I Can’t Feel a Thing from My Head Down to My Toes*

I keep thinking I’ll get so much done, but then reality kicks me in the head. I did quilt. I did draw. I even walked dogs. All good things. I also drove 2 hours to pick up a quilt and went to the chiropractor. And made dinner from scratch. Still all good things. I did not finish the quilting. I didn’t even finish the outlining. That’s OK. I’m going to do more today. There’s progress…

Although, even though I checked the back for missed stitchdown areas, sure enough, there were three I fixed yesterday…the octopus tentacle was just one of them.

Where the pin is. It’s OK. It happens most times.

Then quilting the rest of the legs, above the knees…

Then the dogs earned a walk…and it was cooler (although still humid) yesterday, so we dragged them out to our regular place. I’ve seen the stinky melons on this vine, but don’t remember the spiky balls. So many plants around here have spiky balls for protection…

And I don’t think I’ve seen these out there ever. It’s weird, because I was just there maybe a week and a half ago…so maybe the bushes were there, and the extreme heat made them flower?

Lovely cloudy skies…cuts down on the temperatures. Not so today.

And wild roses…not sure I’ve ever seen them blooming here. But they were beautiful.

I made dinner…it was lovely. No seriously, it was. I’ll be eating leftovers tonight before book club…for a book I read over a year ago and don’t remember (I just wanna hang out with my book-club mates before school comes back and screws up my schedule). Then I finished all the orange balls (fly stitches) and started on the pink balls (bullion knots).

Second to last set of balls.

Then back to quilting, up into the torso, which was a bit complicated.

Uterus done (it’s not a vajayjay, people). Stomach, liver, intestines (it’s not pornography…it’s parts).

Full view of that section. I have the upper torso, arms, and things floating around. Not a small amount left, but not hard.

OK, quilting is never really HARD…it’s just time consuming and I’ve got a hard time sitting still sometimes. Like now. Hence the walk in the middle of quilting.

When it’s late and my co-housemates all go to bed, they prefer it if I’m not quilting. Apparently the WHOP WHOP WHOP noise of the machine with my music loud enough to cover that is disruptive to sleep. Who knew? Luckily, I have another project in process, so I moved into the living room to work on the drawing. I seriously haven’t started drawing before 11 PM on this thing most nights. It’s too hot in that room. I need to buy another fan. I used to have it in a certain place and it was easy to unplug and move. Now I share it (what!) and it’s not so easy to move. So a new fan would be smart.

Anyway, I had decided that the mermaid sea mother needed a viewpoint, but I had already drawn in that space. So I could use liquid paper, but then when I trace, there are multiple lines that show up with the light and it’s confusing. Usually that’s what I do, but this was a fairly straightforward cutout. So I did it.

Then inserted paper behind and drew the earth.

I added a few more things to the plastic trash.

And then broke up all the water spaces. It looks really complicated, but I just needed smaller pieces of fabric for easier ironing. Lots of dead fish. But I think the ocean section is done. Although looking at this, the space under her arm looks empty. I need to visualize a sand fabric back there…it will be fine.

Then while I was driving to Oceanside yesterday to pick up my quilt, I had some ideas for the last figures…definitely a breastfeeding woman. Faceless though…standing for many women? I guess. There’s another one on one of the other waves that I didn’t ink last night…she’s just in pencil.

Here’s the whole drawing (ish…the top is falling off the back of the light table). As you can see, I’m getting there. Also penciled in is a volcanic area, and I need to put a skeleton in. And then maybe a bird or angel or something? Still considering that. Cherubim? Yeah. Maybe.

This will be a fun one to explain. It started out as one thing and morphed into 17 other things and I think all I can do to explain it is to call it my brain on politics right now. It feels really bad. Although the Thai soccer players are out! That’s good! Distract me from judges and laws and stupid policies and tweets and everything else. We can’t look away…we don’t dare. But Shee-it. So this quilt is that. All that.

I spent about an hour this morning going through upcoming shows and deadlines and organizing for them. I don’t know if I’ll be able to enter everything I want to, just because I have a finite number of pieces available. But at least I have an outline and some organization for that. I do need to iron fabrics for the two little ones though, because they’re supposed to be done in 11 days. OK, stop hyperventilating. It will be fine. They’re small. You could finish both of them in about 2 or 3 hours if you wanted to. Shush.

What I need right now though is breakfast. And then once I finish the legal stuff I have to do today, then I can quilt all afternoon. It’s warm, but there’s a breeze…and two fans in here. One day at a time. (don’t think about the school stuff you have to organize before Friday. Shush.)

*Genesis, That’s All (so I had this significant other who used to give me shit for some of the music I listen to, and this is one of the bands he shamed me for, even though Pandora picked it this time. But I like Phil Collins…and his bald head…and his earnest voice. So I guess it’s a good thing that SO is out of the picture.)