Artsy Hangover

This morning has my body feeling like it got a stimulant overload. I'm supposed to be cleaning in preparation for my parents visiting - you know, so for two days I can feign adult-like skills in organization and general housekeeping. Alas the bod has other plans. Here is the combination of factors that led to my current comatose-esque state:

 

 

 - 4.5 hours of sleep. My husband was in Chicago roller derby reffing, and I got it in my head that I could stay up and wait for him. Well he didn't get home until 2:30AM, and the chipmunk ended up reading his morning newscast at 7AM (i.e. "BIG NEWS! I'M A CHIPMUNK! I OWN THIS PORCH AND EVERYTHING ON IT! YOU WANT A PIECE OF ME!? HUH, HUH, HUH? PUNK! I'M A CHIPMUNK! I'M SO FERTILE AND HORNY IT'S INCREDIBLE! MATE WITH ME! PLEASE! PLEASE! PLEASE!?)

 -  My mother and father in-law came to visit. My mother-in-law has the energy levels of the aforementioned squirrel.

 - Breakfast at a German restaurant. The waitress confused my order of a vegetarian bagel with vegetarian eggs benedict. It was so good, but I've never wished so much that the myth of the Roman vomitorium would actually come to be.

 - Art Fair on the Square. Madison's annual art festival that attracts artists from all over the country. The plus sides were that two of my favorite artists were there. One is Andrew Carson, a kinetic sculpture artist who makes the most fantastical sculptures out of metal and blown glass. I've had my eye on his pieces for the last five years, and his art has an official place budgeted out for it for whenever I find a house of my own. The other is Juli Adams, whose print, "Winter in Cuba", is hanging in my bathroom. Though it's likely to soon be replaced by my newest acquisition of hers, "Don't forget to brush your teeth." My husband also got a print for a future workshop - this one entitled, "Test Flight Scotty".

 

 - 95 degrees, and two hours of direct sunlight. Sweltering, beating, deadly sunlight. When a group of us asked the sun to come back last Yule, I don't think we were quite thinking about what we were asking. I think next year's Yule bonfire needs to have some qualifiers put on it.

 - My niece's birthday party at Gymfinity. Picture a large gymnastics gym. Now put extremely colorful blow-up slides, trampolines, a foam pit, and swinging bars in it. Now add about twenty kids between the ages of 2 and 6. Awesome. I give the gym major bonus points for the almost military precision they had in herding the kids from one activity to the next. And at no point did any child jump and land on any other child. There must have been several guardian angels working overtime in there.

 - My moment. I told my husband that we could totally make a faerie house out of the nativity we found at Goodwill. He said it wouldn't work out. He said it would still look like a nativity. I hot-glued  and hammered like crazy. I gathered faerie themed items from my drawers and wrapped and bundled. When it came time for present-opening my niece got almost all dolls - the princess from Brave (who all the little girls think is named, Brave), Tinker Bell, Strawberry Shortcake, etc. When she got to our gift (for all intensive purposes it was from both auntie and uncle), she exclaimed, "It's a faerie house!" There was a bum rush of tiny feet to crowd around and see what was included in the kit. The moms were asking us how we made it and half-jokingly asked if we took orders. Total cost of the house: $3.72. Total cost of the Pegasus and faerie figurines I bought to go with it: $15. Cost of being able to turn to my husband and do the I-was-so-totally-right-and-my-faerie-house-is-SWEET dance: well, you know.

And so, this morning I recuperate. Tonight I'm heading out to dinner with the in-laws once more to celebrate my husband's birthday. And in a few more days the chaos starts all over again with my parents. Maybe I should make a little white surrender flag that I can wave at the appropriate times.