Four

So Stephen and I have this Saturday morning tradition of having fresh pop-overs for breakfast with fresh berries and yoghurt (when we can get them) and, most recently, topped with our favorite strawberry rhubarb jam from Nervous Nellie's Jellies in Deer Isle Maine... this morning we realized this would be our last traditional pop-over feast as  a duo. So we invited Jay Leno and Seth Rogan to the table and savored every crumb. 

I spent the majority of the day feeling very off, mentally that is. I can't put my finger on the exact cause of this off feeling but it is rather annoying. It's almost like a slight anxiety over what is about to happen mixed with a severe case of boredom. I am happy to report that I have not been this "bored" in years. As I am sure everyone reading this can imagine, I have reached my limit for laying down and doing nothing for the majority of the day. I am itching to be active.. to be reading.. to be doing anything other than what I am doing. But I can't be active right now, and my mind refuses to concentrate so reading is an exercise in futility. I want to be deep in thought and contemplation, filled with the wonder of impending motherhood. Instead I feel like I am on some sort of mind numbing drug. Sleeping walking my way through the last days. Feeling wasteful of all of this private time. 

Stephen ordered the Art 21 series for his classes this year, and they arrived this week, so over lunch we decided to watch a few choice portions. Mark Dion, Judy Pfaff, Andrea Zittel.. the usual suspects. Man, have I missed looking at work. Watching Andrea Zittel made me sick with jealousy over her living space, her clothing, her projects.. I have always liked her work but watching this made me want to crawl through the TV and cuddle up in one of her constructions.  For lack of a better term, it was inspiring and really helped to get me out of my  self imposed funk. I wish I was a millionaire so I could build a fabulous studio for Stephen and let him loose in there with limitless time, supplies, and resources. Just being near that creativity is inspiring. I remember when we were first married, and he had his first real school studio space at Ringling, I used to come to the studio at night after work and sit with him. Reading, writing, whatever I brought to occupy myself seemed so much more alive and bright when done in those surroundings. Watching he and his studio-mates working was so relaxing. Contagious creativity? 

After lunch we went outside to help Ollie burn some energy. He is after that barely visible black and red frisbee thing in the above picture. 

This dog can seriously jump. If you have ever been to our house, you know this first hand. It looks like Stephen pulled him up that high but he got up there all on his own. 

He got a little overheated so Stephen thought it would be a good idea to hose him down...

As you  can tell from the video below and the photo above Oliver truly enjoyed playing in the water and the end result was a filthy, filthy little dog who went straight into the shower after he had his fill of rolling in the dirt.

For the duration of this little segment our mailman was standing across the street laughing his tail off. 

As if Art 21 and a filthy nasty dog couldn't lift one's spirits enough, in the midst of our little Oliver escapade, our neighbor, Dee, and her daughter, Heaven, brought over a gift for the twins!!! I hereby  eat all my negative words about our neighbors here. Since I wrote that stuff, we have met just about everyone in the vicinity and they are all perfectly friendly (granted some of the more grumpy ones moved out last month) and we are starting to feel much more acclimated. Anyway, how sweet was that for her to bring a present for the girls!? Just too much. Another neighbor recently left a little baggy of rosemary from her garden on our car. Still another asked us to water her plants this week (she just moved in two weeks ago). The timing couldn't be better since we will soon need some serious understanding as we tote screaming twins in and out of the apartment. Maybe I should buy earplugs for the girl we share a wall with...

Stephen is grilling out tonight - we are doing your grilled peaches again, Jeremy. Hope they turn out as well as they  did when you guys were here :)