Birthdays, Festivals, and Art Exhibits, oh my.

It's been a busy week. I had a wonderful visit with my sister. Because I'm nine years older than her and seven years older than my brother, I was more babysitter than sister when we were growing up, and I never really got to know who they were. As of late, that's been leaving me feeling sad, because they're growing up and I'm missing it. So I really (cheeseball alert) was thrilled at the opportunity to hang out with Rose for a few days. We watched A LOT of movies, went to see Twilight in the theatre, had a fantastic dinner at the Melting Pot, and went to the Botanical Gardens.



And then I sent her home and there was Festival of Trees. Which involves long days, crazy amounts of Christmas trees, wreathes, and gingerbread houses. And a serious need for margaritas. But it went off without a hitch and we had record attendance. And it wore me out so much I slept for 13 hours.


Today, on my one free day of Thanksgiving weekend, Avelino and I joined Leah and Amy for the Franz West exhibit at the Baltimore Museum of Art. It was really quite delightful. West's art brings the viewer in. It is art you can interact with, sit on, climb on, run around, and not a sound from the guards, not a peep, not till eager parent cameras come out to capture the kids, and then the guards leap into action, thankful for something to do, their nerves shattered, their reverie broken by the clunk of jumping feet landing, the giggles and happy cries.

And West did a lot of collages and things that remind me of the various journal pages I've seen all across Flickr. I had no idea who he was when we entered, and I left having fallen in love.

Of course I also visited the old favorites, like Zoe Leonard's "untitled" and Thomas Hart Benton's "Bubbles. I discovered some new ones as well: Grace Hartigan's "Elizabeth I" and Feliz Gonzalez-Torres' "Untitled (Water)."

Then there was the impromptu photowalk as we made our way through the drizzle to the car.


The umbrellas have led me to the start of a new project: photos of people with their umbrellas. Umbrella heads, I'm calling it jokingly. I'll be hoping for rain.

A busy, busy week. And with the end of the semester fast approaching, it won't be slowing down anytime soon.