Portrait of a tortured artist

My life is busy in the best possible way. It is busy with people and projects. Some of the busyness is imposed from the outside, but every now and then I go on a creative bender and my life gets crazy-busy. (are there support groups for this??)

I homeschool my two kids and I cook and I scrapbook and I blog and I design and I just "do" stuff.

A lot of stuff.

As if I wasn't busy enough, I also get major spontaneous bursts of creativity.
("Oh, God! There's going to be bursting??" ~ from City Slickers)

It happens when I least expect it.

I'll be thumbing through a catalog or a magazine and WHAMMO! - inspiration hits.

Along with the inspiration comes a surge of incredible energy and I literally cannot rest until I pull all the pieces together for my project.

I get this crazed look in my eye and start talking really fast (with my hands flying.. duh! I'm Cuban. =D) because I HAVE! AN! IDEA!!

My husband and kids mock me mercilessly. "Poor you. Tortured Artist." Eric usually decides it has to do with me being Cuban. He uses that as an explanation for most everything I do: "You know. . . my wife is Cuban." ("Ah, that explains sooo much.")

Sometimes I sort of "stew" on something for a long time, and then a timer goes off in my brain - Ding! And I'm off. (I know. I'm a little "off" anyway, but that's not important right now. =D)

Okay. So this Pottery Barn Teen catalog arrives in the mail and everything in it just screams "over-indulged pre-teen" to me, but I thumb through it anyway and I find this: