Pro: I slept solidly last night (because I was exhausted…wait, I still am exhausted). I got to hang out with stitching friends last night. I didn’t grade anything last night. It’s Friday and I’ll be ironing a solid chunk of the weekend and then stitching.
Don’t ask about school. I might lose my mind. Not kids (well, sometimes kids). Just all the other moving pieces. And there are a lot of them and some of them are stupid. In case you’re wondering. I know why I became a union rep so many years ago, but it’s hella exhausting.
I also have a book that I need to finish reading by tomorrow at 2 PM, when the library whisks it away. There are 78 people waiting for the book, so if I don’t finish it (which might happen), I won’t see it again for 5 weeks and then I’ll have forgotten the already tenuous link I have to the story. I could just stop reading it, but I have a hard time with that. I think I should stop and then there’s a few pages of clarity and interest and I’m back in again, but…realistically…I have 3 hours left in it. And that’s a lot. And I have a lot of other things that need to get done. So we’ll see. Sigh.
OK ironing. I ironed late last night. The night before, I did much better.
I got the whole bathtub water thing done plus all the things floating in the water and the legs.
Last night, I finished the torso and both arms, which are fussier than maybe they look.
I’m in the high 700s and I’ve pulled a few 800s, so honestly, I’ll finish tomorrow and get it ironed to the background and hopefully start stitching it down. I’ve got a new deadline that popped up that I need to get started on, so I’m pushing through on this. Deep breaths.
I had a plan for the next quilt that was kind of a break from the heavy political stuff, but it looks like I’m diving back in. We’ll see what that looks like. I’m letting my brain percolate it as I finish this one, because I’ll have to leap right into drawing sometime in the next week or so.
Stitching last night with friends…all I did was couch down the fly stitches.
It took forever. It was nice to hang out and chat about travel and other stuff though.
When I get really busy on art stuff and school, I don’t have a lot of extraneous pictures apparently. Even of cute kittens. Here’s Scribble sleeping on the bed I bought for Simba a year ago so he could be comfortable out in the living room (he prefers to lie on my leg or on the couch behind my neck).
I think one cat slept on it once. So it just sits there. Maybe it will be Scribble’s. She’s a sweetheart. Doesn’t sleep with me every night, but comes and says hi every night. Very purry and kneady. Follows me around. Holds her own with the big kitties.
OK. I’m giving a test today, which hopefully will be quiet and calm and shut up. But you never know. Also it’s still strangely warm here, despite being December, and that seems to be affecting brains. Some kids think next week is already Winter Break (it’s not). Some kids will be gone even though they know it’s not Winter Break. We got two new kids this week and their names are almost the same but flipped in order, which is beyond confusing. So I’ll probably have them in the same class period and will never figure out which is which. I think a teacher’s brain only has so much capacity for learning names in one school year and I may have already reached it. Also limited patience. Yup. Reached it. But it shouldn’t be a hard day…not a lab. Just management. And then duty after school and ceramics and I need to buy Drano and a light timer. I don’t have to cook dinner. I do need to read for 3 hours in the next 30 (ha! That is so not happening). I need to hike tomorrow. I need to SLEEP. But not right now. Right now, I gotta go.
I downloaded photos on Friday for a post, and that’s as far as I got. I think I briefly considered it on Saturday, but then got sucked into other things that needed doing and lost track of that thought. Last night, while I was trying to fall asleep, my ever-helpful (not) brain was trying to remember if I’d posted on Friday or not…not is the answer. So here we are, back to Mondays, back to school, three weeks of crazy to survive on many levels, not ready for any of it…except the next stage of the quilt. Oh wait. Not ready for that either. It’s chaos in here and I can’t iron a quilt together in chaos. So. Yeah. But I’m going to have to…and that might just be the best explanation of most of my adult life right there: can’t do it; gonna have to.
OK, quilt…the quilt that I’m a week behind on…easily. Here’s more cutting out, with Scribble.
And more cutting out…
with Scribble’s tail. And more cutting out with Scribble.
And the final push…
14 hours to do it all…
And I have a lap cat. Which is nice. She quickly learned to keep her paws out of the bins, until last night, when I started sorting…
She definitely wanted to be IN the bins. But wasn’t violent about it (unlike Bowie a year ago or so). I didn’t finish sorting last night…started late and then was tired and needed to go to bed to get up early this morning.
More Scribble pix…she is allowed in the sewing room if I’m in here.
Although she has already found Kitten’s cave, where she hid on and off for the last 6 years of her life…
I mean, it’s full of batting. Why wouldn’t you want to hide there?
The girlchild is here; Scribble is friendly.
Which everyone appreciates.
She just settles in and lets the other three cats try to figure her out.
Even Bowie is starting to come around; he wants to play with her, but he’s not sure how.
Three cats vertically in a row. So it’s been a good transition so far. Of course, today is the first work day, when there’s no one around for most of the day. That will be different. But she seems very adaptable…
Strangely enough.
The Man and I hiked again on Friday, because…
we had my family’s Thanksgiving on Friday…
Both kids cooked…nice food choices.
My dad fell asleep on the couch with Annie…
I think he was in her seat.
Saturday night dinner’s drawing…
Not finished, but I only have the time from when we come in the restaurant until they serve the food.
I finished the pomegranate seeds on May’s Forest for the Trees block.
At the moment, all I can handle is the applique. I’ll get to the embroidery, but who knows when? Going back to school has sucked up any loose time I had.
I still think we’re not allowed…
But I appreciate the sentiment.
OK, there’s so much school stuff I didn’t finish over break. Always. I have seating charts written for 2 of my 6 classes. Today is chill, though…starting a new unit, so just vocab and cover page and a short lecture on how to bring your grade up and it doesn’t involve Google or AI. Then staff meeting(s?) and hopefully ceramics. I need a porcelain patch kit from Home Depot too…purposely didn’t go get it this weekend, but I still need it. I also need to finish the other sgraffito frame at the studio before it dries out. I had plans to go Saturday and Sunday, and both fell through. It’s fine; other things happened and it was good, but I need to go today. And tomorrow. And Thursday. Or something. Three weeks…I can do three weeks. I think.
Late start on this. And if you’re gonna tell me about how YOU don’t have the day off, well, you probably didn’t work through the last three weekends, did you? So there’s that. I did a bunch of things this morning, because I have the day off, yay brain. I went to the doctor, I went to Fed Ex and copied a drawing for the next quilt, plus shipped a quilt to a traveling show that is opening somewhere, but I don’t remember where, ah well. I’ll figure that out. I got dog food (for the dog), plastic wrap (for Wednesday’s lab…forgot to get it at the grocery store yesterday), a new sprinkler head (that seems to be problematic and probably won’t fix the problem; might need to consult with my sprinkler guy, who happens to be my ex husband), plus more glazes/clay tools (local clay place is only open M-F 9-4, so they get very little of my business honestly), and the ceramics studio, where I did things that I forgot to photograph. Like a ditz. Seriously. My head is still in the glaze kiln and my tree is still waiting to be bisqued…probably that will all happen tomorrow and I’ll see stuff on Friday. OR I have a ceramics class next Saturday and I’ll see it then.
Came home, tried to fix the sprinkler, failed, ate lunch, started the dishwasher, made a mammogram appointment (they are scheduling 6 freakin’ months out ffs), read a chapter of my book, and am now trying to get my head straight. It’s OK. I need to do yardwork, but it’s like 90 degrees out there. It’s freakin’ November. Too damn hot. And mosquitoes. Sheesh.
OK. So quilt progress. I’m ironing bugs Friday night
Purple and green bugs. Then Saturday night, I did the body bag and some other stuff, like faucets.
And last night, I did the water. A satisfying grayish brown color. Or is it a greyish brown? Hard to say.
I’m in the 200s, I think. But nearly done with them. I’m ironing stuff on a rug next. Or a darts target. Something like that.
Friday, I added these shapes to one of the frames.
Today, I underglazed this one in black and will start sgraffito on it on Friday probably. I added some shapes to the other frame and didn’t take pictures of either of them. Good times.
I allowed myself a little stitching on Friday night…
Almost done stitching everything down on this one…then embroidery. I’ve had so little time for embroidery or any handwork lately. I’m struggling to get the time to do any art. School is just such a timesuck. I graded all day Saturday, then finished the major assignment last night. I’m not doing school today, except for posting a video I took on Friday for the absent kids.
I’m Floating in a Most Peculiar Way is traveling with Fierce Planets. It’s currently at the Stamford Museum & Nature Center in Stamford, CT.
I’m hoping to see this show when it wanders west.
It looks nice.
I didn’t have time to put all the planets in my quilt…maybe need to do a bigger one?
That piece on the right is fascinating: Jennifer C. Solon’s Untamed Fury.
I have another piece traveling to Connecticut…The Way Out is part of Enough Already, work from the Sara M. +Michelle Vance Waddell collection. It’ll be at the MOCA in Westport, CT, opening November 13. I’m excited about how much it’s traveling with this exhibit.
Speaking of traveling, Simba and I went for a hike on Saturday.
He can’t go as far as he used to, but we did a solid 2 miles. He needed a bath after due to the unfortunate genetics of his butt fur.
Check Bowie out, sleeping like a normal cat. Not parkouring across the coffee table.
Not body slamming my teacup. He must be growing up. Might be time for a new kitten. He’s reached 18 months. Might be out of the velociraptor stage.
This is me always.
The night is better.
I did read the article. And sigh. But the comment above it is the best.
Because we all wanna know.
Anyway. I am not grading today or tomorrow. I have fabric to iron, a political project I joined that I need to do something for, lots of yardwork, some housework, books to read, always books to read, maybe some actual sewing. We’ll see. Short week of school. Nice. Chaos though, because I planned two labs. Like a fucktard. It’ll be fine. I’ll get in fast, won’t kill anyone, get out and take a day off. Sounds perfect. I think I’m giving them a test in between too. So that’ll be exciting. But for now, breathe deeply and wonder where winter…or even fall…is.
It was a busy weekend, even though I canceled/missed three things. The next two weekends seem to be just as bad…lots of meetings, driving, going to things, getting things done. I feel proud of the 20 minutes of yardwork I managed yesterday. I can’t keep up, for real.
So let’s do the tracing stuff first. Still doing it. Thought putting that yellow post-it on the drawing marking where I’d last been, writing the next number to trace on there, that’s smarter than I have been in the past.
Mostly I would just document the number and approximate location of the next piece in my phone and then spend 2-5 minutes the next day trying to find that on the drawing, which might be a reflection on my late-night ability to describe positions of things.
You would think like “left bathtub” would be enough, but is that left when it’s right sides up or upside down, how I trace it? I just never know. So the post-it seemed awesome…until I lost it last night as I flipped the drawing.
Super problematic since I hadn’t documented the last number I traced in my phone, so I had to stare at it for 5 minutes, trying to figure that out. I still couldn’t find the post-it. It flipped somewhere into another dimension. Fact is, I managed to get to piece 500 last night, so I’m almost halfway through. I’ve been finding it hard to even get an hour a night, which might still be a problem this week. I have a ton of grading to do…still…always…and this week does not bode well for big chunks of grading time unfortunately. So much of what I need to grade is deep-thought grading. I actually have to be mentally present to get it done. And it’s time-consuming. Of course. Anyway. Day job.
I had a moment Friday night about the No Kings protest…and made a last-minute decision to march…canceled myself out of two other things and made a plan to make it to the last thing that involved parking two miles away from the march, walking in, doing the march, and walking out. So it was over 6 miles in the long run.
Pro: I felt good about the march; it’s a plus to see so many like-minded people with a goal, when the news is so hell bent on the shit show (literally, if you pay attention to our president wannabe king). Also, I got plenty of exercise. It was all uphill on the way back though. I did go by myself, but you’re never really by yourself in a crowd of 80,000 people.
Yeah, I love my country and I don’t want it ruined by racists and people who say they’re Christian but don’t behave very Christian. And they are ruining it right now. In so many ways.
The Man and I went to a new place for dinner. It was fancy. You know how you know? I took a picture of my plate…
Yeah, if I did that every week, you’d see a lot of standard burger plates. But this was pretty.
Speaking of pretty and cool and fascinating, I went to the Visions Interpretations artist talks after the march. I was hoping to see a friend, but thanks to the military and Vance and probably the Republican party, they closed the freeway so they could shoot things over it, and many people had to leave early to miss that. Thanks to the government. They dropped shrapnel on a CHP vehicle. I find that amusing only because no one was inside and no one was injured. Maybe don’t do that again dumbasses. I’m sure that expenditure was warranted. Like the ballroom. And the parade.
I did meet an artist, Eden Quispe, whom I’d only known online. Our work has been in shows together but I’d never seen it (or her) in person. So that was cool. Here’s her piece, Grandma Pearl, made from linens from her grandmother.
She has a truly fascinating process.
I want to be more freeform in my work, but I never really get there. Maybe when I retire.
I took about 3000 pictures of Diane Nunez’s piece Multifaceted…
I took a lot of pictures because it was fascinating.
Also because I couldn’t take pictures of some of the stuff I wanted to because people were standing in front of them.
That is one of the issues with artist talks…too many people.
Although I do enjoy hearing the artists talk about their work.
Unfortunately, I’m running out of time this morning; I’ll have to post the other photos I took later this week. I’ll leave you with this sweet baby…
Ah Nova.
And this almost daily donation of an owl pellet on my front steps…
And this life truth.
Although the new system does not work the same…I actually have to think ahead about what I might want to read next, and that is truly annoying. I cannot make more decisions than I already am.
OK. School. Reviewing net forces and then sending them off to do the things without my help. Ha! Like that’s gonna work. And then dinner out with a book club group that I rarely see in person anymore. Then grading (well, grading before and after) and tracing. Then hopefully more sleep than last night (ha! more funnies) and do it again, slightly differently.
Heyo. It’s Monday. And a week of school and art and whatever else I can fit in begins. I had a great weekend camping up in the mountains, although it was definitely chillier than I thought it would be the first night, thanks to a wind advisory. 50-mph gusts took it down to the low 40s, with a real feel in the 30s. Definitely colder than I had planned, although I brought all the long underwear, thank goodness. The second night had no wind and was quite nice…still chilly, which is a nice change, but not so cold you can’t feel your hands and feet. We were lucky to be in a part of the campground with no small children, mostly quiet dogs, and no partiers, for once. It was delightfully quiet.
It was a nice campsite, plenty of shade; in fact, on Saturday, after our hike, it was a little chilly in the shade. I kept moving my chair so I could doze in the sun, which is unlike me.
We did a 4-mile hike north on the PCT from the campground.
At some point, you get a hazy view of the desert below.
It was actually kind of warm, except under the trees. Four miles seemed about the right amount. I’ve been hiking 3 miles every weekend, but the Man hasn’t, so this was more than my normal and way more than his.
It’s a beautiful place to hike though…lots of trees and blue skies and fresh air…a few people, but not a lot. So peaceful.
That golfball thing on the Man’s head (well, it looks like it anyway) is the Air Force Radar Station. I looked it up. No, we didn’t visit. Probably not allowed. I wonder why it’s white, though. It could blend in more and be less obnoxious.
I drew both nights by the campfire…it’s kind of a tradition of mine. Staring into the flames, headlamp on, seems to help me just draw these days.
So many days at home, I’m only drawing for a specific piece or purpose, instead of just drawing for the sake of it. I used to have time for that, even with the day job. Now, it just doesn’t happen.
This will turn into something else. It was a solid start.
Still working in the bathtub range.
Less political. Which I suspect the new quilt will not be…less political, I mean. I have three bathtub quilts I’ve made over the years, and they’ve been more personal than political. I find it hard to make anything these days that isn’t political. The number of insane acts and policies and pronouncements makes it impossible. The loss of freedom for so many people can’t be ignored. I don’t have solutions that don’t involve coups or alien invasions unfortunately, and since Antifa doesn’t actually exist, I have to draw what I want for the world and make it into art. Draw what is and what should be. So these were prep for the next piece. The bathtub quilts will be in Virginia at the Virginia Quilt Museum starting the end of January. I’ll be there in March for the closing ceremonies.
The first night was already cold, so we were already starting the fire at like 5:30 PM. It was still daylight, so I was stitching on this little tree. It is a tree. Can’t remember what kind…obviously Sue Spargo and very stylized.
Here it is the second day…
The Man was napping…I did a little of that and some reading too. I appreciate the time to just sit and be with the things I want to do. I did bring grading with me; I don’t usually, but I’m in panic mode. I graded one week’s worth of homework in the car on the way up and finished it Saturday afternoon. I then came home Sunday and did a ton more. And no, I’m not done. I’m buried. Sigh.
This was the cold cloudy windy night…
The moon was very bright both nights, which was nice.
This was the beginning of the book I was reading.
Too true. I did all those things this weekend. Except commit felony homicide and move a body. And here’s a quote from the book itself.
I wish I really loved the book (I don’t…it’s OK, but not really my thing). I did love some of the phraseology and ideas. I have another book by the same author…this was a book club book. I’ll read the other one and decide if she’s just too cozy for me. I don’t mind SOME cozy stuff, but this was a bit too much. I’m not even done with it and I’m really done with it.
Here’s my level of cozy at the moment. Gotta love some Richard Scarry.
And Ruben Bolling did it well.
OK. We’re still in roller coaster design today. Hopefully the next three days won’t be hellacious. Thursday was a bit much, but I have hopes that once they start actually taping stuff together and testing it, it will be very focused and I can get some grading done. We’ll see how that goes. Then a 2-hour staff meeting that could possibly be an email. And ceramics? Hopefully. I’m delivering my quilt to the photographer tomorrow and when it comes back, shipping it off to the new owner. Which is good, because I have bills to pay. Sigh. Money stuff is stressful. What’s new, right? And then hopefully, I’ll start drawing the new piece. It’s going to be big, but it has to be finished in December, so it can’t be huge. Keep that in mind, Kathryn.
I have this post-it on my desk at home that says “2:07 damn x 2, WTH”. I stared at it for a bit this morning until I realized it was from the recording my co-teacher had two students do for us of the lab stations. I needed to edit out the swearing, best I could (and I did on one; the other one had to be redone for other reasons). IDK what your day job looks like, but that shit is part of mine. I do edit my language at school. In case you were wondering. I did get called out for a student for using the word ‘crap’ the other day (oh my; after being told to shut the fuck up by two different students…fun times). And I had a student years back who didn’t like it when I said “my lord”, which I do all the time. That was a hard one. I get her complaint, but I couldn’t fix that one. I think we settled on the fact that I wasn’t talking about HER lord, but some random British lord. And also some teaching about the fact that not everyone had her beliefs and she needed to relax a bit. I wonder where she is now? I wonder what she’s doing…
OK, so I’m still not done quilting, but it’s not the thread anymore. When I switched to the new spool, it did keep breaking, so I used some of that Sewers Aid stuff on the spool, but also, suspect the outside thread of the spool was more dry than the inside, because it stopped breaking. I would have finished quilting last night, but I went to a concert instead. Can’t say no to Billy Idol, Joan Jett, VIP table, and free tickets, can you? Yeah, it’s a school night, but I didn’t go to bed a whole lot later than normal, and I fell asleep right away for once.
Back to the quilting though…too many variables to know what solved the problem…science teacher should know better, but I was so frustrated that I just needed it to work…and it did.
I’ve made it all the way around three sides. I have half a side left and two little bits in between things, and then I’m done. The two possible binding fabrics were purchased Saturday morning before I went to LA, because the store I like is only open during my work hours, except for Saturdays, which is yes, in fact, totally annoying. But hopefully trimming it Thursday night and getting the binding on, done over the weekend, photographed next week? That’s the goal. And I had an awesome idea for the next one, which needs to go to a show and be done in December. Ha! OK, I know. I can do it.
I finished grades Monday night at 7 PM, so I allowed myself some stitching time…still stitching things down on this.
Those are pomegranates, so there are little circles going in each of those fruits as well. I will never finish.
So yeah, great show last night. Both singers in their late 60s. Joan rocked it.
She did not throw herself around like a 20-year-old, but she had the voice and the attitude.
And still played guitar.
Impressive.
Billy fucking Idol was good too…
Although seemed to show his age a bit more…for some reason, he reminded me of William Shatner. Not the sexy guy he was in the 80s, but who is? And he had a few musical moments that were questionable. But it was a good rocking show.
Definitely worth going out on a school night.
I was in bed before midnight. But then woken up after midnight. Ugh. It’s fine. He’s more tired than I am this morning, and the dog is just sad that barely anyone talked to him yesterday. Poor pup.
Cute Nova/Luna moment.
And this…not so cute acknowledgement of the current fuckery.
Oh so true. Get the fuck out.
OK. School. Fuck me. I was going to do something low-key chill today, but then I got a bug up my butt and now we are cutting and gluing. Because I’m nuts like that. It’ll be fine. I’m just concerned it won’t take the whole period. I have a couple of periods that literally can’t complete work assigned on previous days…if you give them 10 minutes to finish stuff, they spend it all goofing off and talking. I guess that’s the difference between me at that age and them. I would’ve been finishing everything so I wouldn’t have to do it at home. They just never finish it. After all that, and after torturing my co-teacher into planning for next week, because we literally have NOTHING planned (I’m freaking out), I will have pilates and I will have to take the trash out (with help) and cook dinner (wtf) and THEN quilt. Oh and probably grade shit too. Ugh. It’s fine. I got my grades done. The world is not ending. Yet. I have the next quilt in my head. Deep breaths.
It’s pajama day at school today. It’s also supposed to be 90 degrees. Not sure those two things go together. But I am in pajamas. Flannel. Yup. With pockets though. I have a lighter pair, but they don’t have pockets. Yes, I know how to sew…clothing even…I could easily add pockets. In my spare time. I got none of that. In good news, the parentals are home, safe, not ill, and their lovely aged very deaf dog is back to their responsibility. In bad news, the day job continues to give me acne, bad sleep, and canker sores. I’m sure it will get better. Someday. Not this week though. This week is our first real lab and IDK how that will roll…this is where we can really see what last year’s teachers wrought upon us…that and the first long writing assignment. My hopes are not high. I realized (we realized?) last week that this group is not particularly independent, even when assignments are. I couldn’t grade anything, prep anything, even sit and help a kid I know needs it and won’t ask for it, because of all the kids requiring help who just didn’t listen to directions or quashing attempts to be social when supposed to be working. It was exhausting. Yes, there’s always some of that, but this was too much. So I brought home all the grading I’d been trying to do all week and did it at home…much faster. But eating up my time. Not OK.
Quiltwise, I knew I needed to do some embroidery on a couple of ICE vests that were too small to cut out words for…so I did that Friday night.
I was exhausted; I went to ceramics also and then my parents for the mail, so even though I had mostly prepared the night before to sandwich and pinbaste that night, I figured I wouldn’t have the energy. The boychild went to bed, then the Man, and Art Brain persuaded me to mop the floor, iron the backing, pin it to the floor, finish drying the batting (someone pulled it out of the dryer not dry…yes, I know who), iron the front, and then pinbaste the whole thing around 11:30 pm.
Absolutely some level of fucking nuts.
But honestly, much easier to do with everyone in bed. Dogs, cats, people out of my way.
Saturday night, I started quilting…
Made it through a healthy chunk of the dirt…
Then last night, I did the little people and most of the ICE agents dragging children through the swamp.
I’m sure I’ll be doing this most if not all of the week. And then I realized, how the fuck am I gonna buy binding? The store I usually shop at is open stupid hours and I’m going to LA on Saturday for basically the whole day. I’m not sure how I’m solving that problem yet. I’ll figure it out. Shop somewhere else, probably. Fewer choices in fabric unfortunately. Oh well. If you’re never open when working people can come in? Then they won’t come in.
This was the bed when I tried to get in it on Friday night. Eventually some moving happened.
Cute though. The Man is in there and those are all his babies.
I’ve been hiking every Saturday, late afternoon, about 3 miles, so I can eat a dinner I choose, instead of one my body allows.
It’s also relaxing, mostly. There were a lot of people this last Saturday. Less relaxing. There’s a fine line between hiking safely as a woman and being annoyed by all the people on the trail.
I drew at dinner…this was a two-dinner drawing.
The faster they serve the food, the more dinners it takes to draw.
Speaking of drawing, some of my students are truly amusing.
The arm gestures of Josh. So cute. Yes, I realize they drew a dead person, but it’s also a stick figure.
Girlchild is in Japan…I’m so jealous.
I asked what was going on in this photo, and apparently it’s joy.
This is not very iconically Japan…
But she looked more cool. So we get daily photos and videos of cool things in Japan. I’m very jealous. It wasn’t really on my bucket list (I was last there in 1967 at the age of nine months. OK it might have been 1968.), but maybe it should be?
And in political news…
Yeah maybe I should start saying that. What is your problem?
This is too true.
Sadly so. Also so much disinformation about this. I’m sad for his kids and wife; I’m also sad for the family of the shooter. I’m sure this isn’t what they wanted for him. But hey y’all…it was a white, religious, right wing extremist. Not the democrats. Not a trans kid. Not a woman. Not a person of color. Can we focus on the bullshit coming out of all those politicians’ mouths? And the guns…can we ever say the guns are the problem? I’m boggled by the about-shifts in social media with some of these people.
And this…with teachers and professors being fired over statements about Kirk. My partner says the world is a better place now. Is that a fire-able offense? Dowd is divisive? Seriously? I’m boggled by the rhetoric and the bullshit. Maybe I shouldn’t be. But I am. And the ignorance of history. That too.
OK. Well, all that aside, I do still have to teach middle school today. Energy! Still. Transformations of energy. Writing about energy. Using more than one vocabulary word in a sentence. Writing complex sentences. Things most science teachers don’t teach. Welcome to a literacy school. And two teachers who are readers. Then two different meetings after school. I’d like to go to ceramics, but I’m also trying to go to my quilt guild meeting, because Lea McComas is speaking there. It’s on Zoom, but it’s not the same thing. So IDK how the rest of the day will go; I just know I’ll be quilting at the end of it.
Hey all, somehow Friday snuck up on me. I’m not mad. I’m still running marathons because of work and feel consistently overwhelmed, and sometimes wake up in the middle of the night needing to put things in my calendar (mostly art stuff that I don’t want to forget about because of the art job). Yesterday afternoon, I answered one complicated email about art stuff (complicated because I had to make decisions before I sent it) and figured out where my computer was hiding scans when the printer sent them, and emailed a contract for another show I got into. All good stuff, but it sometimes gets sidelined by the grading and lesson planning. I have a to-do list today for the day job that is physically impossible; no way can I get it all done. So I don’t know what the weekend looks like because of that. Not ideal.
Artwise, I finished stitchdown on Wednesday night, finally. It took 4 hours and 42 minutes. Not bad.
Then last night, I found a fabric that worked and was big enough for a backing, ironed and pieced that, cut the batting, washed it, drying it this morning. I’ll need to clean the floor tonight…wait, I need to embroider some words on the ICE agents and that’s probably easier when it’s a top and not a quilt. So I’ll do that tonight and see how much energy I have for the next step. But sometime this weekend, I’ll be sandwiching this and pinbasting it.
There’s the post-it to remind me to do the embroidery.
I met with stitching friends last night and finished the two leaves, but not a lot else.
This is the July block from Sue Spargo’s Rooted block of the month. I’m almost done with it.
And this.
My students wanted to talk about Kirk, but I reminded them that is a family conversation and they should also consider the two high-school kids who got shot in California (and then the shooter killed themselves) and the drones over Poland. I do think the world is a better place without Kirk, although I don’t think anyone should be murdered. And I feel for his wife and kids. But he advocated for guns and hate. So there we are.
I think that’s a turkey vulture.
It was huge flying in, whatever it is.
OK, the electric company is headed over to turn off my electricity for some solar-related reason I don’t really understand (probably so they can charge me for electric stuff even though I make more than I need). So I need to be off the computer. Fun times. He has all day to come, and he comes while I’m still here. Ugh.
School today, teaching something, planning something, fixing something, grading something. Then hopefully clay and some art this weekend. We’ll see.
I think I just ran around all weekend. I don’t feel particularly rested. Well, there were two late nights. I can blame one on Art Brain…I would have gone to bed. The other one, I blame Delta for flying the boychild in 90 minutes late on an already late flight. It’s fine. And last night, the new glucose sensor is off by 40 points again so the alarm kept going off…which is when I silenced it (it still buzzes) and put it on the floor. It’s still off this morning, so it gets 24 hours. Last time, that worked. Annoying though.
I did get the top ironed together on Friday night. I was exhausted (long short week), and was just going to piece the background, but once I had it all laid out, I’m like, it’ll be fine. How long will it take? That’s art brain talking, because the answer is 90 minutes past bedtime.
Awesome sauce. Looks good on that background, which is always nice. I pick those out when I start ironing all the pieces to fabric, so I’m never really sure what it will all look like in the end.
I started stitchdown on Saturday night.
Going about 100 mph, while singing along (probably quite badly) to whatever my phone was playing. Good thing the Man was also on headphones. Then I left at midnight to go pick up the boychild from the airport; he’d been hiking part of the PCT up in Washington.
And last night, further on in the stitchdown. Lots of details takes a bunch of time.
It’ll look better with outlining when I quilt it. That skeletal middle finger will be obvious.
I did a lot of school work this weekend (ugh). I remember now how trying to do the house stuff, run errands, go to meetings, but still have some time for art, reading, and relaxation…it feels like you’re constantly running.
I took a little time to sew stuff down on this during dinner TV time.
I also worked on one of the Rooted blocks during my quilt guild meeting, probably the first one I’ve been to in 6 months. First Saturdays are hard. I’m gone for the next one; I know that. A lot of the people I like to hang out with weren’t there.
I finished a cover page in science…a miracle for the first month of school!
Yet another roller coaster.
This show, with two of my pieces (one in the bottom right corner), opens this Friday.
I unfortunately won’t be there…and will never see this show, because it’s at Coastline College in Newport Beach and they are only open part of the week, certainly not the weekend. Ah well. It isn’t the first show I haven’t been able to attend. If you go, send me pics.
I also hiked 3 miles on Saturday…
It’s been hot still, so I didn’t leave until like 5:30 PM. The Man’s back still bugs him too much to join me, but hopefully in the future. It was still warm, but there was a cooler breeze in the second half.
I met one human and her massive (unleashed) dog…who saw me, stopped, and then started loping toward me. Kind of nerve-wracking. She’s searching through her pack for the leash and calling the dog, who isn’t listening at all. Sigh. I don’t care if he’s the gentlest giant around; if I’d had Simba with me, there would have been a problem. Leash your fucking dogs, especially in wildlife preserves, where it’s required. Humans are annoying.
Seriously, he was huge.
I saw this while driving home.
I chose to read it as What Would Jesus Do? Get rid of those two buffoons. Also badly centered ‘Vance’, which might be a metaphor.
Back to teaching, this is part of my regular job apparently.
The kid typed the stuff on the left. I mean, it’s probably true, and I did tell two kids that Spanish was OK, but Turkish is out of my knowledge realm. How to get these kids to write in English! I mean, I could have them write in their native language, then use Google Translate, then have them read it to me in English, then write it in English, but that would mean the other 32 kids in the class are just sitting there while I do that for 10 minutes (there’s multiple language kids in one class). This kid, legit writes in English most of the time, so I’m OK with it, but the three Spanish speakers have been in US schools for over 2 years and won’t even try in English. Sigh. I can’t do all the things. There isn’t enough time for all of it.
And for those thinking Chatgpt is teaching for us, we had it read through a set of stations we did in the past and consolidate it into 3 stations, instead of 6. It produced a ‘worksheet’, for some loose definition of such, and I spent over an hour turning it into something usable. I’m not saying it wasn’t helpful; it was definitely a shortcut, but don’t tell me it produces stuff I can use right away. Because it doesn’t. It probably saved us an hour of trying to decide which ones to do and what to cut, and then formatting it slightly differently so it all fits on four pages instead of 20. Still needs a ton of work and planning brain.
OK. It’s Monday. Another full week. Trying to fit exercise and ceramics in…not sure how that’s gonna go, honestly. Today? I’m teaching forms of energy. Mostly notes…a couple of demos. We built in some independent time this week (we’ll see how independent they really are), so we could NOT be direct teaching (which is exhausting for us and the kids) all week. Also maybe we could grade some stuff at school instead of bringing it all home. We have a two-hour (torture) literacy meeting after school today, ugh, with lesson and all. Not fun. Hopefully useful. They haven’t been, really…just been performative, which is annoying. They did let us plan our own learning this year, individually (although me and my co-teacher are doing the same lessons). For once, we get to decide what our kids need. What a concept. Then home to deal with a broken blind and the guy fixing it, with two dogs in the house. Then book club. And some stuff in and around all that. I think I read the book. I don’t remember. Oh yes! I did. It was nice. Not amazing, but nice. Then more stitchdown! Which is where I really want to be.
Well today started at 4 AM as a 5-skittle morning, thanks to my blood sugar alarm. Better than Saturday night, when the alarm kept going off because (according to the guy on the phone) my antibodies were attacking the filament of the continuous glucose monitor and I would just need to wait it out OR the monitor was faulty and he’d send me a new one. Sounds like something my antibodies would do. I love that all my medical staff is trying to figure out why my body doesn’t do what they think it should…when I ask about the early AM crashes, they move things around, meds, when I take my insulin, etc, and damn if those crashes don’t keep happening. Fun times. Yes, I do keep skittles in a drawer next to the bed; don’t you? I’m down to one crash a week, which is…um…still annoying as fuck. But maybe we’ll figure it out. Maybe they’ll start doing more science on women and how their bodies are different than men’s (ha! Oh holy fuck, not for another…1243 days? Is that fucking right? And that RFK guy? He’s a scientific dearth of information. He doesn’t understand anything since the early 1980s, I think. He certainly doesn’t understand how the food pyramid works (that we don’t use anymore). Froot Loops at the top of the pyramid…YASSS, because we’re not supposed to eat a lot of the stuff at the top you dumbass and you’re not supposed to eat a lot of Froot Loops! We’re all gonna have brain worms at the end of this. If Biden or Obama had put a guy in charge of the Department of Health and Human Services that was this incompetent, the Repubs would have lost their fucking minds, but now they’re all for it. Crazy shit. Absolutely batshit. Go get your measles shot if you’re like me and only had one as a baby. I feel like that’s gonna be our downfall.
Anyway. This was an arty weekend, as well as being a weekend full of trying to get my work head on straight. I have a bunch of pictures from the Oceanside Museum of Art opening that I don’t have time to deal with today (maybe Wednesday), but we did go to that and I’m glad…it was really cool to talk to some people there. I also ironed things together…here’s Friday night…
Didn’t get far, because I also had to lay stuff out…here’s the first 100…
Laid out in groups of 10…check out the tiny bones on the bottom. And then I had all these that separated…
This is after I paired up a bunch of them…so I’ll figure this out as I go. I’ve already found about four of them, but also had to retrace another 10 or so, which is annoying. Ah well…this is what happens with tiny pieces. And one of them that I retraced, I found it in the next box, so sorting is also sometimes tiring and hard and I fuck it up. Fun times.
Saturday night’s ironing…
With a closeup…
So you can see the skeletal hand that will look way more awesome when it’s outlined in stitches so you can see all the bones. Some level of insanity there. Then last night’s ironing…
I’ve ironed about halfway through the 200s, I think? There’s a pile of stars to go on that flag, and then I start on the little people who are kneeling on the edge of the flag. This is not fast, but it is pretty rewarding, because it’s the first time I get to really see it in color, besides in my head. I really love the red African fabric I used in the volcanic bits…it shades from bright to dark and looks really good. Yes, fabric makes me happy.
I also spent a shitload of time trying to get my classes organized and the basic shit documented. I didn’t finish grading, because there were two harder assignments and I wanted to save those (aka, not grade all weekend). I did read all the kids’ surveys though, for the first time ever. This kid is a snarky one…
Also, so many of them want to not work at all this year or at any time in the future. So that bodes well for the country…not really; I don’t have huge expectations for 13-year-olds. Also the kids who don’t want to be scientists; they want to be engineers. Um. Hello. What do you think an engineer does? So amusing. I wish them all luck in their futures.
I finally finished appliqueing all the border flowers on Sue Spargo’s Homegrown…
Looks really cool. Now I have to spend the next two years embroidering them all. No really. I don’t think this will be fast. It’ll be amazing when it’s done, but it won’t be fast.
Saturday was hot (real feel 103 degrees), but I need to walk/hike on Saturdays or I can’t eat what I want for date-night dinner…and we were going up to the museum show, so I had to go at like 3 PM, which is earlier than I would normally hike anyway, but still hot. I headed for the hike that was closer to the mounting rain clouds, and I did have a breeze and eventually it cooled off a bit.
I only did 2 miles instead of 3 because of the heat, drinking water and dribbling it over my head the whole time. The Man almost texted me at some point because he heard thunder (I was already in the car on the way back) and thought I should get the fuck off the trail. Yeah. Nobody else was out there, for sure. It worked, though. And so that’s my thing for Saturdays, when I can pull it off. Go hike so you can eat stuff.
This is too true. The pendulum of shit they do care about makes no logical sense.
You care about our health, but you get rid of programs that feed children. I guess it’s OK if they starve as long as they’re healthy about it.
The Man took this picture of his bug-eating plants…with an actual bug NOT being eaten.
Impressive.
And here’s my sweet, very hot, very panty boy.
He’s been a pain at night (because he’s hot and then he makes me hot and then he pants and I can’t sleep through it). But he is a sweet baby.
Speaking of not being able to sleep through it, our baby owl is still here.
So the deal is that they squawk when they’re hungry, expecting mom/dad to provide, which they were a couple of weeks ago. I saw a parent deposit a mouse/rat/small rodent on top of the box for the baby (much squawking ensued), but last week, I saw the baby in the tree outside my office, squawking very loudly about catching their OWN rodent and tearing it to bits (predator birds are impressive in that way), so I know it can catch it’s own food. In the past, we had a pair of babies and then triplets, and the mom/dad chase them off at some point so they get the fuck out of the nest and go take care of themselves. They would still come back sometimes, but not sit on the box and squawk all night. This one is an only, and IDK if the parent is the problem, not chasing them off. We’re pretty sure last year’s parent died in the box (not sure why, but we had two skeletons and one was definitely adult-sized and one wasn’t). We never got a fledged one last year. Maybe someone poisoned the rodents? Who knows. So owls return to the same nests every year, pretty much, so maybe this is one of the previous babies as mom? And she’s enabling the SHIT out of this baby. I’ve heard her a couple of times in the last week or so, screeching away, and then the baby leaves for a while, but keeps coming back. Last night, it was gone for longer, so maybe we’re close to being a big bad adult owl, but it just cracks me up that some parents let their babies live at home and take care of them for so long…I joked that housing prices are so high in San Diego that the baby can’t afford to move out. Too true.
OK. School. Teaching about AI today…responsible uses of it and unacceptable uses of it. It’s not going away, so I’m going full disclosure and how you will fail my class if you use it to take a test. Fun stuff. Then a 2-hour staff meeting after (ugh) and book club tonight on a book I didn’t love. But ironing after. And I think it’s supposed to be cooler today. So that’s a plus. Real summer hasn’t hit yet. We’ll go over a hundred degrees for some time in the future. Not looking forward to it.
Kathy Nida 