Finally a Walk…

It’s early. For me. I’ve got a morning meeting and then we’re taking 260 kids to the zoo. I’m ready to be on the field trip and then done with the field trip. I’m ready for the totally cranky kids to be left behind. Oh wait, I mean, they just don’t come to school because their parents let them control that shit, so then I don’t have to see them or listen to them. Not that I accidentally left them somewhere. I am chaperoning a group of kids that I barely know, which is fine. I want to see some animals and get outside and hang out instead of teaching and trying to explain why you can’t hand your money in at the last minute. Which reminds me, I don’t think we paid for the buses yet. Hysterical laughter.

Yeah. Well. It’s that time of year, apparently. This year has been difficult so far.

Meanwhile, I managed to make it home and walk the dogs…usually a Monday task, but this Monday was a stay-late and figure-shit-out day. So that didn’t happen.

It was Katie’s last day with us (it’s only been like 49 days, so…). In fact, as we were walking, my parents were landing. This was not their plane. Well, it could have been their plane, but probably not…

We were chasing daylight…but no sign of coyotes this time.

Of course they were there. We just didn’t see them.

We all needed it. Puppy on my foot afterwards.

After dinner, I worked on the wonky road a bit. It’s really wonky now. Whoops. I might need to move the center line…

Whatever. Cat on my chest…didn’t last long.

Because I wanted to do a little of this…at least a bit. Calli came with me. I ironed a heron and some grasses.

I didn’t get far at all. Although I’m finally done with the first 100 pieces…

Sometimes all you do is 41 minutes of art and then it’s bedtime…because I knew I had to be up early and I have a long, tough day today.

One pro of Katie leaving is the dogs get their toys back (Katie eats them)…this was an exciting moment for all…but mostly for the dogs, who missed their toys.

Katie only managed to eat one of them. That we know of. Now we have to negotiate the toy hallway in the dark. A dangerous sport.

OK, it’s a survival day. Head down, deep breaths, don’t forget to eat and drink. Good advice for many days and situations.

Magic Wand

Hello Halloween…on the one hand, I love dressing up (I’m Dr. Nefario from Despicable Me this year, while surrounded by minions)…my catch phrase is “Do you want to exPLOOOODE?”. Which seems relevant. Tomorrow, we take 260 kids to the zoo, so they can run off their sugar highs from tonight. Hopefully I survive until Friday, because I still have grading to finish. And a quilt.

Yesterday, I worked for a million hours. Got home around 6 PM and kept working…I still have kids trying to give me field trip money, even though the list is done and emailed. I’m done. No more crazy this week (ha. never say no more.)

It was after 10:30 when I made it in here. The first 100 pieces are taking me FOREVER to cut out. Mostly because there’s these tiny little animals in there. So I need to find these fussy little fabrics for them. Although this is water…

Water is fun. I’ve spent about 2 1/2 hours and I’m only in the 80s. Seriously crazy. It probably doesn’t help that I’m tired and stressed out. Here’s the fabrics piled up as I was trying to pick a bird brown that would show up against the sand brown.

Then I mostly organized them and went to bed.

Sometimes that’s all you can do. Tonight is candy for the three small children who come to our door, plus my parents are finally coming back after 7 weeks. I think Katie doesn’t believe they’re ever coming back, so she’ll be excited to see them. Much as we love her, she is a needy beast and the noisiest of the three dogs…well, maybe Simba is the noisiest, but he’s also the smallest.

OK, I have to be trained on epi-pens today. Again. Need to finish bus and chaperone lists. Need to find a magic wand and erase the noise and chaos from my head. That last one seems the most important.

Insanity Laughs Under Pressure We’re Cracking*

I’m still trying to process all the gun killings last week. I’m trying to process the idiotic things people say after gun shootings and all the arguments I’ve seen on line and did I mention stupid shit people say? Whether you’re pro or con CNN, last night they refused to show the shooter’s picture or say his name…instead they spent an hour or so talking about the victims…about the couple that had been married at the synagogue 60+ years earlier, about the two brothers who were always there. I have to admit to not being able to watch…but it was an admirable choice. And little to no mention of the two African Americans gunned down in a Krogers, one with his grandson watching. WTF America? WTF. My anti-gun quilt (let me be clear, I am anti-gun) has arrived in Chicago for the Quilt+Resist show, not that it will change the minds of anyone who believes their right to a gun is greater than the rights of others to live their lives.

I am an absolute stress monkey at the moment. I have way too much on my plate and I’m exploding all over the place. I’m trying not to. I need to meditate. Last night, my meditation was in the form of ironing fabric…and a little bit of stitching. After I finished some of the grading, of course.

I did that flower in the left corner. Sometimes people ask me why I stitch on this when it’s not my design. Because it’s relaxing. And I can finish something in 20 minutes, even if it’s just a flower.

Then I messed with the road again. This road is a pain in the ass. But I’m almost done with it…I think. Although mine won’t fit around the corner until I sew the other blocks onto it…so that will have to wait.

Then I fussed with a unit my co-teacher is piloting and I’m sort of piloting as well, but I wasn’t at the training and the book is confusing and it’s hard to know what we can do in one period, plus I have to leave stuff for a sub while I’m in Boston, and somewhere in there, my head exploded because I couldn’t figure out how to open the damn PDF in Preview so I could pull out the homework. My kids are going to freak out with this much homework.

It was past 10 PM when I made it in here, the studio, the place where art happens and sometimes I grade shit. Sorted the first 100 pieces…piles of huge and piles of tiny.

The huge are dirt and water (I didn’t iron any water last night)…the tiny are animals, mostly a snake is what I dealt with…in fact, there’s the snake laid out down there.

Hopefully she looks as cool in real life as it did in my head when I was laying out its complicated ass. Seriously. Ten fabrics for one snake that is about 3″ square.

I didn’t get far. Although I have dirt fabrics picked for the rest of the mountain, I think. I need to add some grassy bits to it though. And make sure whatever is behind the bobcat makes it pop out.

So mostly that’s sand and dirt, with a few rocks and a snake. Not even 100 pieces ironed last night.

I also did the last bit of my Halloween costume. You figure it out.

I didn’t have a chance to walk the dogs (and myself) last night. That didn’t help. I calendared it for Wednesday, when I have some chance of getting home at a reasonable hour. Not last night. Not tonight. Now the eyelid is twitching as well. Sure that’s a sign of stress and tiredness (dog had to pee at 4:33 AM…not 11:50 PM, when I tried to take her out…4:33 AM, when I didn’t want to be outside half naked with a flashlight.).

*Queen and David Bowie, Under Pressure (I don’t pick these…my Pandora is psychic)

Stuff Art in the Cracks

Rough night. Something stung my toe and it hurt. Or bit it. Or whatever’d it. And then whatever my innards are doing in response to the diabetes meds…doctor appointment on Thursday. If I can get there on time. Crazy hours that day. I don’t feel right. That’s always nerve-wracking. But teaching today should be easy, so I can grade and I don’t have to feel awesome. I just have to get it all done. ALL OF IT. Yeah right. I already had one group try to turn in their project even though I haven’t given them all of the instructions. Like CHILLAX you sweet little things. You’re doing it wrong. You don’t need to panic yet.

One of the things with diabetes is that they want you to be stress free. I get all these emails and mailers from the insurance company and the doctor’s office about how to reduce stress, but my doctor actually laughed at one point and said I’d have to quit my job and that would be stressful in itself. So there’s that. I’m not sure when I will hit “less stress” for work, but it isn’t going to be this week or next. I am just trying to stay as much in control of it as I can. Exercise, take breaks, stuff art in the cracks. As part of that, I try to go do something interesting or fun on Saturday nights. We went to see the Skull Art Show at La Bodega Gallery…kind of a manufactured thing because they all start with the same skull, but some of them were interesting enough…

Huichol bead technique always makes a statement…this is Jose Lopez…

Interesting composition…Franky Agostino…

Reminds me of my students when I ask where their late work is…Cesar Castaneda…

One of my favorite artists at La Bodega, Evgeniya Golik…

And the always intriguing Optimus Volts…

Maira Meza with her lilies…

Another interesting compilation of things, Renee Tay…

And I really should have taken a better picture of the side of this…Mary Juhn.

Then we ventured out to a new place for dinner. It was strange, but the food was good. Not many choices in the drinks arena, but all the caps were outside.

Nailed to the railing.

Came home and finished trimming all the Wonder Under…it was something over 7 hours or so total.

Then Sunday evening, after my fiber-art-group meeting, I was grading again…all the late work. Simba was very helpful…

As was Satchemo…

OK, he woke up, but mostly because he wanted me to take him out to pee.

Which I did. I finished the butterfly in the car on the way to and from the meeting…

So that’s July finally done, on to August…which are the three unembellished blocks on here…

Next in line.

So then I went to sort all those pieces. I don’t throw out the trash pile until I sift through it, which is good, because I found this piece…

And then I laid out all the bins…

And spent about 40 minutes sorting pieces by the 100s.

The last step? Coming into the office and cleaning up…putting all the fabrics away from the last quilt…hanging up the new drawing.

Now I’m ready to iron tonight. Looking forward to it. But before that, I have to take my achy body to school and get all the things done.

I’m Useless but Not for Long*

I woke up this morning, having slept through lots of noises and daylight arriving and I feel like I didn’t move all night, I was so tired, I must have been like a block of sleepy concrete that weighed down the bed and refused to let pillows and blankets move, until the first dog whined, and then it was awake time.

Quilts=Art=Quilts opens today and I have a piece in it…this is You Pollute Me…

It’s actually not a very big piece…just long.

I’m grading Unit 2…lots of them. I didn’t actually bring them home, because I have three days next week, maybe four, when the kids are supposed to be working on stuff independently (ha!), so I should be able to grade them in time at school. That’s my goal anyway.

We’ll see what reality looks like, won’t we.

Last night was tiring. But I got the field trip permission slips all trimmed, checked, and double-checked, so I know who’s going and who’s not. I started a spreadsheet for the chaperones as well…and I did seating charts for Monday for the project week, which will drive me nuts, but they do have work to do, so hopefully they won’t be total assholes about being with their friend. I’m always boggled by certain groups…when a fairly high-level girl agrees to work with a boy who does NOTHING. Sigh. Oh well. They don’t always get to pick their groups, so I guess I’ll balance it out. Put all the lazy non-workers together next time.

But the dogs last night…this was after I came back from watching the band play. Calli heard fireworks before I left and it was still upsetting her. The other two just wanted closeness, I guess.

That’s Calli’s nervous face. At this point, the fireworks happened three hours ago, but she was still panting and breathing hard about it…

And here she is with her head on my leg. Yes, I petted her lots. I told her she was a good girl and it was OK. It just doesn’t seem to help any more. Oh yeah, and here I am cutting out yard 4 of Wonder Under…

Four yards in, one to go…

Hopefully that gets done today…along with the humongous pile of other things that need doing, which are giving me palpitations at the moment: grade one assignment, start looking at the next unit which we’ve never taught before because I’m going to be gone for two days in the beginning of it so I have to leave something they can actually do with a guest teacher, plus find and sew on D-rings for a quilt that has to be delivered next week, and do another blogpost for the fiber art group I’m in, plus laundry and deal with compost bins and vacuuming and cleaning floors and groceries and cleaning up in here so I can start ironing, because if I don’t start ironing soon I’m not going to get this quilt done in time.

Deep breath. Maybe more than one. I’m overwhelmed. I know that. What my brain and body really need is a 7-mile hike today. And I’m not going to get that.

So I did go watch the man play disco, of all things, last night. Not their genre. And I drew this…

Definitely influenced by the music. I’ve been to this venue, crashing this same party, at least three years in a row, and I recognize the wait staff and one of them waved at me. I’m amused. Anyway. There’s art. I did do art. I did school. I slept. I’m going to make a list and conquer its ass. And then hopefully get some down time. Get out of the house time. Maybe some exercise. Definitely dinner out with that guy I’m barely going to see in the first two weeks of November. Yeah. That.

*Gorillaz, Clint Eastwood

Fearless on my Breath*

My head is fluffy, like the pillow I’d like it still to be laying upon. Inside it’s like clouds, those puffy white ones that look like animals and then turn into vampires. Or cannons. Seriously, I always see cannons…or spaceships, but those are a particular type of cloud. I remember that. I’m sure by the time 9 AM rolls around, some of the fluff will have cleared and I’ll have more space in there for coherent thoughts. It’s a good thing I can get up, check my blood sugar, take a shower, get dressed, feed the animals, make lunch and tea and sometimes breakfast, and sit down in here without any noticeable ability to grab an intelligible thought from my brain. This stuff I write just spills out…it’s right at the edge of my brain and wriggles into my fingers, pushing keys, hey did I tell you I finally got a new keyboard? You can actually see the letters on it. What a concept.

See. My brain just got away from me there.

Interesting segue (not Segway) into one of the things I did last night…which was to see Nick Cave (the sculptural/performance artist, not the Bad Seed)…

He’s looking perturbed by some of the crazy stuff the PBS commentator guy is saying. But also…Nick, I love your stuff, but you aren’t always coherent about your place in the world. Then again, PBS guy wouldn’t shut up. It was still cool to see and hear him…the best parts are when he would describe how he did something or when he would talk about why he was doing it. As artists, we are often called upon to explain our work, and it’s not always explicable. Or it’s private enough that we put it out there and let you interpret it, but we’re not dumping the real story out there. As one of my artist friends said, if I could put it in words, I would have…but I can’t, so I use art.

I came home and graded (oh yes), and then cut another yard out…

At least this part is semi-relaxing at the moment.

Katie is so needy some nights. The other dogs were gone, so she followed me everywhere.

Blurry night dog. She’s lying behind my chair right now. Like RIGHT BEHIND it so I can’t get out.

So this is what 3 yards of cut-up Wonder Under looks like. Slightly bigger pile than 2 yards. Hopefully after tonight it will be 4 yards, although I have a show to go watch…but late, so I should be able to sneak an hour and a half of cutting stuff out into my evening. And more grading, of course.

I really want to be ironing on Saturday, but I’m not sure that’s an option. I need to get the last two yards cut out…that’s about 3 hours. I need to grade at least one major assignment…that’s another 2 hours. Plus I need to clean up from the last quilt, put all the fabrics away, so that’s another hour. Huh. Sigh. Busy day. Don’t even think about vacuuming, mopping, washing bedding, all that crap. The compost pile. All that crap.

I did buy background fabric the other day, plus I bought these to add to the stash…

Here’s the two choices for the background. I think it has to be the one on the left, just because of how busy the quilt is and what needs to go on there, but it’s OK…I’ll use the one on the right for something.

There’s always something. It was too nice to leave behind.

Today in class, the kids are researching stuff. The hope is that they are self-sufficient enough that I can grade Unit 2 before report cards go home. In the past, this has worked. The last two years have not. Sometimes I sit with a kid or table that is off task…it’s amazing how much work they get done when I’m sitting next to them, doing my own work. I guess I’m a role model at that moment. An old scary role model who is sitting next to them. As long as I can get through at least one class worth of the units, I’m not sure I care.

*Massive Attack, Teardrop

Today is About Stuff

I feel so uninteresting lately. Every day I grade, I do some variation of eating, cooking, or cleaning, or all of the above. I teach things and mostly those days are not horrendous unless I have to carry 12 trays of sand in and out of the room 10 times. I do some art-related thing, which right now is boring to watch and semi-boring to do, mostly because I can’t find anything to watch that I really WANT to watch while I’m doing this semi-boring thing, which is sad in itself. Our ability to binge watch things and the media companies’ ability to regulate what we can see when has meant there are fewer things to watch? Or fewer things that are left that I want to watch? I don’t know. I started one the other night that was not in English. I can’t cut things out or grade stuff while watching captions, so that was out. I watched 7 episodes of Grace and Frankie before I got annoyed. I’m not really a comedy person. I like a good drama. I made it through 1 3/4 episodes of Daredevil before the sound of punch punch punch started to just annoy me beyond belief. And one episode of Midsomer Murders…too pat, too obvious, too old-school British. I love things like Prime Suspect or Sherlock, but Midsomer is too perfect.

So I haven’t found the perfect show for cutting out Wonder Under yet. It’s been a bit of a slog, working on it after I finish grading…not starting until 10:30 PM or so. I have two of the five yards cut out at this point. Yesterday was so exciting that I only took one photo…

IMG_8371 small

That is what two yards of cut-up pieces looks like: not much. This is going much slower than I thought it would. I have a thing to go to tonight and tomorrow night, so I guess I probably won’t be cut out by the weekend. That said, I did go to the fabric store yesterday to get the background fabric so I will be ready to go when I am done. Because next week is a mess. And when I got to the fabric store, the girlchild called…from a fabric store! Be still my beating heart. Ah yes, for a Halloween costume. This fabric or that fabric? Facetime colors things weird. Anyway. We both bought stuff. In different states. A bonding moment.

OK, teaching stuff and then watching/listening to hopefully cool stuff and then more cutting out of stuff. Today is about stuff.

No One Can Find the Rewind Button*

Well, this will need to be quick…been juggling stuff all morning without nearly enough caffeine in me to face the world and now I’m just plain running out of time.

I wasn’t really motivated to work on anything last night, but I did anyway. One more school assignment out of the way…one where I question the sanity of it every single time, but whatever. We sometimes do what’s best for the kids, even though it makes our heads hurt. I found an easier way this time, faster, so I got through it.

I did come home to the giant pile of branches that used to be here all cut up and gone, so now I can call the tree guy…before giant ass branches start to fall. It’s OK…storm season is late here.

Apparently the boychild and my ex took care of that. Nice.

Satchemo has a new hiding spot right in the middle of the kitchen. If there’s a padded lunch bag anywhere around, he’s lying on it…

Compost or not.

I did cut things out for over an hour. It’s just really boring to look at the pile growing. But there it is!

I wasn’t in the mood. Trying to find something really good to watch to motivate me, but having a hard time of it. I need a really good sci fi show with 12 seasons I can binge watch, but that I haven’t seen before. Yeah. Right.

Look! He moved onto my sweater.

You wonder why I’m always covered in pet fur.

OK, off to work. I’m late and nothing is done. As always. More cutting out of things tonight.

*Anna Nalick, Breathe (2 AM)

Anchored Down in Anchorage*

Have you noticed that mornings are darker? Yes, winter, and yes, daylight savings time is coming (or NOT daylight savings time…I’m never really sure when we are in REAL time and when we are in FAKE time or what any of that means). So it’s harder for me to wake up in the dark and it’s harder to not trip over the dogs on the stroll down the hallway to the place where all the pet foods are (I have a train of furry beasts in the morning). It’s not a stroll…they are rushing toward the food bowls as if it’s the end of the world…except for Calli, who stops to scratch. Her skin is awful right now. Lots of medicated baths.

Sometimes (because I live in Southern California) I have to stop and think explicitly about what season it is. Although I’ve started wearing a sweater to school every morning, so it’s not early Fall or late Spring. I know, shut up. I got that. I like my weather mostly.

Yesterday afternoon was delightful for walking. The poison oak knows it is Fall…all of a sudden, it’s changing color rapidly. There’s poison oak in my newest quilt.

It was sunny in the morning, but the afternoon was lovely and cloudy and a bit chill, but not really. There’s wind out here.

I always wish I knew more about the rocks and formations around my home. Strange rock outcroppings abound.

We went all the way out to the water bridge. It’s old. It’s protected.

It’s somewhat dangerous looking. The mountain lion signs are still up.

The dogs got tired. Really, that’s the purpose…plus me getting exercise. Perhaps getting out into nature.

Calli was certainly tired out.

I ate. I graded. And then I traced the last 170 or so pieces.

Grading seems a never-ending thing. I’m getting close to caught up, if I ignore the major unit being turned in on Thursday, plus a comic strip, and then another project due the following Monday. Because I’m crazy. But we were smart enough not to assign any additional homework for two weeks. Because then we’d have to grade it.

I finished tracing just before midnight (I started late). It took almost 12 hours and ended up being about 5 yards of Wonder Under.

Usually it takes me an hour to cut out one yard…so that’s the next two or three nights, I think. Depending on other stuff. So ironing to fabric by the weekend? It means I need to go buy background fabric. Or look at what’s in my stash and see if there’s enough of anything that will work.

On to the next phase of this one. Getting close to the fun phase. It’s not that tracing Wonder Under isn’t fun…it’s meditative trying to fit all the pieces in while tracing. But sometimes it’s boring or tiring, depending on how much standing I’ve been doing. Progress is good though. I need to finish this one in a little over a month, which I can easily do, except there’s some traveling in there too…so that’s a constraint. Anyway…it’s going to be an awesome quilt even if I don’t finish it within the deadline. So there’s that.

*Michelle Shocked, Anchorage

Let Me Enfold You*

I’m excited! The 2019 official Spring Break vacation is booked! We’ll even have no showers for a couple of days! Oh boy! I like showers. I do. Especially when hiking and camping. But I’ll live. It’s Utah this time…we tried to stay in one place a bit longer than last time, although last time, there were a couple of campsites that I was glad I didn’t have to stay there more than one night. Anyway. It’s done…although the tent caterpillars in Zion are keeping us out of the campsites there, and you can’t book Bryce in advance, so we’ll only actually be IN one of the National Parks to camp. It’s OK. We will survive. Looking forward to lots of rock and probably freezing my ass off at night. It’s a good thing I’m bringing my own personal space heater.

I also booked the girlchild home for Winter Break, which is nice. Now I just need to get my parents to answer email so I can book her graduation trip. I have no idea what full name my mom has on her drivers’ license. Can’t book a flight without that. Like does she have her real middle name that she never uses? Or her maiden name as her middle name? Or what? I don’t know. I never changed my name when I was married, so I don’t know what people do. Honestly it’s a practice I’ve never really understood, so there’s that.

Anyway, trip progress was made. That’s all that matters.

What did I do all weekend? I did go to see the Visions opening at the Visions Art Museum. There were some interesting pieces in the show. I always recommend it. I also graded a bunch of stuff and traced a lot of Wonder Under, like 6 hours’ worth or so. All good.

But what it looks like HERE is a lot of piles of Wonder Under…which is not very exciting for YOU, but it is for ME. This was Saturday night…I had almost 4 yards traced…

Piles of done yardage…

Three dogs refusing to be photographed. Or to lie in the same place…

More yardage on Sunday!

I’m done with the main figure…I’m doing the water contrails or whatever you wanna call them.

I’m in the second to last of them, around piece 820…so another 170 pieces to go.

I seriously considered doing those last night, but the clock (and my teacher brain) told me no. Fun stuff. So now you know what I’ll be doing tonight.

OK, this song was on what I was binge-watching yesterday…and I remembered how much I loved it when I was young…

So now you get to listen to it.

*This Mortal Coil, Song to the Siren