Almost back to normal!

It has been a whirlwind couple of weeks with planning for my father's surprise 80th birthday party, visiting relatives and tax deadlines. The party was a great success and we managed to totally surprise my Dad. Some family has headed home, we are still enjoying the company of others. Tax deadlines never seem to go away but things have settled down a little at work.

One of the things we did over the weekend was go to The Blaze, a display of over 4,000 carved pumpkins at Van Cortlandt Manor in Croton-on-Hudson, NY (http://www.historichudsonvalley.org/). It was AMAZING! Many of the pumpkins were joined together to form things like dinosaurs and an enormous spider web. It was really a sight to see. We were fortunate in that it was a perfect fall evening, the aroma of leaves, candles & pumpkins added to the atmosphere. My camera is at my office - I'll add a couple of photos tomorrow night. It was great fun.

I am now officially two weeks behind on my projects! I've already posted the book and project for the first one but I haven't selected the second and third (I have to add this weeks book too!). I'm itching to get back into my studio so I should have something posted by Saturday night.

We have purchased tickets to go see "This Is It", the Michael Jackson movie. Whatever you think of his personal life, there is no denying that he was an amazing talent. I am looking forward to seeing the movie and learning more about his creative process. When I read that he often had trouble sleeping I could really understand it - I know that sometimes I get an idea in my head and I have to head to my studio to commit it to paper (or sometimes to start making it) for otherwise there would be no falling back to sleep. I can't imagine what it must be like to have music or lyrics running through your mind continually - much like when you get a song in your head and it is with you all day. We are going to the movie on Thursday night. I'll let you know what I think.

Even though I haven't been getting any projects done I have been surrounded by creativity - our fun decorations for the party (including funny sayings on the party favors), thousands of pumpkins carved in ways I'd never imagined, the minister at Church yesterday (whose sermon was quite creative in conveying its message about REALLY opening ones eyes), and Mother Nature's autumn glory - the leaves are beautiful, just exploding in color when the sun is on them. Creativity at every turn - we just have to pay attention!