoon of Saturday, November 3, 2018, I attended the Cleveland Mini Maker Faire. 2018 marks the sixth year for the Cleveland Public Library - "The People's University" - as a sponsor and host of the Cleveland Mini Maker Faire, and I have attended and written blog posts about three of the previous years' events.

Also, I am excited that my sons had a booth at the Cleveland Mini Maker Faire this year, featuring their tabletop game, PerMUTATIONS. This is the first time they have been invited to share their game with the public at the Library. They have demonstrated their PerMUTATIONS game at the last two Ingenuity Cleveland's IngenuityFest events, which you can read about in our blog posts.

What follows are my 100 @sos_jr tweets and retweets, so you can see photos from the event, and learn how the Cleveland Public Library uses the Cleveland Mini Maker Faire to bring together area makers and creatives to share their knowledge and to encourage others to join them.

I recently learned that the Cleveland Foundation has launched the new Ctrl + Alt + CLE group. Although I missed the first meeting on September 6, 2018, #CtrlAltCLE Convenes: Tech & Digital Equity, it dealt with a topic that I am very interested in, so I knew I should make it a point to attend future meetings. Fortunately, I was able to attend the second #CtrlAltCLE meeting, and a special #CtrlAltCLE blockchain training for nonprofits/government.

In this blog post, I will share:

• Some of the background information from the Launch of Ctrl + Alt + CLE.

• Information about the two #CtrlAltCLE meetings I attended on the topics of Digital Equity and Blockchain for Social Good.

• Funding opportunities announced for Digital Equity and Blockchain for Social Good.

I am also including information about Lynda.com classes that relate to the work of #CtrlAltCLE. The classes are available FREE with your library card!

This is just the beginning of the new #CtrlAltCLE program, and I recommend you join with me in learning how Ctrl + Alt + CLE will evolve.

I knew of Hack Cleveland from reading their @HackCleveland tweets, but I had never attended any of their events. When I read that the Hack Cleveland leadership team had scheduled a #Fix216: Criminal Justice Reform Scope-A-Thon for Friday evening, October 26, 2018, and Saturday, October 27, 2018, I signed up. I figured it was a good time to not only learn about the group, but also learn by participating in the methods they used to develop a social justice technology solution. I also liked the idea of a "Scope-A-Thon," with its emphasis on investing the time to find the right plan to succeed on the issue that would give the greatest benefit.

1. Bail Reform

2. Re-Entry Skills Alignment 

3. Collateral Consequences/Sanctions

A BIG thank-you to Summit Artspace for reaching out on Twitter and recommending I visit the Summit Artspace gallery as part of the High Arts Festival Akron 2018 finale celebration on Saturday, October 6, 2018.

I already knew about the Akron High Arts Festival, and had it in my weekend calendar along with other local fun activities. Thanks to the tweet from Summit Artspace, followed by a Twitter direct message with some great information from Downtown Akron Partnership, I knew I had to attend this event!

I love how the High Arts Festival logo reflects how this Akron event has grown to not only include the Visual Arts, but also Music, Film, and the Literary Arts!

My weekend of Friday, September 28, 2018, through Sunday, September 30, 2018, was a time to learn about the creative people of Cleveland! The weekend started on Friday with an evening with creatives, which I wrote about in my blog post, PechaKucha Night Cleveland Volume 32 at Sachsenheim Hall. It continued with Ingenuity Cleveland's annual celebration of artisans, makers, and technology! This year, the theme was IngenuityFest 2018: FuturePast!

I continued my annual tradition of living the full IngenuityFest experience by attending all three days and talking to as many exhibitors as possible. This was the second year at their new, permanent location at The Hamilton Collaborative, 5401 Hamilton Avenue, Cleveland, which is now their year-round community hub.

I am proud that my sons, Kevin and Mike, had a booth at IngenuityFest for their tabletop game, perMUTATIONS, both last year and this year.

Please share the information in this blog post with your friends. I enjoy attending this event every year, and want to encourage you to invite people who have not attended.

Stuart had planned to be out of town in September 2018, but a change in plans brought him home early, allowing us both to attend PechaKucha Night Cleveland - Volume 32 on Friday, September 28, 2018. We always enjoy both attending PechaKucha Night Cleveland events, and writing blog posts about them!!

We really appreciate the PechaKucha Night Cleveland leadership team, presenters, and sponsors, and want to thank them for all these great events.

When we published our FRONT - Oberlin blog post about our Sunday, August 5, 2018, visit to Oberlin College's Allen Memorial Art Museum, we expected to not have time to visit any more FRONT venues. Stuart had planned to be out of town in September 2018, but a change in plans brought him home early.

With a very busy weekend coming up at the end of September 2018, we decided to make time on Wednesday afternoon, September 26, 2018, to visit the Ohio City FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art venues.

Since the opening of the FRONT International Triennial on Thursday, July 12, 2018, we have visited over fourteen venues. We want to take this opportunity to thank the organizers of, and the venues that hosted these great FRONT International Triennial exhibitions.

This year, the Akron Mini Maker Faire took place at the Main Library of the Akron-Summit County Public Library on Saturday, September 22, 2018. This was earlier in the year than it normally takes place. Stuart had planned to be out of town in September 2018, but a change in plans brought him home early, allowing us both to attend the Sixth Annual Akron Mini Maker Faire! Stuart has attended all six years.

Our @sos_jr tweets and retweets show some of what we and others experienced at the Akron Mini Maker Faire. We hope they give you some insight into what these Makers do, but to learn more, you need to attend the next Akron Mini Maker Faire and talk to the Makers directly.

I had planned to be out of town in September 2018, but a change in plans brought me home early, allowing me to continue my annual tradition of creating a blog post of my photos from the Cleveland Museum of Art's Chalk Festival It is one of my favorite community events, which was celebrating its 29th year on the weekend of September 15-16, 2018! 

I have added my own chalk drawing in the past, but this year I rode my bike on the evening of Sunday, September 16, 2018, to see all the finished artwork after attending the Cleveland Cultural Gardens 73rd Annual One World Day.

Here are my 130 photos of the Cleveland Museum of Art's 29th Annual Chalk Festival, including my favorite pieces.

I had planned to be out of town in September 2018, but a change in plans brought me home early. I was excited to learn that I had not missed a great event that I attend every year -- Cleveland's Annual One World Day, held this year on September 16, 2018, at the Cleveland Cultural Gardens.

I have enjoyed One World Day for many years now, and want to thank the many volunteers and organizers for keeping this great Cleveland tradition alive!

We had never been to Oberlin College's Allen Memorial Art Museum before. We are so grateful that the FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art chose it and other Oberlin art venues for the inaugural year of FRONT. When we visited on Sunday, August 5, 2018, we were extremely pleased with the gem we found there.

On Saturday, August 4, 2018, I returned to the venues in Uptown Cleveland to show my family what I saw on the opening day of FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art.

I hope you enjoy my photos in these tweets of my return visit to FRONT International Triennial in Uptown Cleveland.

Thursday, August 2, 2018, was a great day to explore Akron art! I had planned to go to Akron to spend the afternoon at the FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art venues in Downtown Akron, but the day I picked had even more to offer!

Besides receiving free gallery admission to the Akron Art Museum on their "FREE Thursday," there was also a special event announcing a new community service at the Connect with Dot Launch Party! In addition, the nearby Summit Artspace had in its main gallery the PARALLAX Contemporary Art Juried Exhibition, which runs until August 18, 2018.

Since the opening of the FRONT International Triennial on Thursday, July 12, 2018, I have visited over six venues before going to the Akron Art Museum.

On Tuesday, July 31, 2018, we ended the month by taking the afternoon to explore the FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art venues in Downtown Cleveland. These are the first venues we have had time to visit since the FRONT International Triennial opening on Thursday, July 12, 2018. 

We spent seven relaxing hours taking our time seeing the artwork, and wanted to share our experience through our @sos_jr tweets and retweets about the day.

On Thursday, July 12, 2018, I took a vacation day to attend the FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art opening day press conference. This blog post continues where my FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art - Opening blog post leaves off -- to share my experiences visiting three of the FRONT International Triennial venues in University Circle and Uptown Cleveland. 

FRONT International Triennial Opening Day Press Conference!

The BIG day is finally here!

Since I had received press accreditation back in January 2018, I received a password for the FRONT VIP Portal, and the following details from the SUTTON PR firm:

... our opening day press conference on Thursday July 12th, 2018 at 10:30 am. William M. Griswold, Director and President of the Cleveland Museum of Art, will join both Fred Bidwell, Executive Director of FRONT, and Michelle Grabner, Artist Director of the inaugural edition, to provide remarks, alongside the leadership of FRONT’S presenting partners. The event will take place at The Cleveland Museum of Art in the Gartner Auditorium at 1150 East Blvd, Cleveland OH 44106.

I enjoyed talking to several people at the reception -- it was great to see so many people here from all over the country.

We were excited to be invited to attend the Saturday, July 7, 2018, Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirrors preview.

Here are our photos from the preview, followed by the tweets we shared as we toured the exhibition. We enjoyed seeing this special presentation of Yayoi Kusama's work, and even walked through the exhibition a second time to see everything from a different perspective.

Photos can't do it justice. The Infinity Mirrors installations of Yayoi Kusama are something you truly need to experience. It is great that we have an art museum in Cleveland that features great diversity, from the Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe exhibition we saw in the spring, to today's Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirrors.

Due to commitments at home, this is the first vacation in quite a while where we both were free to take a week-long trip. Because of this, we decided to write this blog post about the different locations we visited in Michigan from June 24 through July 1, 2018. We are sharing our 100 @sos_jr tweets and retweets to show our activities and our photos.

While not a perfect trip, in that we ended up needing to cut it short by two days, we created this post so we can look back on it to remind us of the fun we had and to share it with visitors to our blog.

• Monday, June 25, 2018 - #MightyMac

• Tuesday, June 26, 2018 - #MackinacIsland

• Wednesday, June 27, 2018 - @GrandHotelMI

• Thursday Morning, June 28, 2018 - #CastleRock and #Fudge

• Thursday Afternoon/Evening, June 28, 2018 - #SeeFrankenmuth

• Friday Morning, June 29, 2018 - @Bavarian_Inn

• Friday Afternoon, June 29, 2018 - @BronnersXmas

• Trip Home and After

Happy traveling!

After attending the inaugural Common Ground on July 30, 2017, I knew that I would want to make a point of attending future Common Ground community conversations and related events. When I learned that the Cleveland Foundation planned to have the 2018 Common Ground on June 24th, which was during a week I had planned to be out of town, I delayed the start of my vacation. I am glad that I stayed in Cleveland that day to attend Common Ground 2018!

With so many interesting topics, I had a problem. It was great to have the problem of having to choose from so many options. In the end, I was able to take the 13+ sites that had topics that interested me, and decide on four that I would really like to attend. With the very full agendas happening at each location, I ended up only having time to visit two sites:

• Sunday, June 24 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM - Social Enterprise: Uplifting the Underserved at Cosmic Bobbins

• Sunday, June 24 1:00 PM - 3:30 PM -Why Do Parks Matter? - The Trust for Public Land

On June 9, 2018, we had a great day that we want to share with you. This blog post includes 152 tweets from before and during the Cleveland Museum of Art's Parade the Circle, and from our evening activities on the Cleveland Metroparks' waterfront. Writing this post reminds us of the fun we had, and we hope it encourages others to explore these and related activities in the future.

We were able to attend the Parade the Circle together again in Cleveland's University Circle, and wanted to share our experience and photos from our @sos_jr tweets and retweets. If you never attended Parade the Circle, it is a must-attend Cleveland event!

We started off June 2018 with some great activities and music. We often go to the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Cleveland Metroparks, and we wanted to share in this blog post some of the unique things we did on June 1 and June 2, 2018.

What we needed was a simple day to get away -- thank you, Cleveland Metroparks Zoo, and the Cleveland Zoological Society, for providing the perfect venue.

Earlier in the month, we had learned from tweets by Etsuko Dunham, Danielle Garbo, and Kelly Manderfield about some incredibly beautiful Japanese cherry tree blossoms in the Cleveland Metroparks' Brookside Reservation, which is very near the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo.

There is always something going on that you can learn about by following the right organziations on Twitter. I saw a tweet by @ShareTheRiver that linked to Cleveland Water Tour of the Garrett A. Morgan Water Treatment Plant

The Share The River event post stated that in celebration of American Water Works Association's Drinking Water Week, Cleveland Water was hosting an open house of their Garrett A. Morgan Water Treatment Plant. This was the final event of Cleveland Water's Drinking Water Week 2018 activities.

I am very interested in the subject of water treatment and city resource infrastructure. 

Cleveland Museum of Natural History has nature hikes at Mentor Marsh. We learned that the Museum's Natural Areas Department has over 9,400 acres of land on 56 natural areas.

When Julie and I heard about the May 6, 2018, Bald Eagle Fest at Mentor Marsh, we were excited to check it out!

2018 marked the fifth year for Station Hope, which I have enjoyed for the past two years. It is an incredible event to experience!

Congratulations to Cleveland Public Theatre and all the Station Hope 2018 organizers for the grand success of this annual Cleveland event!

I thought it would be interesting to attend the Akron Waterways Renewed! Blue Heron Homecoming when I learned that it was taking place at the Akron Water Reclamation Facility.

Julie and attend most of the MIX at CMA events during the year. We enjoy both the general party atmosphere in the Ames Family Atrium, and the themed tours through the galleries led by art experts from the Cleveland Museum of Art.

My CMNH friends, adult programs coordinator Ashley Hall, and preparator and lab manager Lee Hall, had often recommended that I attend a Cleveland Museum of Natural History Members Behind-The-Scenes Night. They told me that attendees get to explore the normally off-limits lower levels of the Museum.

Therefore, when Spike Radway invited me to attend with him and Henry Lee, I knew I needed to make time to go.

My wife and great co-blogger, Julie, and I enjoy attending the Starship Troopers, the Reel Science event featured a science talk by the museum's collections manager of invertebrate zoology, Dr. Nicole Gunter. This was the last of the 2017-2018 Reel Science series. The Museum's adult programs coordinator, Ashley Hall, is already gathering ideas for next year's films -- send her your recommendations! 

I highly recommend both the monthly Cleveland Digital Publishing Users Group - CDPUG meetings (the final Thursday of most months), and also the special field trips that they plan. Spike Radway, the founder and program director of CDPUG, always recruits great presenters for the meetings.

It was great to start the month of May with a special field trip to the Apple Eton Store to learn from both Erica Brenner of Erica Brenner Productions, LLC, and Bill Baraona of Flex Media about video editing.

When I first learned about Front International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art in the summer of 2016, I was very excited about this grand art show taking place over many northeast Ohio locations in the summer of 2018. What I did not know was that it was even bigger than just the summer exhibitions. I have already enjoyed attending several Front International artist talks, and look forward to more of these pre-summer events. 

I also want to note that FRONT International: An American City took place at the new MidTown Tech Hive. When I arrived, it was fun to learn that I already knew some of the people who work in this new tech-centric space. I recommend you learn more about Tech Hive by watching for a summer grand opening event which will be announced by Digital C. 

My family participated in a great day of activities planned by the new REI Cleveland store ahead of the grand opening of their Beachwood location.

• Backpacking 101
• Backcountry cooking
• Essential knot tying
• Smartphone photography for the outdoors
• Bluegrass fireside concert

We attended a day of activities at Holden Arboretum, so in addtion to the special activities planned by REI Cleveland, we also explored the Murch Canopy Walk and the Kalberer Emergent Tower.

A flurry of activity! In late April and early May of 2018, I had eight busy days of activities! I originally created this as one single blog post listing all nine events, but later decided to publish nine posts to make it easier to find for my website visitors to read.

I still think of it as one post that I hope will not only give you insight into my eight-day week, but more importantly, encourage you to support these organizations with your presence at future events.

In our blog post, Cleveland Museum of Art's "Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe," we wrote that Stuart attended the Eyewitness Views Media and Influencer Exhibition Preview on February 24, 2018. Unfortunately, at the last minute, Julie was not able to attend. We knew she would enjoy this exhibition, so we planned to come to the show together at a future date.

We ordered our tickets to return on Wednesday, April 11, 2018, since the Cleveland Museum of Art's is open late -- until 9:00 pm -- on Wednesday nights to accommodate people like us who need an evening visit time.

While Stuart knew Julie would enjoy Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe, her enthusiasm for the show was even more than Stuart anticipated! It was fun to start the evening by having our photo taken in the Venetian gondola provided by the Cleveland Museum of Art.

On April 7, 2018, after a busy morning at the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy 2018 Opening Day for Trails - Cleveland, and spending the afternoon at the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland Free First Saturday, I continued the fun with an exciting evening at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. 

A BIG shout-out to PNC Bank! In addition to sponsoring this free day at Cleveland's Rock Hall, they also sponsored the MOCA Free First Saturday that I enjoyed this afternoon.

There was so much happening at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame that night, including concerts, fireworks, food, entertainment, and free entrance to the museum. I want to commend the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame staff how they did a good job handling the large crowds. They kept the lines moving, and provided entertainment and activities to keep people engaged. 

On April, 7, 2018, despite a very busy morning at the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy 2018 Opening Day for Trails - Cleveland, I was still very interested in seeing the current exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland in the afternoon. 

Thanks to the sponsorship of PNC Bank, the museum offers free admission for all visitors on the first Saturday of every month.

The current MOCA exhibitions include INDUCTION: Tauba Auerbach and Éliane Radigue, Simon Denny: The Founder's Paradox, Claudia Comte: Zigzags and Diagonals, and Mei-Jia & Ting-Ting & Chih-Fu & Sin-Ji: C. Spencer Yeh. 

My son, Kevin, is developing two board games, so when I told him about Simon Denny's board game designs, he joined me at the Museum. In addition to Simon Denny's work, there were also game designs by local college students.

Every year, because of my personal history, I always think that April 7th is a special day to explore a trail! So when I saw Bike Cleveland's tweet announcing that on Saturday, April 7, 2018, the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy would have a Cleveland location for its annual Opening Day for Trails, I knew that I would need to attend! 

As I learned more about the day from Share The River's blog, and very informative @ShareTheRiver tweets, I grew more impressed with the strong partnership of organizations in Cleveland that were coming together on April 7th to promote trails and good environmental stewardship in northeast Ohio. The day's activities were hosted by the Cleveland Rowing Foundation.

Reading about the Facebook event, 2018 Opening Day for Trails - Cleveland, also excited me by mentioning the Ohio & Erie Canalway Towpath Trail and the Cleveland Foundation Centennial Lake Link Trail. I have enjoyed exploring both of these trails, and writing about them in some of my past blog posts.

On the evening of Friday, April 6, 2018, my wife and co-blogger, Julie, and I attended a Cleveland Museum of Art #MIXatCMA. This event takes place on the first Friday of each month, and we attend most of them. The MIX: Philosophy theme had special meaning for me, since it reminded me of seeing Auguste Rodin's sculptures in Paris. There is no additional charge for us to attend these enjoyable events as members of the Museum. 

Superman: From Cleveland to Krypton - An Exhibit
May 6, 2017 - March 31, 2018

Follow Superman's journey from his creative birth in Cleveland to his growing international popularity, his connection to social justice issues, his influence on the current superhero craze, and the pride our community maintains for its homegrown superhero.

Three floors of exhibits in the Main Library will feature memorabilia, art and artifacts from the Mike Curtis Collection of Superman Memorabilia and other prominent collectors.

When the closing day for Superman: From Cleveland to Krypton - An Exhibit came on March 31, 2018, I knew that I had to take my family for a final visit, and write this blog post to say how impressed I was with this exhibit. The exhibit not only told the history of Superman's creators, but did an excellent job of showing the Cleveland connection and how Superman led to the creation of other superhero characters.

Arrived VERY late -- I had a blast!!!

As I drove through the rainy streets of Cleveland on a very late Saturday night, February 24, 2018, I was not sure I should attempt to attend the last hours of Brite Winter 2018. I had been invited by the Communications Department of the Cleveland Museum of Art  to attend the preview for Eyewitness Views earlier that evening. Thus, I had already had a very fun and very full evening.

It was very late, very dark, and raining, but since I have greatly enjoyed attending Brite Winter for years, since it was a small event in 2011, I decided to see how the event's evening ended. It ended up being the best decision I could have made!

As I parked my car, I saw the bright lights of Brite Winter transforming the underbelly of the Main Avenue Bridge to a festive area full of music and fun! It was great to be with all these people, dancing and having fun into the late evening.

I was very fortunate to attend the Cleveland Museum of Art's Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe Media and Influencer Exhibition Preview during the museum's members-only opening on February 24, 2018. This event was a fantastic preview with special music from the 18th century performed live in the museum, special drinks and food, and generally a great members party before the exhibition opened to the public on Sunday, February 25, 2018. The exhibition runs through Sunday, May 20, 2018.

2012 to 2018!!! Our sixth Blogiversary of celebrating the fun of exploring our community and writing about our experiences!

Thank you to my great co-writer and wife, Julie Smith! I always enjoy sharing the journey with her. I also want to thank the many organizations that hosted the events/activities I wrote about this year!

Please take a moment and scroll across the following images/links, and please click to read some of our 29 blog posts for 2017, and the posts we have done so far in 2018. 

The Cleveland Metroparks introduced their new Trail Challenge on National Trails Day, June 3, 2017!! It was very appropriate, since the Trail Challenge reflects the spirit of National Trails Day by encouraging people to enjoy the great outdoors and to explore trails in the Cleveland Metroparks.

In this blog post, I will share information about my journey on the 10 required trails (and beyond!!), for the 2017 Trail Challenge through:

• My @sos_jr tweets/retweets

• My comments about what I observed

• Information about the parks featured in this first Trail Challenge.

December 1, 2017 - a new month full of possibilities! We started off the final month of 2017 with a very active weekend!

• We decided to kick off this December weekend with Mix: Illuminate.

• We enjoyed Cleveland's University Circle Holiday CircleFest, which was expanded into a two-day event.

• We saw Wicked at PlayhouseSquare a few years ago, and were excited to enter the ticket lottery this year.

On Saturday, November 11, 2017, the Main Library of the Akron-Summit County Public Library held the fifth annual Akron Mini Maker Faire. I have attended all five of these events showcasing creativity! Every year, I learn about maker groups and their very ingenious activities -- it is a true joy to explore!

On Saturday, November 4, 2017, the Cleveland Public Library celebrated its fifth Cleveland Mini Maker Faire by bringing together area makers and creatives to share their knowledge and encourage others to join them. 

This was the fourth Cleveland Mini Maker Faire that we have attended. Every year, we have a great time talking to people about their creations. We love learning about what is happening in Cleveland's creative community.

On September 27, 2017, we traveled back in time almost 100 years via the Cleveland Museum of Art's dazzling The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920s exhibition. We were thrilled to attend the Media & Influencers Preview for this spectacular show.

When you go to this exhibition, please be sure to allow yourself plenty of time to fully explore it. The Jazz Age includes such an incredible variety of art and artifacts, that even after our two-hour visit, we plan to come back to see more. Ironwork, jewelry, clothing, accessories, paintings, furniture, cars, a chandelier, and other surprises -- all with an artist's flair! This exhibit is rich with the elegance of the era!

In 2016, the theme for IngenuityFest weekend was "Awakening," since it was held for the first time at their new, permanent location: The Hamilton Collaborative, 5401 Hamilton Avenue, Cleveland. I found it interesting that Ingenuity Cleveland chose the theme “Metamorphosis” for IngenuityFest 2017 to reflect how they have evolved into a year-round community hub.

Included in this blog post are my photos and @sos_jr tweets and retweets from IngenuityFest 2017 weekend. I met a lot of interesting people, and enjoyed a lot of great entertainment. I encourage you to learn more about the creative people involved -- it would be worth your effort.

Every year, we visit and write a blog post about the Cleveland Museum of Art's Chalk Festival. It is one of our favorite community events. This blog post includes our photos from the two-day event, and our @sos_jr tweets/retweets with more photos and information about this year's Chalk Festival.

Most years, we attend only on Sunday. Stuart normally does a chalk drawing, and we take photos of all the finished works late on Sunday. This year, Stuart had two events scheduled for Sunday, so we spent a relaxing day on Saturday, September 16, 2017, on the Cleveland Museum of Art's south lawn overlooking Wade Lagoon.

Stuart did his annual chalk drawing, while Julie took in the ambiance of this peaceful setting. The Fine Arts Garden, with its Chester Beach’s Fountain of the Waters, combined with live music, and people from all over Cleveland creating their art, made for a perfect day.

The Print Club of Cleveland's 33rd annual Fine Print Fair took place on September 15-17, 2017, at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Before the weekend opening of the Fine Print Fair to the public, there was an opening night benefit preview, "A Prints of a Party," on Thursday, September 14. 

While, as members of the Cleveland Museum of Art, Julie and I attend many events at the museum, we were not aware of the Fine Print Fair. Therefore, I was very pleased when Sarah Palagyi invited us to the "A Prints of a Party" preview by contacting me via the Column & Stripe Twitter account. Unfortunately, Julie had another commitment that night and was unable to join me.

On September 8-10, 2017, the largest annual cycling festival in the United States, NEOCycle, was held in Cleveland at the Cleveland Metroparks Edgewater Park, through the support of the Greater Cleveland Sports Commission! This was my third year attending what has become a great Cleveland tradition!

The 2017 One World Day took place at the Cleveland Cultural Gardens on August 27, 2017. Over 25,000 people attended!

My goal for this blog post is to share my 80 @sos_jr tweets and retweets, which have photos and videos from the event, as my way of thanking the organizers of this great, annual, Cleveland tradition. I also include below some of the articles and videos from the event.

The day was great fun, so enjoy the sights and music!

PechaKucha Nights in Cleveland rock, which is why we enjoy both attending them, and writing blog posts about them!! On Friday, August 25, 2017, it was very appropriate that the PechaKucha Night Cleveland Volume 31 rocked out at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame! The presenters reflected the creative spirit for which the Rock Hall is known.

We really appreciate the PechaKucha Night Cleveland leadership team, presenters, and sponsors.

On August 21, 2017, the first total solar eclipse in the continental United States since February 26, 1979, occurred. It was also the first total solar eclipse to cross the entire country (from Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean) since June 8, 1918! We knew this would be a special day!!! Stuart used his last available vacation day to fully experience the phenomenon, and our son Kevin joined us as well.

We always have a good time at PechaKucha Night Akron! We want to congratulate the PechaKucha Night Akron leadership team for their success, and thank the presenters and sponsors who made the night possible.

Here is the information we gathered from the Friday, August 4, 2017, PK Akron Volume VIII at The Well Akron Community Development Corporation.

I first learned about the July 30, 2017, Common Ground event from an announcement by Global Cleveland on Twitter. I immediately knew I needed to attend, and share my thoughts about it in my blog.

I also want to thank Cleveland Foundation Senior Marketing & Communications Officer Jennifer Trivelli, who reached out to me via a Twitter direct message on July 7th to confirm that I knew about #CommonGroundCLE -- Greater Cleveland's largest outdoor community conversation and meal.

I attended the BlueBridge Networks Third Non-Profit IT Innovation Summit on July 27, 2017, at the Cleveland Museum of Art as a guest of Kevin Goodman, managing director and partner at BlueBridge Networks.

This was the second time I have attended this nonprofit IT summit, having attended in the BlueBridge Networks Non-Profit IT Innovation Summit II on November 5, 2014. I want to thank Kevin Goodman for inviting me again, and let the presenters know how much I appreciate them taking time to share their knowledge. 

We had four days of fun and four sunsets on Lake Erie!

Our extended Fourth of July weekend, July 1-4, 2017, was filled with many activities, each day ending with a beautiful Lake Erie sunset!

• July 1st Sunset - Lake Metroparks' Lakefront Lodge after Cleveland Shakespeare Festival at James A. Garfield National Historic Site

• July 2nd Sunset - Edgewater Park of the Cleveland Metroparks Lakefront Reservation

• July 3rd Sunset - Lake Metroparks' Lake Erie Bluffs Coastal Observation Tower after exploring both the Lake Link Trail & The Holden Arboretum

• July 4th Sunset - Sunset and Fireworks at North Coast Harbor after Neighborhood Parade

Thank you to all the great organizations that made these four days of fun possible. We look forward to visiting many more Northeast Ohio venues to enjoy Lake Erie sunsets.

Back in 2012, we wrote about attending a Crash Party, which introduced the ArtLens App and related gallery. Through this event, we became fascinated with the ways that the Cleveland Museum of Art uses technology to engage their visitors. Since 2012, we have visited the gallery and used the app many times and have written several ArtLens-related blog posts. We have watched both the ArtLens App and related gallery gradually evolve to expand their functionality and ease of use.

When we were invited by Cleveland Museum of Art Chief Information Officer Jane Alexander to attend the 2017 ArtLens Crash Party on June 21st, we knew that major changes were coming -- changes that were not just evolutionary, but revolutionary!

Ever have a day when you have a few things planned, but as the day proceeds, opportunities for more fun activities arise? That was my day on Saturday, May 6, 2017, when a couple of fun things evolved into a full day and evening of activities.

• Late Morning: Cleveland Flats - Drink Local. Drink Tap. Inc.'s "4 Miles 4 Water"

• Early Afternoon: Downtown Cleveland - Cleveland Public Library's "Superman: From Cleveland to Krypton – An Exhibit" Opening!

• Late Afternoon: Uptown Cleveland - Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland (MOCA)'s Free Admission First Saturday

• Evening: Cleveland's University Circle - Cleveland Museum of Art's MIX: Model

Thanks to all the organizations that hosted these events -- from the flats to Uptown and beyond!

We were fortunate to receive an invitation to attend the April 26, 2017, Cleveland Museum of Art's "Alex Katz Media and Influencer Exhibition Preview."  The exhibition opened on Sunday, April 30, 2017, and will continue through Sunday, August 6, 2017. 

The museum's Director of Communications, Caroline Guscott, and Communications Associate, Kelley Notaro, greeted us as we arrived to start the evening. They introduced us to Curator of American Painting and Sculpture Mark Cole. It was great to have Mark Cole at the preview, so that we could ask questions about the paintings and learn some art history of the time period represented by this exhibition of Alex Katz's work.

We also met Diana K. Tuite, the Katz Curator from the Colby College Museum of Art.

To celebrate Earth Day, most years, we attend the Earth Day Coalition's EarthFest, and have written blog posts about our experiences at the event the past two years.

Earth Day 2017 was different -- out of some very negative things happening in our country, a very positive movement to take action grew! We mean, of course, the national March for Science in Washington D.C.!

The same day that it was announced that the national March for Science would be held on Earth Day, April 22, 2017, we learned to our delight that there would also be a March for Science in Cleveland!

The good people of Northeast Ohio came out in force! Congratulations to the March for Science Cleveland for this grand success!

2012 to 2017!!! Our fifth Blogiversary of celebrating the fun of exploring our community and writing about our experiences!

Thank you to my great co-writer and wife, Julie Smith! I always enjoy sharing the journey with her.

Since my first Hello, World! My First Blog Post! on March 8, 2012, I have expanded what I have written about as Julie and I are in our fifth year of blogging. Please take a moment and scroll through and view the topics of the 36 blog posts from 2016, and the seven posted so far in 2017, that you will see at the bottom of this post! As I wrote last year: "It brings me joy to look at the blog posts we did this past year -- great memories of fun times, plus the anticipation of a new year full of possibilities!"

This was the third year that we were invited to attend the PlayhouseSquare Launch Party for the KeyBank Broadway Series. Thank you, Digital Marketing Coordinator Alyssa Brown  for inviting us to attend this great PlayhouseSquare event on Tuesday, February 28, 2017!

It was an evening of fun and anticipation as each show of the new season was announced. For the past two years, the Launch Party announcements took place at the 2,800-seat Connor Palace Theatre, but this year, the event sold out the 3200-seat State Theatre!

In 2015, we learned that Cleveland draws the largest audiences in the country for these touring Broadway productions. This year, the Launch Party audience was the biggest ever for the event, so it will be exciting to find out if this will lead to the largest attendance in the history of PlayhouseSquare's KeyBank Broadway Series.

Record high temperatures at Brite Winter 2017!

On Saturday, February 18, 2017, Mother Nature did not deliver the normal sub-freezing temperatures that we have come to expect at Brite ​Winter. This year, we had record high temperatures across the area.

Unfortunately, Julie was not able to attend this year, so I went just for some of the evening activities this year with my son. Congratulations to the Brite Winter leadership on their eighth successful year!