Go ahead… let Sugar Hole puppets serve you ice cream.

The Sugar Hole is a walk-up, soft-serve ice cream window in Chicago’s Irving Park neighborhood, not exceptionally unique but for one significant factor: the staff are puppets.

“That’s gonna be $10,” said Puddles, a blue alien, to his first two customers on a hot Saturday afternoon in July. “And I don’t have arms so can you put it between my eyeballs?”

Josh Dihle and Abby Monroe are the husband and wife co-owners of both The Sugar Hole and Color Club, an adjacent arts and events space they opened in 2021. Dihle said they wanted to add some kind of walk-up food window for years, and the idea of staffing one with puppets was mostly inspired by their 2-year-old daughter's puppet-heavy toy bin.

"One day at dinner we were talking about like, 'Oh, well, The Sugar Hole, what if it was a little puppet hand that came out and took your change or took your money when you paid?' And then my wife Abby was like, 'Oh, well, maybe just: puppets should work there.' And I was like, 'Oh my God, you're right.'"

On this episode of the Rundown podcast, host Erin Allen talked with several folks in and around The Sugar Hole – including Dihle, a few ice cream patrons, as well as puppets Puddles and Aurora Bearialis and their human operators Camille Mitchell and Emilie Wingate – to get a grasp of what a puppet ice cream shop is all about.

"For me personally, I get a big kick out of standing across the street and looking over and seeing this absurd thing occurring that grew out of literally a joke," Dihle added. "I like that moment where you can see something that had lived inside of your head literally abutting with reality, and that people are catching the ball and going with it."

The Sugar Hole is open weekends from 3-8pm and is located at 4146 N. Elston Ave.

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