it's humid, and the scent of my neighbor's freshly mown lawn mingles with last night's rain...wafting in my studio window making me dizzy with spring...our second spring, really. somehow, fat bumblebees have been coming inside to visit me, and everything stops while i play capture-and-release. they go up high to my lights, so it's not an easy task. today is a slow one...easing into the day with coffee, and finally a time to play around with some design ideas at my jewelry bench. nothing needs to get done, so it's relaxed. i'm stretching the last of the linen that Caroline gave me, and have some inklings of what that may turn into. just a gentle morning - one i've needed. smoking has been mostly good - some days just 2 cigs, some days 4, but i never thought i'd get to that plateau without an intervention! on the days i feel like smoking more, i say "ok" but wait 30 minutes to light up. and usually by then, i'm elbow deep in something and no longer feel the urge. when i do smoke, it feels foreign, and usually after a few puffs, i'm done. so that's a real step. with the season's change, i feel a stirring - an awakening - inside...creatively. there are things i want to express in my art and can't wait to do it. i'm still back-and-forth about an offsite studio...it would mean not having materials close at hand when midnight inspiration hits, or the snow is many feet deep, and it would mean leaving Diva alone most of the day. but it would also mean more focus. there is no laundry or cooking or phonecalls or computers in an offsite studio. maybe there's a happy medium. maybe if i split materials, and dedicated a certain amount of time to the offsite - say, 3 days a week or something, then i wouldn't feel like every waking second needs to be spent there. that mindset gets as confined as a cube in an office. but a big empty room where i could spill paint on the floor and not clean it up - that would be fantastic. i'll look around closer to home, rather than downtown where i assumed i would want to be. one of my Summer Sisters is coming to visit next week, and i am downright geeky with the thought of it! she's coming to town on business, but we will have some time to spend afterwards. i may make her miss her flight home :) it's amazing to me me how much this fills me up - just the thought. ok - time to shower & get outside in the day...thunderstorms predicted for the afternoon (thank goodness Diva can't hear them anymore) and i want to get a walk in before that. wishing you a beautifully sweet day....