Panic

It’s funny. When I get closer to the end of a school break, I start to panic, realizing I haven’t done nearly enough of ANYTHING (because I always forget that I don’t keep going for 24 hours straight on a regular basis, and the priorities shift. Yesterday I got up with the intention of finishing 3-5 classes’ worth of the project I assigned before break, but I only got through 2 before I was screeching at the top of my lungs and wanting to throw my computer out the window. So I went to the gym after that and gave myself a break, but then thought I could easily finish the binding on the small quilt that needs to be done by Friday and then do another class of grading.

Oh yeah. Binding takes longer than I thought. First I had to cut a new set of binding strips, because I had done wibbly wobbly math in my head the previous night. I am notoriously bad at math late at night. And then sew them on. And remember to eat dinner. And finish the book I was reading (it was good…it deserved finishing). And then I started the hand sewing, which always takes much longer than I think it will…

Which is kind of the theme of the whole quilt. It took 56 hours to make it. I started it just over a month ago. Most of it has been completed over Spring Break. But it’s tiny for that many hours, only 16 x 24″…proving to those people who want me to make smaller stuff so they can afford it that when I go small, I don’t always go simple. It has over 800 pieces in it, which is a bit nuts.

Here it is finished, not official photos, but I was trying to hold off on taking just one small piece in because it’s cheaper if I have more than one…and I hate having to pay a big chunk of money on such a small piece, but I don’t think I can get another one done just to justify the photo shoot.

There is that other crazy top lying around, but I still have to finish the other three classes of project grading. Before school starts again. And do a few other things. Time always speeds up at the end of breaks and I lose entire days it seems. How is it already Thursday? And I’m considering inking it now that I’m seeing the photo. So that’s more time. But not a lot.

I am planning on starting another project right away…the drawing’s done and numbered. I just need to shift a lot of stuff off the light table. But really, what I need to do is finish the grading first. I don’t want to. It might hurt. But before ALL of that, I get to go see my co-worker’s baby today. School can wait for that. Hell, everything can wait for that.

Never-Ending Cups of Tea Would Be Cool if They Were Real

Stayed up way too late again, but for a reason! OK, it’s always for a reason. It’s not always a good reason. My brain is sometimes very juvenile. Anyway, so I finished quilting.

I didn’t get a lot else done yesterday honestly. It was a lost day. Oh. I did hike the dog. And there are photos! But they’re on my phone and I need to get my act in gear and do some work today, so you’ll have to wait to see them.

It took about 3 hours to do all the outline quilting, which honestly was the biggest part of this quilt.

I had to go pretty slow because the details are so freakin’ tiny…

And I was lucky to have a color of thread that worked for the background. I know some of you have incredible thread stashes, but not me, so I thought I might have to quit last night and go shopping today, but no! I had one that worked…

The total quilting time was 4 hours and 23 minutes…a baby quilt. I had a few places I had to go back and fix because I’d forgotten to stitch them down. I mark them with pins. Ironically, this pin is in the wrong place…it’s the next artery to the left. But I figured that out.

And then quilted the background, finishing around 1 AM or so. After I think.

Then I read the prospectus 17 times and measured twice as many times before I trimmed it. I really hate pieces having to be an exact size. She’s only 16 x 24″. Tiny really for me. This would be a perfectly reasonable quilt at 200-250% of this size. Anyway. Then I cut the binding but realized in the middle of the night (OK, morning, because I didn’t go to bed until morning) that I cut it too small. So I have more and will cut again today. But I really really really have to grade stuff first, as much as it might kill me. And tomorrow is actually kind of busy, so I need to get the quilt done today as well. Dad will be disappointed that I haven’t worked on the yard, but that’s because his priorities and mine are different. So I’m going to plop myself on the couch with a never-ending supply of tea and I’m going to grade until I start pulling my hair out. Then I’m going to the gym (I hope). Then I will come back and put the binding on the quilt and then grade some more…and if that doesn’t sound like a fun day to you, well, then, I agree. Finishing the quilt will be fun. The other parts suck. Well, I like the gym. And never-ending cups of tea would be cool if they were real.

I Can’t Think of a Title Because That Damn Crow Won’t Shut Up.

An empty nest during Spring Break…it sounds like bliss to those friends of mine who still have kids at home. I remember Spring Break was almost torture, because I still had tons of schoolwork, housework, and yardwork to do, but I had to entertain two kids as well. And feed them and clean up after them and all that. As they got older, sometimes they would help around the house as well, but it was still work to get through those two weeks. They were necessary to my sanity in the school year, but I didn’t feel relaxed at the end of them. Yes, I’m lucky to have two weeks off, because as any teacher knows, it takes a week just to try to recover from what you’ve been doing in the weeks before. So I get the recovery time and then a week to try to fix whatever I need to fix. Or finish grading, more like it…almost 9 hours in the last two days, but one assignment is done and input. Hopefully the next big assignment will go faster (ha!). I’ve already done some of it, the paper stuff mostly, before break started, so that was smart. But the computer stuff…my school computer is dying and is scheduled for a reboot after break, but I’m trying to bully it through some work before that happens. Otherwise I have to sit in here at this computer and I can’t have some TV show nattering on in my other ear, persuading my brain to continue working. My brain requires multiple stimulants to do just about anything. Seriously. Even art. Can’t be quiet.

So it’s been too quiet here, too much alone time. Spring Break with no kids around. No one around really. It is what it is. At some point, this will be summer break as well, although not this year…at least one is coming home. Not sure about the other one. We’ll see. I’ll have to put the house on Airbnb or foster a child or puppies to get through that.

So I spend my days working through the lists of crap to do that are mostly in my head. Yesterday, the front yard, which has been a disaster since the septic field was redone, was on my list. The weeds are over 4 feet high and I’m waiting for the county to get called. My neighbor is frustrated, but he’s retired and has a gardener, neither of which are my superpowers.

Weeds. Huge ex-lawn. Deck covered in leaves. Tree overhanging.

Two plus hours later, I’ve cleared the deck, trimmed the tree, excavated weeds to the middle (mostly), and weed-whacked part of the growth.

My whacker isn’t going to make the grade though, so I went and borrowed dad’s. It’s gas-powered and I might need a shoulder harness to wield it, and if I don’t hold on tight, it might send me skyrocketing through the air into my neighbor’s yard. I’ll have to go back out again today…there are more weeds to pull and things to whack. And the real decision of what to do with the space anyway…I’d love to have the time and money to re-landscape it in a more native-plant style. But that’s not in the cards. It rained a little last night. Hopefully that will help with the weeds in the middle. They were not happy about being pulled.

This morning, I pulled 17 thorny splinters out of my hands…and that was WITH gloves on.

So after that and groceries and cooking up some weird stuff (some recipes are just lame with amounts of ingredients) and grading for fucking hours, I finally made it into the studio. Late. I pinbasted this one and the other one (which I didn’t apparently photograph).

And started quilting. Barely. It was late.

It’s the line that will pull this thing together. And I’m running out of time, so I need to put some significant hours into this today.

Oh! And good news this morning…a quilt I made for a specific show actually got into said show! A miracle. The Goddess of Never-Ending Chaos will be in Houston as part of the Turmoil SAQA exhibit.

This is kinda what it feels like when I meditate. Seriously. Even with the kids moved out. I’m glad it got in. There were 24 chosen from 220 entries…typical 10%…but it’s nice to be in there once in a while.

Up All Night

So yesterday I spent an hour going through two containers of old pens and pencils. I’m fairly sure my SIL would have just tossed all of them, but I don’t have her budget. I did toss about half of them, but a handful are going to school to supplement my stash there…and the others are going into a useful container here. Which I should consolidate with all the other useful containers and then stop buying pens for about 8 years. Seriously, when I die, my children or grandchildren will pull out their hair over the pens. After they’ve screamed over the fabric and thread. But this cleaning house thang, it just takes more than I can handle. I do a little every day. I also did a little yardwork yesterday and will head out for more today because it’s nice and cool. Plus my greenery trashcan just got emptied. I think. I hope. And then I graded. Oh my. Talk about pulling out hair. I got through three periods of the last unit by sheer willpower. Strength. Gimme it. And I input grades right as I finished them, so when those little widgets finally remember to sign on and check their grades, the shock will sit right with them like lead in their guts.

I swear I think I give up on this year. I’m gonna keep on teaching, even teaching good and cool stuff like frog dissections and brains, but I’m going to stop (I swear!) worrying about the grades, because I just can’t. I can’t take this year on and listen to admin saying I get what I give. I just can’t. Where are the parents in that equation? And why is this year so different? Some break happened between kids born in 2002 and those born in 2003. Turning work in must be controlled by a gene that was stymied by a vaccine or something.

Yeah. Stop thinking about school. Grade stuff, but don’t think about school. Laughing heartily over that one.

So after about 4 1/2 hours of grading (which puts me at an estimated 15 remaining? I might have underestimated dammit), I needed to do something else. Even though it was almost midnight. What the fuck? I’m wide awake (no idea why…haven’t slept well for nights) and it’s Spring Break. I gots nowhere to be. Literally. Nowhere.

So I stitched to music. Window closed so hopefully the neighbors weren’t too disturbed…actually, I think this photo is from Saturday, because that’s when I started.

So the thing about small quilts is that the distances are shorter, so the stitching-down part was way shorter than it would have been in a full-sized quilt with this many pieces…less than two hours and I was done.

But it wasn’t even 1 AM and I was still wide awake. I had started stitching down this ancient one (seriously I don’t know when I last worked on this…wait! I have an app for that. Well I picked fabrics for it three years ago, March 2013. I ironed it together that July. And it’s been hanging in here ever since.

Because it’s a little weird. Honestly. But it deserves to be finished. I needed to take some photos of me stitching and this was the only piece lying around I could stitch on, so I started it about a week ago for the photos and then put it aside. Now it’s ready to be sandwiched and quilted. So some pieces really do lie around and wait if they’re not compelling enough. Right now I think it’s calling out for a shitload of embroidered flowers. Or whatever.

I went to Easter dinner at the parentals and worked on these again. I could have taken grading. God knows I have enough of it. But I’m trying to finish these birds…think I’m down to 5 now.

The wool work is soothing. It’s easy to achieve something interesting quickly. Well not really quickly. But they relax me. I’ve been handling a lot of wool pieces lately. Need the calm. The distraction.

So yeah. Today I need to sandwich the two quilts and start quilting the more complicated one. Mostly finished picture due Friday (one day reprieve!). And final photos by April 15. Easy peasy. Seriously. I don’t think quilting will take as long as a full-size quilt. And then I can start on another one. Because my sanity depends on it.

Because the pile of grading is still there. The finished stuff is in the green bin. The other two periods are on the couch.

And there’s another pile on the coffee table of another project. Plus the assignment that’s online that I can’t even bear to look at. It’s just a matter of priorities right this second. What first? Yardwork? Then shower. Then groceries and pick up the poor dog. Then grade until my eyeballs bleed. Then make art. No housecleaning in that scenario. Hmmn. I need a secretary to plan out my days. But he/she would have been here at a reasonable hour, banging on my door, and when you go to bed at almost 2, then you need more sleep than I got. I can feel that behind my eyeballs. Well maybe I’ll sleep tonight then dammit. Stupid hormones.

So not up ALL night. Although definitely went to bed in the early morning. So I guess I skipped night. Yeah.

Find the Balance

Serious hermit behavior results in…well…results. Certainly not my original plan for yesterday, but I guess it turned out OK. Although I’m running a little crazy from the quiet. I finished watching The Killing finally and decided for a change of pace to watch Call of the Midwife…I’m not sure it’s a whole lot different, despite the era change and the content change. Maybe that’s just my brain. The next steps on this quilt will be performed to music instead, so that will be a change.

I did get my taxes almost done yesterday too AND walked the dog, so I did OK. But I also ironed for 6 hours…which is kind of pitiful maybe. Or not. That’s 6 hours of talking to no one. Well…briefly to my SIL. Texting daughter. Ex about daughter and taxes. That was about it. Next week…sigh. I will need to do some things besides art next week, although it will probably hurt my brain. I do need to have this to an almost-finished state by the 31st though. Yikes. It’s sounds impossible when I write it out.

I didn’t start ironing until after 3 PM, after I’d done all the stuff I needed to do.

I ironed the third figure apart first…it was easier than trying to fit the wings around the existing arm.

Then I put it where it belonged and ironed the other wing under her head.

I ironed the vine separately as well and then fit it around his head and hair.

Then all that was left was this bird…whose wings gave me fits. I misplaced two feathers and recut one and fit the others so the last one didn’t matter, but I don’t know what was going through my brain because I found the missing pieces as I finished up ironing. They were just in the wrong section, but I could have sworn I’d already checked there. Brain fade.

Then I ironed everything down to the background.

It’s supposed to finish down to 16 x 24″. The image is about 15 x 23″ I think. I didn’t want to leave a large border.

The next step is to stitch it down, hopefully today. I am going to the gym. Need to strengthen the body and clear the mind. It feels like cobwebs in there.

Then sandwich it Sunday and start quilting. It’s taken as long as a large quilt to iron down because of all the tiny pieces, but hopefully the next two steps will be quicker…although there is a lot of detail, so maybe I’m dreaming on that hope. And it needs a name.

Next up…financial aid, finish the silly taxes (the last form is giving me fits), yardwork, housework (still), and grading shit. Aargh. I can’t. I just can’t. There’s definitely a war going on in my brain at the moment. Trying to process stuff and weed out the crap so I can face the rest of the school year. Calmly. Mindfully. And keep the balance. What I’m doing now is not really balance…but I need to swing back to let the work stuff in so it doesn’t bury me later. So probably FIND a balance first. Like I haven’t been working on that for the last 20 years…

Keep Calm and Hermit On

I often go into hermit mode on breaks from school. I’ll go days barely leaving the house. Yesterday I left twice, both for things that were already on my calendar. I don’t actually have anything for today, but I’m going to walk the dog. Next week is a swathe of unscheduled days. I know I need to grade stuff, clean stuff, trim stuff, but I also need to clear my head, make it possible to go back to school in a little over a week and survive the rest of the school year without totally losing it. I need some calm and patience. My counselor says I need to fill myself back up, and she’s right. More importantly, I need to do a better job of that on the weekends through the end of the school year. Problem is there are so many to-do’s and other things that get in the way of the filling-up.

Anyway, yesterday was hermit mode. I worked on art-related things for over 6 hours, about 4 of those hours on the small quilt I’m putting together, which just so you know is supposed to be 16 x 24″ finished. That’s way smaller than I usually work, and it’s been difficult ironing it together, because tiny pieces are fussy. But it’s a good place for my brain to be at the moment. Clearing shit out inside the head, even though I can’t seem to get it together on the outside the head part.

I had these ironed the other day, but they were in the bin, because a couple of them aren’t attached to anything, and I was waiting on the cloud until I got the legs in.

There were some other free-floating pieces I did yesterday…

And then I started on the legs of the central figure, so the clouds went back in. That damn tree is a pain in the butt…

It’s always in the way.

This is a tiny uterus with an even tinier eyeball in it.

The torso came together. The girl’s knife is because she cooks…not because she wants to hurt things, although at the moment, that’s probably a toss up.

I think that’s when I went to counseling…then the store, came back and went to my quilt class. More on that below. After class and cooking food, I started on the upper torso, which was a little fussy.

Overlapping shit…then on to the head and hair, which I did separate from the torso at first.

Then once I had all the main pieces in, I ironed it to the torso.

There’s a few more things to go on there, like the face for instance, and the missing hand. I was too tired to deal with them last night though. Faces are complicated and they hold the strength of the figure…the expression is important. And on something this small, I didn’t want to fuck it up. So I went to bed with my book instead. Today I’ll get the rest done, I’m hoping. I should be doing other things, but I can’t get my head there. Maybe tomorrow.

On Wednesday night, I was in a bar at a music thing, so I drew. Desert plants were definitely on my mind. Not sure about the rest.

Those big heads are still in my brain, percolating. And a new Earth Mother drew part of itself in my head last night. I guess I should put it on paper. I feel a need to just make some stuff for a while without a deadline attached to it. I didn’t have anything portable on the current quilt to take to class, but I had three drawings I’d copied, one of which I wanted to do next, so I numbered all three of them.

They each came out at about 400 pieces…

They’re all about 17 x 21″ inches, so smaller than what I normally do. I’m in the mood to just bang out some smaller pieces (not as complicated as the one I’m doing right now). So maybe that’s my pre-summer project. And I can draw another Earth Mother in between and aim to do her over the summer.

Although there are shows that are talking to me, and I should consider them. Their deadlines are later in the year, though, and right now my brain hurts. So I’ll deal with these, I think. At least the first one. I’ll see where I’m at once I finish it.

That one reminds me of one I gave away. Unfortunately.

OK, so I’m going to walk the dog this morning, even though it’s a later start than I wanted, because I need to clear my head. Cobwebs. Shitty crap in there. Then I’m going to come back and spend at least an hour on taxes. The taxes I should have done a month ago, maybe more. Then I can do art. Or maybe I should set a yard or house goal as well. Sheesh. Too much in one day. I really just want to iron the damn quilt down. And continue to Keep Calm and Hermit On.

Ironing It Out…

Back to avoiding all the shit I’m supposed to do over break (yardwork, housework, financial aid)…I’m in art brain mode. Why? Because I started ironing and an image started to appear and now that’s all I want to do is stare at it and make it come together. For hours. Fuck the rest of it. Seriously don’t want to deal with anything else. Bad. Bad Kathy.

So the one thing with this quilt is that normally I would have enlarged it 250%. But it can’t be enlarged for this show. It has to be fucking tiny. So it’s taking longer to iron because I’m dealing with these utterly teensy weensy pieces.

The tree is upside down because in real life it’s upside down. I have two right-side-up figures and one upside-down figure. I’m sure at some point the girlchild will complain that she is upside down in this piece and I will explain to her that she was the second child and she came out backwards and that’s why. Then she’ll complain about being naked in the quilt, but that’s what happens when your mom is a quilt artist and does nudes. So there.

See…the pieces are mostly tiny. In fact, some are so tiny that I’m not cutting them out until it’s time to iron them down, because I would just lose them.

This is about 180 pieces ironed. I still need to do the rest of her arm. The moon to her left with the clouds, it’s done. So are the things below the tree. They’re in the bin, waiting to be ironed down to the background.

That’s about three hours of work. Not a small amount. So it took 3 hours to iron less than 200 pieces. I’m figuring 12 hours total. She doesn’t really have a yin/yang tattoo, but she does have a scar from back surgery.

Girlchild got out of her increasingly nasty dorm situation yesterday, finally…a relief to all of us. Still trying to clean up loose ends on that, but hopefully it will be done and behind us soon. And hopefully I can force my brain to do some work soon too…besides ironing. Right now though? Right now I’m going to iron for a while. It’s my meditation. Clears my mind. Lets it process. Sometimes that’s what I need, more than I need a clean house and a weeded front yard. I know some people don’t understand that, but honestly, I’m at an age where I just really don’t care about that. Cronedom, here I come!

Running Away to Anza Borrego…

So I’m back. A short trip to the Anza Borrego desert, only one night of camping (honestly, with the wind trying to pick the tent up, I’m glad we only had to deal with it for one night. Vacation shouldn’t be sleep-deprived.). We saw about a million metal sculptures by Ricardo Breceda…OK, there are apparently only 130 of them, but we saw all of them.

I liked the dinosaurs best…especially the ones where you had to drive way the heck out into the desert to see them. This post is photo-heavy…mostly a picture journal of the trip. The wildflowers were apparently “gone”, but there were plenty of things blooming for me…

I took photos of almost every sculpture we saw, but some of them were definitely better than others. I was amused by the eyelashes…Brecedo definitely likes eyelashes…

Harvester ant holes…we didn’t actually see a lot of wildlife. Even birds were absent the first day, mostly probably because of the crazy winds.

The dinos I liked the best were way off the road. We didn’t see many people out here. This is a newer one…he hasn’t rusted much.

After a while, they all look like they’re dancing.

Teeth abound…

It’s actually a little frightening seeing these guys and thinking about them wandering around…

Humans would not have survived, I think.

You look tasty, my dear.

These guys were wobbling in the wind. Then again, the bursts were pretty strong.

Definitely all about the teeth.

More flowers…I missed the pink cactus. Never remembered to stop for those.

The details on the skin/hide were kind of amazing.

And all the pieces of metal. Breceda wasn’t an artist until his daughter asked for a T Rex.

Ocotillos were in bloom all over the place.

This thing had a name. Most of his creatures are prehistoric, although honestly, there’s one group that wasn’t on the maps, and we’re pretty sure they’re made up things.

Yup. I brought someone to conquer the angry beasts.

That cloud stayed until sometime in the middle of the night. The winds above must have been competing for air space.

The scorpion…that reminds me…Yup. Scorpions have two eyes on top and 2-5 pairs along the sides. Yick.

So this thing. Not on the map. Big curved claws. Carries its young. Furry as heck. Looks like a cross between a beaver and…something.

Here’s one who fell over…

Making shit up. Don’t know what that is.

The famous serpent, which goes across the road. Awesome. Need that for my yard.

Llama with serpent in background…

Indian Head right near the opening to Indian Head trail.

The caterpillars were around…some much bigger than others. The wildflowers come, then the caterpillars try to eat them all, and then the Swainson’s hawks migrate here to eat the caterpillars. More on the hawks later…

One of the few furry beasts we saw…HUGE ears. The rest we saw were dogs. On leashes.

I swear they’re dancing…

These guys were up a road that was misnamed on the map…

The tortoises were all a little feisty too…

Peccary with babies…

An entire wash of bighorn sheep…which was nice, because we didn’t see any in real life unfortunately.

The wind is still scattering the clouds.

An ironic metal saguaro in the middle of the desert without saguaro.

We were sure it was a cutout from a distance, but it was in fact 3D when we got there…

A ha! A hawk! So we headed out to one of the hawk counting areas and saw a kettle of hawks scared off the ground by three coyotes. These hawks migrate from Argentina to Canada…

There’s the kettle settling back down after being scared up.

I’d never seen so many hawks in one place…over 60 of them flying together.

Camping in the high winds…the ice chest kept the tent from taking off.

The campground was nice and quiet, despite quite a few children. There are bathrooms and showers and running water, and even shelters over the tables. Definitely a nice place to hang out.

The next morning, we were tired from the windy-night’s sleep (or lack thereof), but planned a hike up into Borrego Palm Canyon.

It wasn’t a long hike, but there was some chance of seeing bighorn sheep, plus it was supposed to be pretty. And it was.

It was a bit warm, but bearable.

A stiff breeze (and sometimes serious wind) dried off the sweat as we hiked.

There were plenty of flowers still around.

But the wash was dry…at least down here it was.

As we went up the canyon, there was water. It must go underground at some point.

Still no sign of sheep, but I caught this guy in a photo…

The palms grow naturally here…

When we got to the oasis, there were about 100 6th graders there eating lunch. Wow. So get the hell outta there before they leave! They probably scared off all the sheep.

We’ll have to come back to see them (the sheep. Not the 6th graders).

We took an alternate route down and promptly got lost and were wandering through the wash.

A quail led us back home (not really).

After a change of clothes, some food and drink, and a relatively easy ride home, I took my second shower of the day and fell promptly asleep on the couch. The dog woke me up for her dinner. Mine was a piece of toast. So not motivated to cook!

I couldn’t find my brain for the rest of the night, so I just messed around with the wool projects I have lying around. Tried to organize them and cut stuff out so that I could sew things down, but never found the energy to actually sew.

It was a good, albeit short trip. Maybe there’s a longer one in my future. Who knows? Meanwhile, I have plenty of work to get done here, if I can just get my brain to come online. I’m in recovery mode…

Painting with Fabric

I used to post every night, for almost a year. It helped me sleep, and I was having a hard time with that, getting no more than 4 hours a night. And at some point, my brain switched back over and allowed me to sleep without the brain dump in the wee hours, so now I usually post in the morning, before week, setting my mental tone for the day. I don’t know which is better. I know I get more sleep when I post in the morning, because I don’t stay up late writing AFTER my brain is done making art. So that’s how it rolls.

But I’m on vacation, so my brain’s kinda messed up anyway. I don’t usually post on Sundays, but I know I’ll be traveling and possibly out of phone range for a little while, so I figured I’d do this now. (What’s funny about this is that I got distracted last night and never finished. I remembered once I got into bed, but there was no way I was getting back up to finish it. So here it is…in the morning again.) I don’t want to start the next phase of the quilt I’m working on right now, because it would mean leaving parts of it lying out while cats were looking for something with which to wreak havoc. So I’ll start that when I get back. I spent some time grading today, just to get some of those 26 hours out of the way. I did the same thing yesterday and Friday night. Two assignments are done and in the computer. The two giant ones, unfortunately, are still staring me in the face. I figure there’s a good 20 hours in those and the other assignment I have left. Then there’s a small one…it won’t take long.

But first, I’m going to break in my new boots and try to relax for a few days. If that’s possible. I have a ton of pictures from two openings last night, but no time tonight to resize them, so that will have to wait as well. I did finish cutting out all the pieces to this tiny (for me) quilt on Saturday, so that was a plus…and then today, I sorted them into bins…

That was just the beginning. It took just under an hour. There’s a lot of tiny pieces in this quilt. Ironing it is going to be a bitch, I think. Not sure. Maybe not. I also managed to sweep some leaves and take out the trash. The yardwork on this place alone might kill me in the next two weeks. I’m hoping to be efficient, but I get side-tracked by artmaking and it sweeps all the household To-Do lists right out of my head.

This is from Saturday night, one of the openings I went to. This is my quilt Primal Scream…

It’s actually pretty old, but I didn’t have much available for the show and this was in the Grossmont show, so I had just taken it down. Plus the show was about the Power of Feminine Energy, so it seemed relevant. The show is up in the Centro Cultural de la Raza in Balboa Park here in San Diego through April 3, 2016. There’s some really good work in the show, but again, like other shows, more curatorial presence would be good. It’s an interesting space, being in a round building. I don’t know what’s in there usually, because I’ve never been inside (that I remember). But it was not a bad venue for a show…just really loud and kind of uneven.

Ironically, the other show I went to, I had lots of friends in it (which is cool), but it was a higher level of competency. And I thought, hey, self, how do you get into THIS show? I’ll have to ask. Although there were no other fiber artists in either of the two shows. It really is a painter’s world out there in Artlandia. I try to describe my work sometimes as painting with fabric, but only to those who are thinking of their grandmother’s pieced quilts. Because it’s not like that at all. So I say it’s a painting with pieces of fabric. Think about an art painting on the wall but no paint is involved. Unfortunately, I don’t think the art world in general believes what I do is a painting, so I’m always fighting that. And the quilt world thinks what I do doesn’t really belong either. Rock and a hard place. I think if I took my drawings and turned them into paintings I’d be fine. And it wouldn’t take as long. But I don’t like painting and I do like the texture and complexity that fabric and quilting fabric brings to the piece. So I soldier on.

The Mindful Sloth

AHHHH. Spring Break. I feel relief flooding through my body. Calm waves wash through my brain. OK. Wait a minute. Not yet. First I have 700 errands to run this weekend to get ready for camping and hiking on Monday. In fact, I got home, exhausted, yesterday, beyond tired, sat on the couch and fell asleep for about an hour. Then I got up and went hiking boot shopping! Yay! Yup. Bought boots and new socks and new inserts. Had gift cards and my dividend from when we bought the boychild all those winter things. Paid for almost all of it. I’m very excited.

Today includes tires and checking a tent and figuring out what we’re missing and dog food and dog meds and shit I don’t even remember at the moment. Plus an art opening…which I’m hoping is as good as all the hype around it. We’ll find out I guess.

So last night, after figuring out food and eating something and grading for a while, because honestly, grading is going to be a big part of my time “off” (it’s never off, is it?), I went back to cutting tiny pieces out. I really REALLY thought I’d be done last night. Really.

Fuckin’ A.

On the left, stuff that’s cut out. In the middle, the scrap pile. On the right, what’s left.

Bloody hell. I was tired. It was midnight. I couldn’t do it. Tiny little fussy pieces. Maybe an hour at the most. Couldn’t do it.

I cut for almost two hours last night. Should have started earlier? Except when. How. Whatever. So 7 hours in…just a bit to go.

And there’s the grading. Actually, that is only a small portion of the grading. I have a pile on the couch and about 300 things online.

And there’s the cat too. So there will be lots of that going on over break.

I haven’t cleaned up my photo files from last March yet, so this is what I was working on a year ago…

The big Earth Mother quilt. That was a fun one.

I still want to draw a more naked sister to this one. I liked drawing it. I could work with this. But there’s other stuff ahead of it…and two shows coming up in the fall that I might want to enter. Have to look at those today. Maybe today. I’m having a big flailing morning for sure. Cannot get motivated to do shit.

I do occasionally go back and read previous posts from last year, just to check my mood and stress levels. It’s useful because it reminds me that this happens every year, that March kicks my ass and Spring Break has a lot of grading, but I make more art, and I never ever ever catch up on house cleaning and yardwork, and there are X number of days left in the school year and they will be stressful, but I will make art to save my sanity, and maybe I will hike and do fun stuff as well. So yeah. It’s all good.

I am going to make a serious effort to return meditation to my daily practice over break. And to draw more. And to try to relax. Much as I can. I’m just not very good at it…at walking away from all the Have-To’s for any period of time. A significant failing on my part. OK. Well. I might function better with food. And a shower. At least I’ll have some chance of getting out of the house with those behind me. Maybe. Today I am like a slow-moving sloth. Just moving that arm as slowly as possible. Mindfully! ha ha ha. That’s it. I’m moving slowly because I’m being mindful about everything I do today. Yup. That’s it.