From the Mess to the Masses*

Three days off is always so nice. The weekend is so rushed when it’s shoved into two days…mostly because teachers need so much weekend time just to prep for the next week, unfortunately. I really enjoy being able to stretch work out a bit with that third day, although I’m sure if I always had three days off, I’d manage to fill them up and feel the same day-before stress I usually get on a Sunday. Too much to do in too little time.

The weather also cooled off considerably, so my brain is back. We got a little rain and it’s about 20-30 degrees lower in temperature. It’s like we’re human again.

I am trying to persuade Kitten to stay in the office for a little while, even with the interloper in the house…it worked for a bit.

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There were treats involved. Who uses an ironing board base as a pillow? Cats are weird.

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Speaking of weird…I almost bought this just for the raccoon. Yes, that’s a Disney princess behind him.

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Majorly weird. And not cheap.

So when we got back from the store (must have food), I started folding and putting away fabric, both from Saturday’s run to get a background fabric (the brownish gray or grayish brown)…the green is for the chalkboard behind her. And some other stuff that leaped into my hands.

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Then I found and sorted by color all the fabrics from the last quilt…

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And put it all away so I could start the next one.

And then I graded for a while. See this stuff? They all do this. Inhabit me with their tails. Plus that’s the gradebook he’s lying on. AND he looks pissed off that I might want to do these things near him.

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Trust me, Satchemo, I feel the same way about grading. But you’re not helping. I need to do more of it today.

Then I hung the drawing…big but mostly square. I’m still not sure how I feel about this one. I mean, I’m making it. We’ll see.

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I tell you that so you don’t think I’m always totally confident about what I’m doing…that there are times when I’m not sure it’s going to turn out well or at all. And I keep doing it.

I just have to hope it works. I started out in the earth, so browns…

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But I quickly got into the flesh run for the first figure in the quilt. She used a run of 7 fabrics, although that brown was only used for one thing. I laid out all the flesh pieces last night…

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Here are all the pieces that are part of the first figure but aren’t flesh…so a lot of artery/heart pieces, some lungs, eyeballs, and I don’t remember what else.

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I’ll get to those today. It means I was almost to the 400s, but I haven’t done all of them. I don’t know what that means in terms of how far I am. I’ve got more to do, for sure. I spent almost 4 hours ironing yesterday and finally had to force myself to stop to go to bed.

She has words on her neck.

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I still have the three lightest fabrics of flesh to iron down…that was 1 AM. There’s a lot in the box…honestly, I need to pull a bigger box for the pieces.

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It’s already full. Ahhhh. I love this part; I really do. That and ironing it together.

OK, today. Well grading, of course. And a dog walk for sure…now that it’s cooler. And then ironing. Lots of ironing. Yay.

*Phoenix, Lizstomania

A Stain on My Notebook*

It’s muggy here. And still hot…not as hot as yesterday, when the breeze felt like you were standing too close to a fire. It makes it hard to get anything done. And then the wind picked up; you’d think that would be good, but it was hot and I was trying to sort Wonder Under…the wind was strong enough to pick up pieces out of the boxes and whirl them around. This morning, the wind is gone (although there’s still a wind advisory out), and there’s the trickle of occasional light rain. That part is nice. Sitting here with two cats not real keen on each other’s existence, but tolerating it because of catnip treats and I guess my presence. But we’re still sweaty and uncomfortable and trying to stay semi-cool and hydrated. Ugh. This heat sucks my brain out and spits it on the tile.

I saw 109 degrees later…it’s interesting though, because I don’t doubt the effects of climate change, but it’s been that hot here before…so I can see San Francisco’s temperatures as an indicator of climate issues, but this is semi-normal for us. The humidity isn’t normal though.

That said, heat or no heat, I finished the damn trimming of the Wonder Under…ironically, so now I can iron in the heat. Laughing about that.

It’s a pretty full box. There are lots of big pieces that take up space.

I keep putting stuff out for the hummingbirds. They appreciate it in this heat.

I had both dogs on the couch with me…because it’s hot as hell and it makes sense to lie on a couch OR on mom when it’s hot.

Calli looks like this when she wants to go out. I suspect this was a request to go in the pool rather than to pee. I understand.

The next step is to sort all the pieces by 100s so they’ll be easier to deal with at the ironing stage. Satchemo was occupying the light table though.

It’s interesting though that once you start putting these bins out and gently pushing them toward a cat, they often get offended and just move. I did leave him room, but this is about when the wind picked up.

It didn’t take long to sort them…about 40 minutes. Because there are only 800 and something pieces instead of 2000. Note to self!

I did go to the fabric store and stare at a bunch of possibilities with the drawing in my head, trying to make a decision. NOT a dark blue! I ended up with a gray brown…an interesting color that looks brown against most grays and gray against most browns. Lighter than I usually go as well. So my goal is to start ironing down some time today…honestly, probably tonight, because I’ve got a bunch of grading to get through plus some other stuff around here. I do need to clean up in here too…to put all the fabrics away from the last quilt. That will take about an hour. And I might need to move some cats.

I did two nights’ worth last night…the wavy buttonhole stitch in yellow in the bottom left and the leaf shapes in lazy daisies in the bottom right. I’m trying to fill in all the bottom bits, I guess. This is 245 days in…120 days to go. So 2/3s of the way through the year. Interesting.

I guess I thought it would be more filled in by now.

We were watching Logan, meaning I was stuck in the living room (which is not where the fabric is), so I stitched some wool bits down on the right.

This is April…the month I should have done before starting May. I have two more blocks to stitch down wooly bits on, and I think I need to cut out more eyeballs. I usually have a bag of them already cut out, but I can’t find it, so I’m guessing I used them all. I found eyeball fabric though, so I’m fine. Stitching the wooly bits down is my least favorite part of these. And I think once I finish stitching these down, I need to cut out the next batch of block pieces. But none of these are crucial.

Ah…a cool breeze smelling of wet dirt. Now that is bliss. I could live with that for a while. And one of my favorite parts of quiltmaking starts today with ironing to fabric. Yah. That’s a good weekend.

*Squeeze, Black Coffee in Bed

Glitter on the Mattress*

Do you ever spend all day checking your email obsessively, waiting to hear about that one thing you really wanna know about? Did you get in? Were you rejected? Well, was your work rejected? After 30 years of entering shows, I don’t really worry about rejections. They happen. A lot. And that’s OK. But sometimes I just wanna know. It’s not even the end of the world if it’s a rejection…you just wanna know one way or another.

I have all these mental deadlines for my art, everything neatly spaced out and organized in the calendar in my head, and then things come in and blow that all out. I thought about one art invite for about 12 hours and then decided no. Not for me. The other one though…sigh. I’m a little irritated, although I have yet to see deadlines…it just wasn’t on my calendar and I’m not sure I want to shove it in there. I have this quilt, then one other, and then hopefully a commission. I won’t plan past that right now because I can’t. But it does mean I need to stay on task, on top of the work. Which I can do. I don’t have a lot of mental down time between quilts because there are always about 50 of them in my head and even in process in sketchbooks or already copied. I remember the days when it might take weeks to get the next one going. That is no longer the case. And I’m OK with that. I like the work being there all the time in some form or another.

I currently have this one I’ve been working on…hopefully getting the Wonder Under all cut out today, deciding what the background fabric will be, and starting the ironing onto fabric this week. Then there’s the smaller climate quilt…it’s all cut out of Wonder Under and ready for ironing as well…it’s been sitting around since June or so, and it will keep sitting around for a while. Then I have at least three or four drawings that have been enlarged and numbered and are ready for tracing. And another two or three drawings that are enlarged and partially drawn. Plus quite a few drawings in the sketchbooks I have lying around.

Ironically, I haven’t drawn the next quilt yet…but if that takes me a while to process, like the last one, I can do some part of one of the ones lying around. This is my meditation, my relaxation, my happy happy joy joy.

I have almost 6 hours into cutting out here…

Probably have 2-3 hours to go…I’m binge watching The Crown now. Finished Hinterland. This quilt brought to you by Brit tv.

Satchemo is still adjusting…and the other two cats have kind of been pushed out of this room, hopefully temporarily.

I had gaming last night, but I finished this one on the right…

And started working on this one, but because I’m doing May before April (for no real good reason), I was missing two threads that came in April and were in my other box. But I worked on the leaves and came home and found the other threads.

I really should do things in order.

See? Now he’s taken over the light table…also Kitten and Midnight’s domain. We’re working on sharing spaces…

Here’s the 10 completed blocks…

This is Sue Spargo’s Folk Tails…it’s a pretty fun stitch, with lots of different embroidery going on. Plus animals. This is what I do when my other stuff is not portable and I have to go places and either keep awake or stitch with friends. None of it is quick to finish, but I’m OK with that.

So a long weekend. I have 4 things to grade (ugh. already) and I need to clean up the studio so I can pick fabrics and I want to sit on the deck and draw but it’s still uber hot today and tomorrow it’s supposed to rain so that might have to wait until Monday and there’s errands and cleaning and who knows wtf else. And I miss my kids. Boychild is hiking again and girlchild is idk, but if I ask her, she’ll tell me. Anyway, must eat and get cutting stuff out…try to focus a bit on art stuff today. Maybe school can wait.

*The B-52’s, Love Shack

See Inside, Inside of Our Heads*

The heat is supposed to break soon…maybe Sunday. We’ve had a couple thunderstorms move through this week, which are nice to break the temperature with a little rain, although there’s fire danger…but Calli, the Golden Retriever, has been frantic by the time we get home. Yesterday she had clambered behind my ex’s dryer, destroying the vent and who knows what else back there. I’m not even sure how she got in there, with a sink pipe in the way…or how long she’d been there when I got to her. I spent a goodly portion of the night trying to calm her…

I worry about her when I hear the thunder and I’m at work, but there’s really nothing we can do. He has places for her to hide, but she goes to the extreme. Considering building some sort of really sturdy soft fort for her to hide in. Not sure if she would though…that’s the problem. Or if we’d come back and she’d have destroyed it, and be cowering in it, unable to escape. Poor puppy.

I did a line of French knots in the bottom left corner. Maybe I’ll do more…

I didn’t cut stuff out until late.

So I only got one yard done…a little over an hour. I have 3 yards left, which is about 3 hours and a bit. Less than I wanted done, but maybe I’ll do some tomorrow. Or maybe even tonight (unlikely). I didn’t grade anything either because I went to the gym instead and enjoyed my book and the air conditioning. OK, I worked out too, but those other two things are surely motivators. Think I’ll go back tomorrow. Looking forward to a long weekend, that’s for sure. Though we’ll spend a chunk of it doing cat behavior training. That’s OK…it’s for the best in the long run. The cats will be happier and so will we. Satchemo (the new cat) gets along fine with the dogs, of course…it’s the other dynamic we have to work on.

And of course, the weekend goals always include sitting somewhere with a sketchbook and relaxing, plus walking a dog or two. They will enjoy that too, once the heat wave breaks.

*Trapt, Headstrong

Legs Up with a Book and a Drink*

Last night, I graded one class worth of the first real assignment for the year, the first one where I can sort of evaluate what I’m dealing with in terms of writing. They’ve had one quiz as well, which was open-note, so that evaluates something else. My original plan was to grade all the classes last night on that assignment, but oh, hell no. One period was enough. Now walk away. It’s funny how each new group of kids has a personality…this group listened to me when I said to put a space after punctuation (oh hallelujah! Finally!), but the run-on sentences might kill me. I mean, I’ve seen run-ons before, but this is like the run-ons have run-ons.

Yeah, I teach science. What’s your point? I need them to communicate better, clearly even, and so now I’m scrambling…as a science teacher…trying to figure out how to help them with that. Wish me luck. I suspect it’s not a one-day lesson (I don’t even have one day…I need a 5-minute lesson). Put it on my list of things to do. The ever-growing list that threatens to overtake the world.

I’ll find a way to grade the other four periods…absolutely will have to. Might even do the last period next, because I suspect they are the lowest. And I will ignore the four emails that came from one kid whose paper I returned…because if I get four emails from him every time I return something to him, it will drive me bonkers. And he’s a sweet kid and doesn’t deserve that.

I was talking to a friend yesterday about how to turn school off when you come home…how to walk out the door and get into your car and then Not do school at home. I think it’s impossible to walk away from the workload, and even harder to walk away from the kids and not keep it in your head…not constantly be trying to problem-solve the job while you’re trying to clean the bathroom. We try. Maybe some are good at it. I’m not.

Bottom left, more chain stitch to define an area…no real plan in my head except to fill that in somehow.

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Selfie with Wonder Under and cat.

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I didn’t start cutting out until late, but I did finish a whole piece, so that’s a plus. I think there are 5 left?

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Or maybe 4? Not sure. When I went to bed, the cat was sitting on them so I couldn’t count. I am still hoping to be done with cutting out earlier this weekend rather than later, so I can start ironing down to fabric…a nice long stretch of that would be good. Because that might balance out the grading, which needs to start in earnest. I always forget how much of my life is spent grading grading grading. I’ve spent 15 years of teaching trying to figure out how to simplify that and still get what I need out of my students. All the magical posts from people who have solved that problem…sometimes I read what they write and then I try to impose my kids on that. Doesn’t work.

Anyway…let the attempt to balance my life begin…and may it end each day with artmaking.

*Squeeze, Is That Love?

I Came Back as a Bag of Groceries*

Rough morning. Sleep in the heat is always difficult. And there are additional night stressors, like the cat who wanted to clean her butt right by my face because she’s feeling anxious. And when it’s over 100 degrees, furry animals right next to you are delightful (ugh). But I know they’re all needy babes at the moment, so I pet them all.

And when it’s really hot out, you should move furniture, by the way. And books…piles of books. And then cook things. Over a stove. AND with an oven.

It’s fine. I do OK with sweat as long as I can cool down occasionally. Eventually it will cool down again.

I did two nights’ on here, down in the bottom left. I decided I wanted to get that section filled in, so I did a chain stitch in a light blue and then a wavy buttonhole in the orangey-red color. I like that bit.

We were watching Sense8 while eating and this guy’s shirt fascinated me. I especially like the blue/red ferny things about a third of the way down. So we had to rewind a couple of times so I could get the idea of them…

I don’t know what I’ll be doing with that…

While we finished watching, I was sewing more of this down…because when it’s over 100 degrees , that’s the best time to work on a wool quilt. You know.

And then I sat back and watched more Hinterland, always interesting just because I lived in Aberystwyth for a year. I often yell out (in my head), hey! I know that bit of road! Although the art department was in the wrong place. Maybe they’ve moved it? Or maybe there really is a printmaking studio up there…who knows?

I cut stuff out while I was watching (and thinking) all that.

Another needy furry beast who wants to be right next to me in the heat…

I did a couple of hours…that was my goal, so I met it! Whoo! I can’t promise I will on all the other nights though. Gotta fit a gym visit in somewhere. I think I cut out 2 1/2 yards, minus those pieces under the scissors.

Pile of Wonder Under is NOT moving. Cat is. Hence blur.

You can tell I’m still not very awake. Probably gonna be this way for some more days…between the heat and the additional cat stressors. It will all get better soon. Just don’t expect deep thoughts or complicated math out of me any time soon.

*They Might Be Giants, Dead

I Ain’t Wasting No More Time*

I finished tracing Wonder Under. This is very exciting. OK. It’s not. Well. Last night was hard, because my feet were tired from standing and walking, and here I was, standing some more. So it was exciting to be done with that.

I thought the piece had just over 800 pieces, but it was closer to 900…

It’s lots of bigger pieces, so it took up a lot of Wonder Under, about 7 1/2 yards.

And over 11 hours of tracing. But it’s done…and now on to cutting it out. Let’s assume another 10 hours or so…usually it’s less than the tracing time, but these are bigger pieces, so they’ll take longer to cut out. I wanted to be ironing to fabric this weekend, but that would mean doing a couple of hours of cutting every night. It’s certainly possible…I can’t guarantee it. Although I won’t have to stand to do it, so that’s a plus. The transition from a summer of sitting whenever I like to standing all the time is somewhat traumatic to my feet. Perhaps I need new shoes? My podiatrist would say so. But he doesn’t pay my bills.

The weather here is a little weird…we got a brief spurt of rain (and thunder) yesterday in the middle of a heat wave.

It’s supposed to be really hot again today and tomorrow. At least it’s cooling down at night…although it takes my house a while to realize cooler weather.

Meanwhile, adjustments abound. On the left is Satchemo…on the right is Kitten. It’s an uneasy truce at the moment…

I feel sorry for all of them, but hopefully there will be just a few more days of drama and then they’ll all calm down.

Meanwhile, best thoughts to Texas…may the rain end soon. It doesn’t matter what we think about climate change at the moment…real live people and animals are trying to survive. Let’s take care of them and then figure out the science.

*The Strokes, Someday

Turn and Face the Strange*

Well that was an interesting weekend. Believe it or not, I don’t tell you everything I’m doing…and this weekend was the beginning of a significant change here, which has caused some stress and sleeplessness, but should be good in the long term. Once we get to the long term, that is. It has meant that I didn’t do any art for two whole days straight, which is like crazy for me, but I got back to Wonder Under meditation last night for a couple of hours. Yes, I wanted to be done tracing this weekend, but that didn’t happen. I probably will be tonight though, so that’s OK.

There’s 3 days done on here…although I’m not sure I can tell you what I did. I know I did a green straight stitch and then lazy daisy and fly stitch up on the top pieces of feather stitching. I think I did some fly stitching around the sheaf stitching and some French knots before that.

But I can’t be sure. Sometimes I just have to play catch up on this. I actually did two nights’ worth on Saturday evening and then sat out on the deck for the other one last night…the thing I kept saying I would do all summer and didn’t do. I guess now is the time to start watching the sky and the hummingbirds and the breeze in the trees.

Well. Today? Supposed to be 105 degrees, so less breeze and more ugh. It’s better than torrential rains, though (be safe and take good care, Texas).

I really do miss not doing this stuff on those days when I can’t…I had hoped to do some tracing on Saturday, but it turned into trying to fix a bunch of water issues and clean crap up…stuff that needed to happen, but it took up too much time for me to get to this. Last night though, I took my time back…

The thing is, I’m almost done. I got to somewhere in the 700s last night before I quit from exhaustion. Went to bed early again…which is good, because there was a lot of cat neediness at 1 AM and 4 AM.

This drawing has a lot of bigger pieces, because I wanted to make sure I could finish it, and they’re harder to fit into the random spaces on the Wonder Under. So I’ve used a lot of yardage, but there’s big empty spaces in there too. I’ll use them for something. I always do.

But today, I go back to work. Back to getting stuff done and organizing the teacher part of my life. I will hopefully get the last 100+ pieces traced tonight and start cutting them out. We’ll see how that goes.

I think I forgot to mention that All Stacked Up in My Head got into Quilts=Art=Quilts…

The opening is October 28 at the Schweinfurth Art Center in Auburn, NY. I won’t be there, but they will. Check it out. Report back.

Meanwhile, I’ll be here, making more. She’s got a lot of things on her mind…

*David Bowie, Changes

No Wonder My Head Spins

Well. We survived the first full week of school. It felt somewhat marathon-like, but it’s done. And I woke up this morning (eventually) and immediately created a to-do list in my head the size of a blue whale. There is No Way in Hell I can possibly get all this shit done, but it’s there.

First, figure out who’s paying for the girlchild’s college this month. There’s three of us, so it takes some coordination…mostly my telling people what to send me and then my remembering to pay (sometimes an issue). (I did this.)

Second, try to change a bunch of my email addresses on sites, because I’m trying to migrate onto gmail from the other stupid account that has had major storage issues. This is a pain in the ass. But it has to be done. A little at a time maybe. (I did some of this…I may never be done doing this.)

Third, and this should not be happening right now, but that is how my brain works…set up a Patreon account. I’ve had a couple people suggest it…I can offer video and drawings as incentives, maybe small quilts for a higher support level. Video can be more complicated explanations of how I do stuff or talking about a specific piece or I don’t know. I want to fund a coloring book and, honestly, be able to buy fabric and batting and thread without wondering if that was my food budget for the month. Even when the kids finish college, there are loans that we have to figure out how to pay, so I won’t be out of the college hole for years. I’ve been living paycheck to paycheck for so long, it’s exhausting. The worry alone…anyway, when I get it launched, I’ll let you know. There will be some very cheap pledge options. We’ll see how it goes.

Fourth, my fridge calendar needs updating. I need to see 5-6 weeks out to get my head around certain deadlines. It seems I am always working to deadlines. (I did this.)

Fifth, the girlchild has been texting, Snapchatting, attempting Facetime (apparently Target has shitty cellular coverage), and calling, as she gets close to starting her third year (I had typed first…it’s not her first year…it’s her third. Holy crap.). (This may continue all year.)

I should walk the dogs at some point, but the middle of the day is not my favorite time for walking. I need to trace some Wonder Under, clean the bathroom, go grocery shopping because tomorrow is a mess, make some decisions about school for next week, cut down the ivy that’s growing up the side of the house, take out some recycling, clean up the entryway, shower! (that’s probably important), and clean off the table. Just to start. At least. Fill the trash can with what little is left after all summer of cleaning. Deliver the last two or three bags to the thrift shop people. Wash the bedding! Almost forgot about that. Hang on a second. No. I want to shower first and you can’t do laundry AND shower in my house at the same time. Well. You can, but you won’t like it. Set up gradesheets, input the first few assignments, put names on the last class of photos, and grade two classes of homework. Oh my. See? It’s crazy. Most of that really does need to happen this weekend at some point. (I have done none of this.)

No wonder my head spins.

A lot of times, I just walk away from all the work and house stuff and head for the art pile. It’s the only thing that makes sense.

So last night, though, I spent time petting dogs…

They were very needy. But not nearly as needy as they were at 12:30 AM, because then I went out to watch my favorite 80s cover band…preach! Actually, before that, I finished a book, because it’s on digital loan from the library and the book is good and the loan ends Sunday, so if I didn’t finish it, I would have to try to get it again and I didn’t want to do that, so I sat there and read until I was done. Trying not to fall asleep. I did all that before I went out.

And I got home really late and went to bed and tried to sleep in with 4 animals making all their noises and requests for attention (some more polite than others). I’m sorta awake today. I took a sketchbook with me last night, because I never know when I’ll be sitting along and bored, but that didn’t happen, so no art. No art Friday. It happens. I need to do art today to make up for it then, right? RIGHT. So get outta here and do some shit.

A Good Place to Be…

Well yesterday I managed to post my blog in the wrong place, but then fixed it. And then lost my keys. Or couldn’t find them. For long enough that I thought I might not make it to work. I “lost” my purse too, but since I knew I brought it out of the dentist with me, I assumed (correctly) that it was in the car. I did eventually find my keys and make it to work in 7 minutes flat (yikes…you can’t really be late when you’re a teacher), but it threw me for the rest of the day. Honestly, I don’t know where my keys are now either, but I usually drop them in the same two places every day, so they’re probably there. I hope. Unless the beginning-of-the-school-year brain did something crazy with them.

I’ve been misplacing a lot of things lately…too much chaos. That’s one of my goals for today at school: control the chaos. I have too many piles and pieces of paper. I need to get those organized and handled. What’s on the counter reflects into the brain. I’ve never been a particularly neat person, but generally I know where shit is. Organization doesn’t have to be neat by the way. I get nervous in houses and rooms that are totally and completely neat and minimalist and put away. Which is funny, because people generally clean up before you show up…but that’s not always who they really are. I can never get really truly clean and put away. I try. That’s all I can say. And no, I never volunteer my house for meetings. That would be crazy.

So I draw in class. We do cover pages for each unit and mine are generally a little crazy because I’m trying to get kids to think about what we’ll be studying and go outside the box. Plus I guess it’s another intro to their teacher. So this is Unit 1…

It’s basically the nature of science, how we explore and figure stuff out etc. The kids told me to put a student under the desk with stuff dripping on them…and then I added the wing mutation.

I always try to toss female scientists into the mix, so the girls get into their head that they can be a scientist. I tell them about my Physics teacher too, the one who basically thought girls couldn’t science and turned me off it.

Plus we’ve already done some days about safety in the lab, so it’s good to reiterate those things. I think it turned out pretty well.

I have to admit to not having a ton of energy when I get home right now. Girlchild reminds me that it will get better…that the first full week or two is really hard. Yup. It is. But if you think I’m always go go go…nah. I stop on the couch and barely move sometimes for like an hour or more before I find the energy to get up and do stuff. And then I get up, because just sitting on the couch is boring honestly.

So I forgot to do this the night before, so there are two night’s worth on here…

Stems and leaves on the roses…

And the sheaf stitch…totally forgot about that one.

That’s why I have so many stitch books…to remind me that stitches exist…brain extension.

So I started tracing around 9 or so and worked for almost 3 hours…

It’s really boring to just post pictures of what I traced. I think. Maybe you’re inordinately interested. I have I think 5 yards I’m working on right now…

I quit right before having to cut yard number 6…because there was a long piece that wouldn’t fit on the Wonder Under I already had cut. So I’m on piece 555 with about 7 hours into the tracing. More than halfway done…but no way am I gonna finish tonight. Maybe tomorrow? It depends. I’m already really tired and I have a show to go to tonight…so the odds of my being up early tomorrow are pretty low unfortunately. And I’m still trying to get on a good gym schedule, to make it routine again. It’s hard to do when you’re tired, but it’s important. So that’s tomorrow as well.

Anyway. I have plans for getting organized at school, maybe walking the dog this afternoon, since he’ll be on his own tonight, and finishing the tracing sometime this weekend (ha ha ha…because this weekend is kind of a mess for that). Hopefully I can get it all cut out next week and then start ironing over the 3-day weekend? That would be cool…sounds like a nice way to spend a long weekend. A breakfast out, maybe a walk somewhere with the dogs, and then some ironing. OK, I know that sounds weird to most people, but I really love the part where I’m picking out fabrics. It’s very relaxing and meditative. A good place to be…