have a great weekend.

enjoy those around you.

eccentricities and all.

the last time i looked at this bush it was a weed.

now it's this gorgeous, overflowing purple thing.

everything's coming up roses...

or something like that.

um, yeah, i ask myself this all the time. particularly when it comes to thinking about what i am going to do once the girls leave for college.

and here is the lint that goes through my brain:

i don't want to make a mistake, what if i get too involved and i don't have time for the other parts of my life, what if i'm the oldest person in the room, what if i sound too 1990's, what if i have to start at the bottom (again).

i could continue but i won't bore you. of course the biggest question for me is the what? what do i want to do? what's interesting? what's the right thing for me?

modern love

in the beginning of the summer my husband noticed something.

doing dishes makes me really angry and hostile. especially when we have dinner parties and a multitude of pots, pans and dishes await me after a long night of way too much food and red wine.

so now, after dinner, i am not allowed in the kitchen. jimmy kicks me out and he does the dishes along with anyone else he can recruit to help him. this weekend it happened to be my in-laws, sam, zoe and elliott.

as you may have guessed, this new arrangement has been working out quite well.

i feel a bit princess-y but i think everyone that lives with me prefers this to the angry/hostile me.

did you know that the dog days of summer have nothing to do with heat per se but a dog-shaped constellation people noticed bizillions of years ago that occurred in the night sky whenever it was really hot.

this is the kind of useless information you start bouncing around when it"s 102 outside and you've lost power, i.e. no air conditioning and lukewarm diet cokes.

at first the power outage was no big deal. and then it just got really hot. i tried napping it away, but i couldn't get comfortable. and then i went swimming but after 10 or so minutes i was bored with being in the pool. so, i finally just gave into the hot and stickiness, pulled out a gossip magazine, opened a bag of trail mix and just leaned into it. three quarters of the way into my bag of nuts and white chocolate chips, i heard a beep and then looked up at the microwave to see its lights flashing. we were back in business.

it always works out that way: the minute you decide something is not a problem, it isn't. in spin class my teacher always reminds us that when you fight a wave it will smack you down every time. turns out that the whole whatever thing is actually a really healthy way to live.

yeah, right. whatever.

now what...

like many women i know, i am trying to figure out what's next for me. in exactly one year sam and zoe go off to college probably never to really return home for any significant length of time.

i've spent the last ten years firing up two girls. helping them figure out who they are and encouraging them to stay true to that.
i have talked to them about everything hoping that by example they will learn how to talk about everything because it's often
hard for women to ask for the things they need/want.

of course i could say i lost myself somewhere along the way but i don't see it that way. there's so much about parenting that
forces you to crystallize who you are and i see this as a big gain.

But so what?

i know i need to push back from helping others dream so i can forge ones of my own.

sometimes it's just hard to know where to begin.

flower power....

wow, this blog has gotten kinda nature-y.

i'm really not that green---i only recycle because i have to.

(it all ends up in the same place...right?)

but this summer's been so gorgeous.

i can hardly wait to take photos of the sunflowers this weekend.

sometimes you just gotta get out...

what is it about getting outside that clears your head?

is it the change of scenery, the colors, the air?

get lost....

i go for these crazy, long walks on the weekends.

sometimes for over an hour.

it's just me and lola and the farmers.

we start early in the morning when everything is so still.

i love this time of day...everything seems so possible.

s'mores stuffed chocolate chip cookies

a month or so ago i made oreo stuffed chocolate chip cookies and they were a big hit.

in fact they were such a big hit that i must've made six or seven batches.

this time i decided to do something different and i made these s'mores stuffed chocolate chip cookies.

here's the recipe. you may want to run a couple miles before making them.

they're not exactly low-cal.

but you won't care.

the beach calls...

i love the beach.

i haven't spent nearly enough time there this summer.

gotta change that...

the assistant to the assistant to the assistant to the assistant curator...

yesterday was a pretty special day for me.

i got to meet sammy for lunch. at the office. her office.

sammy's interning at moma this summer.

she took art history this year at school and fell in love with art and everything about it.

this picture sort of says it all.

be real or don't apply....

so, this is turning into the summer of college talk.

it was a pretty telling day when i bookmarked collegeboard.

as complicated as the college decision can be, it ultimately comes down to one thing:

what are your interests and how well does a school match up with those interests.

there are so many distractions out there but ultimately you've got to do what makes you happy.

otherwise you're just faking it and that's a waste of time.