Oh Life, It’s Bigger*

I got some significant quilting in last night…was finally able to get my head down and into it without breaking the thread every 20 minutes etc. What a relief. What’s ironic is that I don’t have much quilting time in the next two days…OK, not ironic. Just plain frustrating. But it’s all stuff I need to do in one way or another, so I have to just take a deep breath and realize I’ll be quilting all weekend to get done. Or something.

I can only sit like that for so long…

So I did some tulips and grapes and a giraffe and some trees and a hand…

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And a crane that took a really long time and was very hard to see in the dark (sheesh. I need better light in here.).

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Oh yeah, and a gecko. I started on the vines around him, but didn’t finish.

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Look at his suction cup toes! OK. That’s crazy.

There’s the whole crane…

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It was not easy to stitch without good lighting. I have a light on my old machine…I’ll need to get one for this one, I think. Yeah, I think this machine will do the job.

I did a flower as well. Just a little one.

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I still need to do a good chunk of the stuff in the lower torso. It’s all lots of tiny details, but they all really pop once the stitching is done. Aargh. I really want to just stay home and do this. It’s the hardest part about going back to school, because I often come home too tired to really manhandle a quilt under the machine. Or to do anything, honestly. The first two weeks are usually pretty difficult. Plus I was missing my kids already last night. Got all sad in the head.

I played with puppy quite a bit last night to tire him out, and finally put him on the chair (Kitten allowed it) so he would stop trying to rip up the linoleum floor in here. Yes. It’s coming up. I know. But you don’t have to HELP it. He’s like offended by the floor. Honestly it makes more sense to be offended by the wallpaper. Or the general mess in here.

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I have not made a significant dent in any of the messes in the house. Well, except the entryway. And stuff is already piling up in there (OK, most of it is going to school today).

I spent most of the day with girlchild. I had a Groupon at our local ceramic-painting place. She made me an awesome mug last year (World’s Okayest Mom) and I broke it. Funny…I do break mugs all the time (I’m a klutz), but usually after years of using them. I think this one lasted a few months. So I painted a mug for me and she painted a mug for me.

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Mine is the weird one, yes.

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Hers is for me to take to school. I’m amused.

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Appropriate use of an apostrophe. Thank god.

School. I am so not ready.

*REM, Losing My Religion

If Today Is All We See*

So. I went in yesterday with the two sewing machines that I had killed now, and even though I made sure the newer one didn’t work in the morning, it worked by the time we got there. But what he thought it was now was something that wasn’t even worth it to fix…it would cost too much. Parts aren’t even made any more (my “newer” machine is probably circa 1990). The older one he could make work, no problem, but he cautioned me that it wouldn’t hold up to my quilting practices.

So it’s not that I’m hard on machines per se…it’s that the average person drives their car about 15,000 miles a year, say, and if we’re talking about my car, I drive it more like 100,000 miles a year. Except we’re talking about sewing machines. And it’s not easy sewing…it’s hard on the machine itself. So dirt roads for the car.

To shorten the story, mom and I went back and I’m currently test-driving an older Sapphire, which has the larger harp, but is more of a workhorse. It’s used…but probably not much. Yesterday, I managed to quilt most of this one using only one bobbin…

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Not bad. I broke a needle in the beginning, but I think I was using the wrong foot. I switched to the one my mom loaned me, a springy bouncy free-motion foot, and I was much better off. It’s different than my old machine, of course, but it was pretty easy to use after I tried four different things and ripped a bunch out and tried again.

So later that night, I tried the outline quilting I do, which is very different…much slower, I need control, and it goes through a ton of layers. It did really well with this.

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It was late by then, so I didn’t do a lot, but I’ll do some more today and then make a decision. I think it will work, though. All my sewing machines have been hand-me-downs from my mom…but she does more of the design work, and I don’t need something like that, so she’s been trading in her old ones over the years to get the one she’s got now. This one is much simpler, but will hopefully stand up to the work I give it.

And the good news is that I can now quilt this shit out of this thing and get it done. I want the quilting done this week (although the next three days are kinda screwed for that…).

We did walk the dogs yesterday…

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There are so few dog walks left with the kids this summer. Wah. Calli had something wrong with her foot at some point, and boychild considered carrying her. It didn’t last long (she fussed and squirmed)…

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The other thing about this machine is that I can close the lid and the thread is covered up completely. So it’s CAT PROOF. Oh yeah.

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That’s a selling point. I still have to do this with the quilt to keep Midnight from lying on it or vomiting on it, but I don’t have to remember to remove the spool and rethread every time. That’s a plus.

It’s funny though. I was sitting there contemplating having no working machine at all, or limping through on the old one until I completely trashed it, or trying to use other people’s machines and knowing that I couldn’t do that forever…and I thought, shit, I should be a painter or something. No major machinery that you need for that. But it’s not actually cheaper in the long run, I think. Brushes and paints aren’t cheap if they’re good quality. Certainly I could still quilt without a machine, do it all by hand. I did that with a few of my early quilts (and even they aren’t hand-quilted…just hand-appliqued) and it took FOREVER. So I’d finish like one small quilt a year. When right now I’m looking at needing to finish three or four large quilts before the end of the year, certainly before next spring, another two more. And two or three smaller ones. Oh yeah. It’s crazy, but you can’t do it without a machine that works. So there we are.

It’s my Christmas present. I have good parents who try to support my crazy art. And honestly, when you think about the stuff you get for Christmas and birthdays, this is one of the best presents for someone like me.

*Zero 7, Morning Song

Hell Ain’t For Sure, It’s Only a Chance*

Well, the plus is that the sewing machine still isn’t working this morning. This doesn’t seem like a positive thing, but it means I can take it in and he can actually SEE the problem, EXPERIENCE it in real time. That is the only way to get it fixed for good.

I’m about to go up to my neighbor’s house and offer the workers WD-40 for their wheelbarrow. Squeaking. Horrendously. Worse than the squeak is Simba’s need to bark to protect us from the squeak. Yes, it’s a horrible noise, but it’s unlikely to kill us. He’s very protective about weird-ass noises. It was so delightfully quiet on Friday, when they weren’t here. Today I have drills and hammering and squeaky wheelbarrows and more yelling.

So hopefully I’ll have a working machine tomorrow. (please please please) Then I can drown out their noise with that.

Yesterday, I finished the drawing…just under 5 hours on the full-size part…plus maybe 2 hours on the stuff that was in the sketchbook (I watched a 2-hour movie…let’s put it that way). There’s a lot of Stare Time built into that…staring at the drawing, trying to figure out what goes next and where and how…staring off into space, trying to visualize it.

I’ve done a head in the clouds before…it’s a worry space, a hope space, a remember space. Depends on the drawing.

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This one is definitely a worry space. She’s long…I know she’s 36″ wide, but I haven’t measured the height yet.

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Kitten is still invading the work space…she’s extending her claws because I was batting at her…she was in my personal typing space. She doesn’t seem to care what I need.

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The kids came back, mostly cranky and some exhausted. Simba was quite happy about that. I won’t let him sleep on the bed.

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And then later that night, I numbered the pieces. I kept thinking this one was easier than the last, fewer pieces, less crazy. Hmmm. Well. In general, it is. But I went a bit crazy in the cloud…

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I took some of the things from that other failed drawing…I figure if that one ever becomes a quilt, it’ll be OK for the gas-mask woman to show up again. The nuclear power plants and leaking barrels have been around for a while.

Oh yeah. See? It is fewer pieces than the last one. Psychotic grin on face. Uh huh. You don’t wanna know the deadline on this one. Let’s just say I’ll be tracing Wonder Under starting today, because I can’t afford to lose any time waiting for my machine to come back. I’ll quilt the other one as soon as I get the machine back, but I’m busy until then.

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It’s confusing too, because basically there’s 3 figures right behind each other, so some of the parts are labeled so I know who they belong to…and I tried to number one figure at a time. I’m sure I’ve fucked that up somehow.

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Those aren’t even her arms.

Seven hands. Yes. Only 7. I guess technically there are 4 figures…I don’t really count the little guy in front.

Anyway, the plus is that I have school kind of under control (well, for where I can be at the moment…I can panic further on Wednesday when we start planning shit I don’t even know anything about), I finished all the copyediting last week, and at least I have another project ready to go, so I’m not wasting more time. I also copied the other drawing, the one where I have to cut off the head and the bird, so I can draw that as well. Although there are two smaller ones and some coloring book things that have to happen first. So even though it’s a Monday morning and school starts in two weeks, I’m not completely panicking. Well, just a little.

*Mojo Nixon, Tie My Pecker to My Leg (yeah, you read that right…it was a challenge to pick lyrics for the title today)

Bring Your Alibis*

So yeah. The sewing machine experiment lasted for about 18 minutes. It jammed up the first time 12 minutes in and then repeatedly after that. Weird things going on with it. I’m taking it in tomorrow, but not after making sure it’s warmed up and jamming happily so the guy can see it in action. I don’t mean ‘jamming happily’ like making good music on a Sunday afternoon. I mean like vibrating needle shaft that won’t move or sew and makes me swearz-a-lot. Yeah.

So the thing is, I don’t really believe in fate or messages from the gods, but sometimes I think you have to look at what’s working and what’s not and choose to walk away from some things. I’ve done my due diligence with this machine and it’s not going to work until I can get it to fuck up for the machine guy and hopefully that will be soon, but there’s no point in the last two Friday nights, where I’ve been grinding my teeth and growling and wanting to throw it in the pool. I mean, yeah, it’s frustrating. But it’s not like I don’t have some leeway on this deadline AND shitloads of other stuff to work on.

So get on with it, Kathryn. I have to admit that Friday night was mostly a wash. But Saturday afternoon, after the machine pissed me off, I took about 15 deep breaths and walked out of the office, determinedly heading for the big drawing on the light table. Because I kept staring at the original drawing and trying to let my head process it…and I’d even penciled in a head and a boat (like you do) the other night, but couldn’t get past that. NOW was the time.

You wonder why so many cats end up in my drawings. (It’s because they’re always WATCHING me. )

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Same with teacups. Except I don’t really feel like they’re watching me. Just that they’re always there. Really I should be drawing more scissors and mechanical pencils.

So I did pencil in some of the stuff at the bottom, like the boat and the general leg placement (there were issues…as you’d think there would be with three people standing stacked up behind each other. Oh hey. That’s a good title. Stacked up. Hmn. Document that shit.). I love that some titles come to me as I’m drawing, and some I have to pull out right before I have to enter it in a show, because I can’t think of anything.

So I added all this stuff at the bottom, referencing my first Earth Mother quilt from a million years ago.

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Puppy is such a cute dork.

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Then I had figured out in my head about 4 or 5 days ago about what was going on the sides…a layered landscape from water to mountains…

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So I added that on each side…

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Here’s the little guy, fishing.

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This quilt actually has two males in it! I know. You’re shocked.

Plus yeah. A cat.

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So it’s not done, though.

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I did start the head, and it’s got references to Tlingit art. I was born in Alaska, and I swear the graphic arts and totem poles from there are so stuck in my head…I think I must have filed it away in baby brain, and parts of it have been leaking out over the years. People talk about not appropriating other cultures’ art, but sometimes it just sneaks in. The Native stuff has been in there for so many years. The idea of filling the figure with symbols…you have to wonder how much influence early exposure has on one’s brain. I do.

Anyway, so I’m hoping to finish drawing this today and then number it. Although technically, I think there are two smaller ones I need to work on as well. So I may try drawing those this afternoon as well. While I’m on a roll. With a Sharpie.

So this is the booklet I got from the class…

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We worked in groups to try to plan a standard yard. Interesting ideas to use rainwater and take irrigation down to nothing or almost nothing. Certainly things to think about.

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Then my evening turned into puppy walk…man, this dog either needs to learn how to poop appropriately for one who has fluffy butt fur, or he needs to get used to my bathing him.

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Bad design.

Then this morning, I pinbasted the wool quilt that has been laying around forever. It won’t get quilted any time soon, but when I feel like it, it’s ready.

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Last night, I remembered I hadn’t sewn any of the eyeball buttons on the next wool quilt, so I did all 30. I flicked one across the room at one point and had to go searching for it. No, I would not have bought more. I would have picked a random button that didn’t match.

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Now they all need trimming. Guess piecing is on the back burner for a while. It’s OK. Julie and I are trying to figure out an easier way to do the borders, but honestly, I guess I did the borders on Earth & Twig above all as one and didn’t die. So I could probably do these that way too. By the time I get enough room in my schedule to put the borders on, it’ll be winter. Winter Is Coming. Yeah right. We have to live through Southern California summer first (doesn’t come until September/October).

Then since I had marshmallows and Rice Krispies, I did this. Sometimes you just have to.

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The kids are on their way back here, mostly to be cranky and entertain the puppy, I think. I’m in need of a nap, personally, but will try to hold it off with caffeine. I want to go finish the head part of the drawing and start some new stuff. Might as well use my non-quilting time wisely. This week is kind of a bitch. Same with next week. And then I’m back in school. Summer is so short some years.

That’s it. From now on, my blogpost titles are always lyrics from whatever I’m listening to as I write…well, until I get sick of that. Or forget I thought of it.

*Hotel California, Eagles

Time Is Running Out…

I took a class this morning on waterwise gardening, trying to use what little rainwater we get in an already dry landscape. It was interesting enough…honestly the best part is the free booklet and the 90-minute consultation. I figure I’ll need to spend the next 3 or 4 months trying to make the soil not awful, plus kill weeds, and move dirt around to use the rainwater better. I won’t be planting until November or later. Which is fine…

Anyway. Yesterday. Yesterday I quilted. I wanted to quilt for a good long chunk of time, but the sewing machine is acting up again. In the first 2 hours, though, it only had issues three times, which isn’t bad. It was the last hour that got hinky, and at some point, I just turned it off and walked away. It didn’t help that puppy needed attention and was trying to rip the linoleum off the floor in here (don’t worry…it’s already coming up…he likes to destroy things that are already damaged). So I gave up. And was frustrated as hell.

Three hours in though…shit, I need so many more. I’ve been scared to turn it on again, thinking it will just keep doing this frozen vibrating needle thing. But maybe it’s related to overheating…and it won’t happen for a while. I don’t know.

I did manage to quilt all of the earth portion…

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And started up into the body. Right after the owl is when it went bonkers.

Don’t you feel like, with electronics, if you leave them alone for a while, they will magically work again? Well. We’ll see.

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I had a couple of nests…the machine has some issues anyway, beyond the needle thing, for sure.

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And the pileup on the machine to keep Kitten out of the thread and Midnight from lying on it (and all the other things animals have done to my quilts over the years: muddy paws, chewing, vomit…).

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Then I spent some time trying to tire out the little boy dog.

I was trying to figure out his birthdate (I don’t think it’s on any of the paperwork we got for him), and I happen to know the name of the first owner and I found her on Facebook. She’s a kid…really. I mean, she has a job and all, but her FB feed reads like a 12-year-old and I don’t think she is. She’s obviously happy about the puppy in the beginning (who she eventually names Fluffy Teddy or something like that), but there are photos of him in a crate with BAD scrawled all over the photo. Surely, he’s not always a well-behaved beast, since he was still rancidly biting when we got him. In June, she posted that she missed him…now I didn’t get Simba from her, but from ANOTHER kid (college-age) who had only had him a few weeks. So who knows what’s up with all of that. He’s here now…

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Psychotic teeth and all.

I did the top part of that redraw…I like the bottom, but not the top.

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I swear, drawing is a pain in the ass at the moment. Need my head in something that makes sense, that’s successful.

Anyway, I’m gonna try to quilt again, and if it doesn’t work, I’m going to go work on the other drawing(s) I need to do…hope they turn out better than the one above. Time is running out. I really need this thing quilted soon.

Just Get My Head Into It…

Morning is never really my strong point. I’m one of those late-night people. I don’t really get much done in the morning. And currently I’m sitting here in my office and I can clearly hear people at my door, plus Simba is going ballistic (Calli is in Arrowhead), but they haven’t figured out that my doorbell doesn’t work (oh hallelujah…I live in the boonies for a reason) and apparently they don’t want to knock. I’m OK with ignoring them because I heard them at the neighbors and it’s selling something, whether product or religion, and I don’t need either.

Yeah, my attack dog is a Pomeranian-chihuahua.

Last night, I had to text pictures of him to the girlchild, who missed cuddling with him. Huh.

So yesterday was kinda wishy washy. I copyedited for a while. Need to finish that up this morning and send it back. It’s the last chapter, so I hope there’s another book coming, but who knows…no guarantees. Then I was supposed to go to my stitching meeting, but I still don’t really have anything portable. The quilt is huge, so transporting it to quilt on it somewhere else is not realistic. So I took the last of the birds…

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I didn’t actually finish stitching it until later last night, but it’s done! A miracle! Well, until you realize that now I have to trim them all down, stitch them together, add the borders, and then do 96…NINETY SIX little balls with fancy stitching in the borders. Well. That’s gonna take a while. There’s no shortcut for that.

The birds are Sue Spargo’s 2013 block of the month project, and I’ve been working on them…well, since 2013. Mostly at soccer games, honestly, and then stitching meetings after that, because they’re nice and portable. I’m thinking the whole quilt is not gonna be so portable, and probably uncomfortable to stitch on in summer, being totally made of wool. But I’ll try to get to the point where I can stitch balls on.

I call it Bird Crazy, but it’s actually called Bird Dance…

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See all the balls? Yeah. So I’ve finished 30 birds…in about 3 years. I’m rocking it. Seriously, though, people always want to know why I’m working on other people’s patterns, and the reality is that mine are often not portable, or not something I can work on at a soccer game (I’ve spent a huge part of the last 10 years at soccer games…really until the last 12 months). And I like the embroidery on wool. It’s relaxing. And enjoyable. So it’s my hobby. I’ve always enjoyed embroidery…I just don’t usually have time to do any of it on my own quilts, because the deadlines are so tight, or because I’m so mentally done with the piece by the time I get to the end.

I do have one top I started quilting where the plan is to add a lot of embroidery…and I did a memorial quilt for our last dog (who yes, died in 2012? I think?)…by DID I mean that it’s a bunch of wool pieces and a background, but I haven’t gotten any further than that yet. Things I’m making for me don’t get priority on the sewing list.

So after stitching meeting, I came home and played with puppy for a while, but I know I have a bunch of deadlines to deal with, and many of them require drawings, so I thought I would do that thing I always WANT to do, which is sit out on the deck and draw…so I did.

It was after 5 PM, but still not cool…but the sun is on the other side, so that makes it bearable. And I played some music and drank some milk (of course)…and did this.

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Now straight up, I like the body but hate the head and the bird. So they’re gone. But I think I can work with the rest of it. I’m probably gonna enlarge it and cut the head and bird off. There will be a head and a bird. Just not those two. Sometimes when I haven’t been drawing for a while it takes me a bit of fudging to get what I want. So that’s a start.

I love that prosthesis, by the way.

Then I had told Simba, who got left behind from the Arrowhead trip (not enough puppy supervision), that I would take him on a walk, because he got stuck inside while I was gone. I waited until it was cooler, much cooler…in fact, we were racing the dark back (I’m OK with that, except for the coyotes and the snakes).

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We saw a horse…twice…and Simba was sure he could kill it. I think. The horse was more intrigued than scared, luckily. Like…what the hell is that tiny growling thing? Exactly.

I was trying to tire him out, and it worked for a bit. Midnight is very tolerant of him, but she’s also bigger than him…and he truly doesn’t know what to do with her…except sometimes clean and/or nibble her ears. Which she doesn’t seem to mind.

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Hiking made me tired, but eventually I managed to come back into the sewing room. I recently finished the last little bit of embroidery on the 2012 Spargo quilt, Earth and Twig, after letting it languish for a good long time (like probably 2 or 3 years…see, I do that too). Yesterday, I finally found the backing and other pieces, then pieced the backing (hanging in the background)…then ironed the front and cut some batting. It’s ready to be sandwiched, hopefully sometime today.

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I’ve never quilted wool before, and honestly, it will be on the back burner for a while, but it will be ready. So that makes it closer to done.

Today I might have an art opening, if I feel like dragging myself to it. I have a few other things I need to do before I can start quilting, but that’s the goal…to quilt a lot. Don’t think about lesson planning and school supplies and deadlines and crap like that. Just get my head into the art and do it.

Pinned Down…

Well. It wasn’t the most effective day in the world, but I eventually ripped some usefulness out of it. Proof that I can flail for hours and still look like I got shit done. So yeah. Lack of sleep kicked my ass. I tried napping, but barking dogs and daylight were not my friends. I couldn’t concentrate for many hours, probably due to heat. But when I look at my post-it note for yesterday, I crossed off three and a half things (out of seven), so I did OK. I think. I feel like I’ve been fighting this all summer. All I do is work and sweat and clean and make art and sometimes eat or do random stuff like Shakespeare or art exhibits (OK, those aren’t really random). I’d really like to go on a travel vacation, one that is somewhere cool I’ve never been. I see lots of friends doing these things and I think, well, I could plan a year out and save up for it…in fact there are three possibilities in the next 12 months…but then I get fucked over by a cat swallowing thread and needing surgery. Sometimes I feel pinned down by my own life. An insect struggling with pins in her wings.

The kids are leaving this morning for Arrowhead with their dad and grandpa, an annual tradition that leaves me alone for four days (well, I get the little dog and two cats, so not totally alone). I have a shitload of stuff to do, so keeping busy is not a problem. It’s just that my brain was already in a cranky place…so I’ll have to work that out (drawing?). I even have a fridge full of food, so I could notionally get away with not cooking mostly. Except eating the same stuff over and over gets boring.

If you see me in a wine bar with a sketchbook, feel free to come over. Just don’t ask to see what I’m drawing.

So sandwiching a quilt this big (63″w x 73″h) is a pain. I found four yards of a backing fabric (that’s probably another nod to Sandi Fastnow there…) and pieced it together…then earlier today, I bought batting (and thread…JoAnns still has it, but in smaller spools) and washed it. So I cleaned out the entryway (again) and the floor and kept the dogs off of it while making and eating dinner and then laid it all out and spent an hour lying on the floor pinning. Yeah. I know. Pain in the ass.

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I still like her. She hopefully has exhibits in her blood…at least one. I hope.

Simba was pretty good about leaving it alone (notice the ONE paw). He’s confused by my projects, but he behaves pretty well.

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Check out all those pins. I finished after 11 PM. I had the fan on me in there as well…way too hot for this. No wonder I had all those weird dreams last night…

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There were some fussy bits that wanted to puff up and be cranky…as always. But I think I tamed them.

I had another one to sandwich, but there was no way I was lying on the ground for another hour or so. I’m hoping to do that one today, before the floor gets really dirty again…but honestly? I don’t know where the backing fabric for that one is. It’s one of the Sue Spargo quilts, so it came with a background, and I think I have to piece it as well, but I don’t know what I did with it. Sigh. I am losing my brain.

See how hot it was? Kitten gave up lying on my keyboard and mouse and annoying the fuck out of me while I’m trying to copyedit, and went to lie in the sink.

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Way cooler in here mom. You should try it.

OK. Copyediting, then something, then stuff, and things, and then sandwich another, and then start quilting and/or drawing and stuff. Be effective. Efficient. You only have two weeks and a bit before you go back to school. Don’t THINK about that, because you’ll panic, but remember you need to be working better than yesterday. Keep an eye on the post-it.

Post-It Life Management

So it’s entirely my fault I don’t have enough sleep in me, because I wanted to be done with the stitch down, and it so encompassed me that I stayed up way too late. I figured no workers would be at the house above me because they poured concrete yesterday (not true…they are up there now, but not making lots of noise…strangely arguing about trapezoids)…but it was chainsaws at 7 AM below me. My fault for having stuff growing over my fence, although they left the volunteer tree that I can’t get at. Sigh. I’m having one of those days where I feel like I can’t do all the things that need doing, but I know part of that is the missing hours of sleep. I will try to work my way through it.

But I did finish the stitch down…so even though I’m like three days late on my mental schedule, I think I’m doing OK. Maybe. Aack. I’m panicking. Part of that is signing up for professional development for school, and realizing how close it is. LOOMING. It does it every year, just about scares the crap out of me. More this year, because I have no idea what I’m teaching.

So I’m making a list for today to help me get through stuff…signed up for a landscaping class for the front yard, mostly about drought-tolerant design and rainwater control…so the boychild can maybe start some of the moving of dirt etc. before he leaves for college. I’m not planting until October at the earliest…it’s just too hot right now. Lists help though. I can focus my brain to make a list and keep checking it all day. Keeps me on task.

So I stitched for 4 hours yesterday, all after 9 PM…first I went down in the garage and found another fan, which I turned on my face…the tower I have was purposely purchased to be lower than the ironing board, so pieces don’t fly when I’m ironing, but it means I sweat like crazy from the boobs up…so this helped immensely. It was a double-fan night…

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I finished both boobs, the outstretched arm, and the head. I thought about stopping before I got to the head, because it was 1 AM at that point, but I knew I had work today, and my goal is to sandwich this and the other quilt I have sometime today (I need to check batting too). Plus copyedit. So I knew if I left the stitch down until today, I wouldn’t sandwich until tomorrow. And that still might happen, but it’s more likely to be done today if I finished last night. Besides…I thought I might at least get to sleep until 8 AM…ha ha ha. (and now they’re pressure-washing above me. I give up.)

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Wherever I am, they are. This is Simba trying to make friends with Midnight, who made a disaster of my nice piles that haven’t been fully put away yet. Because I’m not sure what to do with them. Actually, I have an idea now…just now…because I need all the college files in here. I use them all the time. But I need to find the rolling file thing that’s in the garage.

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Midnight outweighs Simba by probably 4 or 5 pounds. He doesn’t care. Plus she has sharp pointy bits, but she doesn’t really use them on him.

Kitten does. She’s not as tolerant. This is how I know my office is haunted. Kitten stared up in the corner for like 45 minutes. I don’t know what she was looking at, but she was Looking At It. Up There.

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This is when I stopped.

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Then I did all those nighttime things you do…mostly shutting windows and peeing a dog. So 2 AM before I got into bed. That explains this headache.

She’s all stitched down…I’m sure I missed something. She needs a good ironing…

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There’s gonna be a shitload of detail quilting on this…plus a lot of background under that arm. When I get batting, I will need to get thread too, but I’ve heard JoAnns isn’t carrying it any more. It’s hard to buy thread online to match…I’m going to have to figure that shit out today or tomorrow.

I think I’m going to need a nap later. A serious nap. And it will be hot and sweaty. Ugh. But if I get some stuff accomplished today, it will hopefully remove some of this panic. My anxieties are managed by post-its and daily reflection…note to self: buy more post-its (I don’t really need to do that. I have plenty.).

I Swear

Life is getting in the way of art. It’s OK. I’m letting it. A high-school friend is down here for about 24 hours, so I’ve been hanging out with her…waiting for her to show up again right now…so I may not finish this in a timely fashion. Oh well. (Obviously I didn’t…because it’s afternoon now.) Besides, they’re pouring concrete at the house above me, so there’s motors and machines and lots of yelling. Somehow the yelling gets stuff done. AND the last chapter of the book I’m copyediting just showed up this morning…so there’s that. And the 17 errands I keep putting off…I’ll be working on those this afternoon. So busy while on vacation! Watching the leftover days of summer tick away. I’m going to have to do lesson prep next week, I think. Crap.

I did get some art time in, though, while waiting and in between stuff…I had enlarged this drawing Friday night after all the sewing machines broke, and then taped it together. Yesterday morning, I added space to all the sides to finish the drawing.

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I also penciled in some possibilities, but obviously haven’t had time to really decide what to do with it.

And last night after dinner, I did stitch down some more.

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It’s taking forever because I haven’t been home. I’ll get focused soon. Hopefully tomorrow will be very focused. Ha. OK. Maybe. Certainly if the concrete was poured today, they should have to stay away from it for a while, right? No more yelling.

Boychild was trimming upslope yesterday…because it was cooler. Today is Not Cooler.

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I appreciate all the shit he does.

So my friend and I went to the San Diego Museum of Art because of the Quilts and Color exhibit, but also saw some other stuff, like this Chinese brush painting…

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And some more normal paintings, but I’m less of a fan of the normal. And then lots of quilts…

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Lots of log cabins…

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Nothing I hadn’t seen before in style, but they are still interesting examples…

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This one was silks and the strips were tiny…

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Beautiful stuff…

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And the old utilitarian tied wool quilts…

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Are kinda fun.

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An entire room of devotional art…interesting stuff.

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And dinner out with the parents and kids. The dog has been in the pool about 700 times. Then she tromps around in the dirt and wants to come back in. Sigh.

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If I ever redo the rest of my floors, it’s gonna be easy to clean, but not WHITE tile. Like mottled tiles with dog footprints of all sizes already imprinted on them. So you’ll never know how dirty it is.

So I’m really tired, too much brain exhaustion, don’t feel like stitching or drawing at this very moment in time. Just drank two full glasses of water (dehydration kicks my ass this time of year). So I’m ready to float down a river asleep in a raft. Too bad none of that is available at the moment. I will be better tomorrow. I swear.

I’ll Figure It Out…

Some things that were going through my head in the last 36 hours…first of all, hallelujah that the hot weather has broken for now, because I was considering Naked Quilting, and there’s a few things that might be an issue…my kids for one thing, plus the fact that some parts of the body sweat too much and underwear can be a good thing to catch all that wet. Plus needles and scissors and nudity aren’t a good mix.

Second, the heat seems to have nixed the mockingbird. Yeah that bastard has been forcing me to sleep with a pillow over my head for months now, which is significantly difficult when it’s already hot. But apparently heat is not his superpower, and he has shut the fuck up. Hopefully permanently. No, I’m not wishing he were dead, because I’m not 12 years old (OK, let’s not analyze that thought in reference to a certain orange-faced, mop-wearing crazy man at the moment), but I would like him to let me sleep.

What else can I be grateful for this morning? More deadlines? Because I have more of them after yesterday’s fiber group meeting. It’s OK. I have 17 Excel spreadsheets currently in force to help me plan my art doings in the next year, and all of them say STOP trying to plan and just do.

Well, Saturday evening, I gave up on the do for a while (I did stitch stuff down for a good four hours Saturday, so I was no slacker…) and went out to see Arts and Amps at the Karl Strauss Tasting Room (it’s not really in PB…don’t panic). I was hoping for more Arts, but it was mostly Ale and Amps…although some of the beer sales went to help the Orlando victims…OK, not the wire work of fucking ducks…that’s Spenser Little, local wire guy, who I think I’m officially stalking, based on how often I go out to see his work.

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He gets around. The reason I knew about this event is a group called Cohort Collective that I follow, because I like a bunch of the artists’ work. And me and the guy were sort of fighting the idea that it was too hot to do anything and too hot to walk anywhere for dinner and we should do something interesting, so this is what we did. Yeah, there was a band. They were OK. The beer was good…but I mostly watched the painters work on this giant piece of canvas that had something else painted on it before they started (obviously), but we got there late, so we don’t know what it looked like before they started. So this was Dolan Stearns, whose style was kinda sloppy when you watched him, but had an interesting effect…

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And Christopher Konecki, who I’ve posted about before…we didn’t stick around for his part of the painting…not their fault. We were hungry and the food there wasn’t gonna work. But I was fascinated with how he painted…very different from the other two. Plus he wore gloves.

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And Nekoes, who did the beer growlers with faces…a very precise painter.

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Yes. I came to watch graffiti artists. Some day I want to try that. Or learn how to do it. I have this garage door. I swear I’ll paint it some day. In my spare time. Here was the commemorative glass…

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True, I think. Well. And a sketchbook and a good black pen. Yes. They carded us. We laughed hysterically.

My afternoon yesterday was spent at a fiber meeting, which is where all the new scary deadlines came from…they’re only scary because I’m already overwhelmed, but I’ll figure it out. I did some soul searching last night (OK, it was early this morning, and then I couldn’t sleep, but whatever. Don’t judge.) and I have some plans in place. They don’t involve sitting around and moping about how much I have to do, but I might need more cookies to implement them. Seriously.

I forgot the jalapeno when I did the kamikaze shopping yesterday morning, knowing the girlchild would be cooking but wouldn’t be helping with the shopping. I always forget something, which you’d think would persuade her that she needs to come with me more often, but no.

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Then we came home after dinner and I eventually started sewing. Kitten saw a lizard tail briefly and then spent the next 45 minutes sitting there and watching for more. Kitten TV is very slow and boring.

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And I stitched more down. I have one arm mostly done, plus all of the torso below the boobs and the whole Earth thing. I have a little over 5 hours in, and today is a bit compromised because a friend is in town. It’s OK…I won’t be getting as much done as I wanted to by now, but it’s not the end of the world yet. And friend time is good time.

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I’ll figure it out. I have two other plans in motion right now, although some of it is just in my head (a perfectly reasonable place for it to be, if you ask me)…as I’m sitting here listening to RAIN. That ain’t gonna last. But it’s way better than the alternative.