Char colored sunflower crayon pages in daycare and brought them home. He also planted some that are starting to sprout! Didn’t have a ton of time for art so I made this crazy little sunflower with a face for him.

David brought me home a pile of Yupo paper (Mother’s day present) when he arrived in OH from TN. Excited to experiment with it but haven’t managed the time. Started back on a healthy living program yesterday. Took a three mile walk together at lunch. Worked and worked and picked up Charlie at daycare for a trip to see his grandmas. Had a little cookout and some yard work at my mom’s house and we picked up David’s mom to come with us. Charlie played soccer and rode his bike in the same place I used to play at his age. Absolute beautiful family evening. It was dark when we left mom’s freshly trimmed yard. She was happy. David gave Char a bath as soon as we arrived home and that gave me a few minutes to try a little peacock head on the Yupo. It’s fun and strange. You can push around the paint. Make all the happy little mistakes you want. I want to stay home from work tomorrow and just paint all day on it. Use all 75 sheets.

Yep. But I will be at work.

Sunday recharge after an insane Saturday! Relaxing in the sunroom and waiting on David to come home. Not doing anything profound but I was being somewhat prolific. Made tons of little watercolors as fast as I could. Most not so good. These were my favorites.

No chance the rest of the day will offer any art time so I made a quick little painting about two of my favorite things. David took off for Nashville to play a few gigs there. Charlie is a total grouch and I am letting him watch his tablet through breakfast to try and get us through until daycare and work. Ready for an exhausting weekend.

We’re tired from family bike riding and a long work day. Char wanted to learn how to paint pumpkins so that’s what we did.

I didn’t want to paint. It has been a tough work week. I managed a little hum-bird. Notice the boys lounging wishing I would just turn out the light.

• 

I am using all of my Monday for work. I am actually missing my bed and boys. I do have Woob here with me and we are putting in a critical night at the office. I stopped for 30 minutes to fulfill my responsibilities to art with minimum effort.

My sister bought these vintage watercolor crayons at an auction a long time ago. They are likely giving me lead poisoning but…

Charlie and I have had an exhausting week. We have suceeded personally when I wasn’t sure I could even get up and do half of what I needed to do. He has a tendancy to immediately tell me he can’t do things. I worry that is me. My insecurities. Maybe it is just normal to be so small and green. Maybe he believes he will never be tall enough to complete the tasks. Today he was confident. He learned a song by listening to it for hours. Then he sang it all. Worked at the timing like I did in my 30s trying to play and sing songs. Here he is 4. He used the hand held sweeper he has been afraid of since his eyes could follow it and understood how to remove each tiny crumb. Swept up an ant because he is a wild boy. Best of all he was actually interested in painting a flower to preserve it’s memory. Flowers his dad bought us before he left to play music to cheer us while he was gone.

As sad or stressed or sick as I could be, there is nothing better than him asking me to teach him.

I am at the end of a case of shingles. My body has hated me for years. It’s the stress. Do I keep allowing, creating this stress. Is it normal stress? Is it the way I am enternalizing it? Am I at “that” age. Shingles. These things are no joke. A tiny patch of them eats away at your nerves. For me to go to the doctor on my own for something outside of preventative care means I was sure I was dying. Absolutely maddening.

David drove all day to get home. We scrambled for two hours to clean ourselves up. Bathe. Brush our hair. Sweep. Clean. Clean. Clean. Toys in boxes. Paint brushes in glass jars. And we made him some sub-par dinner he told me was delicious. He took Char a little bike ride to remind me we live in a beautiful place. And before 8:00 pm Charlie fell asleep on the chaise in the sunroom. His day was so full of learning he couldn’t even stay awake at his happiest.

I mangled together a weird cat in the dark and watched Seinfeld and sipped Whiskey David received from his band mate for his birthday. Coveted whiskey we shared with club soda and oranges. Then soon David was asleep too.