Camping in the Rain…

We spent the weekend camping. The district gave us another random 3-day weekend. Pro: we missed the day after Halloween. Con: Grades were due, so if I hadn’t been super over-prepared and graded everything the weekend before this one, I would have needed to grade over a 3-day weekend. Sigh. Anyway. Random days. Always fun. It was nice to not have to try to leave right after school and get up there in the dark. We did a lot of sitting around (and then moving around because it was cold. We had a great campsite…

A little isolated, especially since about half the people that had reserved spaces didn’t show up.

Why? No running water. We got the email a week or so ago and figured we’d been there before…there are pit toilets…just no showers or faucets. So not ideal, but cheap.

Canyon live oak…huge acorns. Like walking on marbles.

We had a bet that someone would get hit by one this weekend…they were constantly falling and just missing us. Definitely hit the car and the tent, but missed us. At some point, scarab beetles were also falling from the sky…Saturday night when it started to rain (water most of the time, with an occasional beetle).

It was definitely chilly…around 34 degrees the first night. Put all the clothes on and start a fire…and then draw.

The next day, we hiked. We had (well, I had) grand plans, but the Man’s back was acting up. We did 4 1/2 miles (the longest…probably a combo of elevation, his back, and my continuing viral crap). We started in Doane Valley but didn’t hike there most of the time.

We saw a weir and were supposed to see waterfalls, but access was iffy. These clouds were coming in…we knew we were getting cloud cover, but all the rain had left the forecast.

Ah well…forecasts are iffy.

Cool tree dropped in the middle of the trail.

It started raining around 5:30 PM, so I cooked under an umbrella…there’s a photo of that somewhere.

This guy hung out most of the time…

We did actually manage a fire…it wasn’t raining super heavily in the early evening, so I used the umbrella and drew…

Some election anxiety. Here’s the drawing without the blurry smoke/fire stuff…

And the other one…

I love the time to draw. It was too cold to embroider. I read a lot. It rained all night. At one point, water was dripping onto my head in the sleeping bag, so we moved everything down. It was really wet in the morning, so we just packed up and came home. It wasn’t bad…it just made the last night a little uncomfortable. We went to bed early because of it. It’s fine.

I’m still feeling off…the virus has not left. The cough is there and bad when it’s there and often not bad. Wait it out? Not sure I want to be back on antibiotics so quickly. So I’m tired…after three days off work. No surprise. Next weekend is also 3 days off (Veteran’s Day)…maybe it will help me recover.

Meanwhile, I haven’t been tracing because I finished off a bolt of Wonder Under and went to open the new one I’ve had in my stash for a while, and it’s different. The paper is much much thicker and the fusible web is very thick too, very plasticky. I didn’t have time until yesterday to go to Joann’s and they didn’t have any, so I ordered some online, but there’s a lot of reviews that say this thicker one is the new version? I’m not sure, because when I look at the label, it has “W1” on it and it came from Walmart, which has some weird versions of things. The one I ordered is a smaller bolt…apparently that’s how we make money now. Make everything smaller and charge more for it. We’ll see when it comes…whenever it comes. Trying not to add Wonder Under anxiety to election anxiety. Or to-do list anxiety.

I did fix my pants. The pockets had holes where they were attached to the pants (typical stress point), so I patched on the back, but for whatever reason, it wasn’t holding well, so I stitched them as well. It’s my brain that wants to make them eyeholes on my ass.

OK. School. I know what I’m teaching today…not sure about the next THREE days, but today is set. Not sure if I’ll have to head back to Urgent Care…holding off until I see more evidence that this thing is not on its way out. Hopefully clay this afternoon…starting something new. And if I can’t trace tonight, maybe it’ll force me to make the wings for that ceramic piece, right? One can hope.

Not Connecting

My internet is out at home. I’m at school, tired (like take a nap tired), getting ready for a mandatory meeting that could be an email, trying to get my head around the to-do list…which requires my orange notebook…which has disappeared. Fate! My head has been off for over a week…getting over a virus and an infection plus the side effects of the meds…I feel mostly alive.

I started tracing…

But it’s not a fast process, and someone needs to stay out of it…

Going well…

In fact, I was super relaxed last night while tracing, feeling the meditative powers, then realized the reason I’d gone to Home Depot after school was to buy slats so I could ship a quilt today. I’d put a label on it Monday night but didn’t do the rest. So I started that at 10 PM. Might be part of why I’m tired.

So I’m hoping for more meditative tracing tonight. Also need to start to get ready for camping this weekend. I’m alternating between excited and exhausted again for that. Some part of me wants to nap in a pillow fort for days.

Hoping the Meds Kick In

Graded all day Saturday. Drove all day Sunday. Did some art. Still recovering from virus and infection. Body not thrilled with any of it.

I finished the drawing Friday night…

And started numbering…

Did not finish.

Kept going on Saturday night.

Managed to finish. Notionally 1606 pieces.

Odds are I missed some.

Started tracing last night…

Didn’t get far. Big ground pieces are a pain to trace. This will be the view for a while.

This was the grading view at some point…

Followed by some of this…

The Man had a show on Saturday night…Barbie-themed.

Nice outfit.

This is Bowie trying to get comfortable.

He’s not very good at it.

This is where I’m at right now.

Can’t go back to bed though. Hoping all the meds kick in and I survive the day.

No Art

Fun few days. Got sick, some virus. Fucked with my blood sugar. This is the fun part of being a teacher. I woke up, realized blood sugar was crashing bad, laid back on the bed and ate 10 skittles and contemplated my life choices. I can call in sick (because I feel like crap), but I need sub plans for that, and I don’t have the mental capacity for that, let alone the ability to even get down the hallway to the computer. And we’re supposed to be doing stations and one is a lab. AND I’m giving a makeup test at lunch and if I don’t do it Thursday, it won’t get done before I have time to finish my grades. So. I waited 15 minutes and stood up. It wasn’t great, but I could shower. I tried eating breakfast, not so successfully. Let’s add the third thing…Kitten bit me HARD on Wednesday morning. She gets cranky. I was trying to type on the keyboard and pet her and she didn’t like it. I washed it out, but by the end of Wednesday, it was swollen and red, so I soaked it and doused it in Neosporin and hoped. By Thursday morning, it was worse. The red was spreading. My blood sugar was crap. I needed to have a fasting test at 4:45, so I had to stop eating at 10:45 but I was not into eating things (virus? infection? both?), so I drank the juice they gave me for the diabetic kid in my classroom and then went and got more (it’s amazing how fast three nurses will respond when you mention the diabetic teacher is in need of something). Strangely, by the end of the day, I was feeling better. My blood sugar had evened out. The hand still hurt…

Before you freak out, I put my name in at urgent care, went and ran my test, and came back to urgent care. Three hours later (no joke), I had two shots, one on each hip, and a pill container of antibiotics. It’s much better this morning. I’m better, although the weird ticklish cough from the virus is still here. Blood sugar was normal this morning. Redness has receded, although it’s not gone. And yes, I’m still teaching today. Yesterday, I sat all day. I barely got up. I’m not sure I’ll have much more in me today. Pro? I got through most of the regrades I needed to do tomorrow, so there’s just two assignments I need to grade…wait, no, three. They’re all easy. It’ll be fine.

The point of all this is that I have done nothing artistic for two whole days and I hate that. But I went to bed early both nights. Which is obviously what I needed. I might need it tonight too.

This cat was in my yard.

I’ve seen it before. Few people let cats out because of the coyotes. Strangely, my little dog (who I was taking out to pee) did not see the cat. His eyesight is definitely declining.

This is true.

I also have three tiny scars from the kitten last night…so it’s not just my cranky old lady doing the damage.

OK, today is the last day of stations. I’m going to hopefully grade the one digital assignment that’s left and start grading homework, while staying seated as much as possible. I’m not going to ceramics today. Tomorrow, I’ll finish grades, pack a quilt to ship…wait, I need to sew some things for the Man’s show as well. I was going to do one last night, but my body was insistent that sleep was more important. Sunday, I’m driving two women to an art meeting in Huntington Beach. Ugh. That’s gonna suck. But whatever. I am hoping to draw tonight…hoping to have the physical energy to stand and the mental energy to think of what needs to fill the space. Because days with no art kinda suck.

All Art

IDK why I thought I’d have more time today to post about Visions…ah well, maybe Friday? I have 12 minutes now before I need to leave. Let’s keep it short and sweet…all art.

I have two things that came out of the kiln…this, where I was trying out a different way to glaze/carve…

And this, where I was trying to make a usable mug…

Where if I tried to make it to sell it, it would cost about $300 because of the amount of time I put into it.

I don’t do fast art, I guess.

Both of these need a glaze on top and the mug needs some inside so I can actually use it.

It’s smaller than I like, I think. Not sure.

I have a really hard time visualizing mug sizes. As shown here…

Way too big to be a mug.

I think this is almost ready to dry.

I bought more clay. So I can make more things.

The drawing is progressing.

I worked on the tree…

The ground is really all that’s left, unless I want to put more things in the sky.

I’m always staring at the blank spaces.

Close, but not there yet.

Maybe tonight? Probably not.

I’m fighting a cold; don’t feel well. Luckily get to spend all day today in a training. (lucky?)

Working on this.

and this…

And this is way too true…

OK. Me and cold meds going to school. Feeling yuck. Canceled stuff after school today preemptively. Have a lab I’m doing the next two days, so I can’t be out. Fun times.

Tiny Pieces…

My voice is still shot. I think it’s allergies…super dry here and I keep doing that dry tickle cough. Which sucks because I have to talk a lot at school today. Also I talked a lot this weekend. Some weekends I don’t talk hardly at all…this was not one of them.

Quilt Visions opened this weekend. I don’t have much time to write right now, but in general, it was fun, it was good, it was inspiring. Makes you wanna come home and make more art, yeah? I might need to put some of the pictures in the next post, just because I always try to link the artist’s website if I post their work, and I don’t have much time for that today.

Anyway, here’s me with mine at the opening…

And the artist talk on Saturday…thanks to whomever I stole this from.

And here’s all the artists…

Like I said, I’ll post some art with links probably Wednesday. But you can see the whole show here. Not that it makes up for seeing it in person, but I get it. Who would want to visit San Diego? Crazy. That guy in the pink shirt in the background of the photo? He’s the musician.

OK, got 4 minutes left. I drew a lot this weekend too…

Finished an arm, added to the head area, did the speech cloud.

Then added the visual disturbances and some barbed wire. Like you do. Someone said ‘omg the tiny pieces!’. Well fuck yeah! That’s why I’m here.

Anyway, I still need to deal with the tree (started drawing it yesterday) and the ground and the sky. But less of the tiny pieces and more of the bigger sweeping pieces. I think. What do I know? Monday night artist might feel differently. I do want this thing to span the next three months, so I think I’ve got that down.

Yes to that.

The brain scan (my actual brain) I used for the top part of the head.

And reading with Bowie.

He’s not very good at it.

More Visions stuff Wednesday. Right now I need to find my lunch, take meds (headache), and get to school to teach…something. I’m sure it’ll be obvious when I get there. Friday self is good at prepping for Monday morning self. She knows. Then ceramics after school and more drawing. Good times.

Positive Emotions

Yes Friday. Yes. My voice is giving out (oh wait, I have to talk at two artist events this weekend), I’m tired (this is nothing new…by Friday, I sleep through the Man coming to bed late and the multiple urges to pee and just SLEEP through the night. But because of exhaustion.). The boychild comes back today from 6 weeks of training. Simba will be so excited. I’ll probably miss seeing that, because I’ll be gone most of the day, but it makes me smile to think about it. Also because the barky dog will be off my bed for three whole nights before he leaves again. Not for 6 weeks this time…just like 10 days. My voice might get a rest today; we’ll see. Yesterday was a lot of notes and finishing a lab and a couple of kids who like to blame adults for their actions. Fun times. Some things about middle school never change. There’s always kids who drop papers on the floor and just leave them there, and those who yell out in class while you’re in the middle of instructions, and those who fall asleep multiple times a day in class. And I often wonder how they turn out in the end. The two boys I had to deal with are on the immature side of middle school, which still happens in 8th grade, unfortunately. Next year, I go back to 7th grade and it will be all over the place again. Might be a relief to be back in 7th. We’ll see. It’ll be different anyway. All the stuff I’ve spent time learning and preparing will have to go into mental storage for two years while I just teach 7th grade. Weird.

The drawing is going well. It feels good to draw. Something big. It’s been a while. OK, a few months. And someone just proposed a new show for one of my groups where I’d have to have a piece made by January…a relatively small one, but still, WTF, y’all need to plan ahead. Sigh.

ANYWAY, back to the positive emotions from drawing…

Wednesday night, I did the vine and the hands…and maybe the snake? Can’t remember. Last night, I drew for 2 hours because I had a Zoom call with friends…so I worked on the torso a bit…

I’d like to say that Bowie was helpful, but you know he wasn’t really. He wasn’t as bad as Luna used to be…she’d try to dive under the paper while I was drawing. Kitten would just lie on top of the whole thing and whack you if you tried to move her.

It’s hard to see in this photo, but I drew the brain scan (one of two) they did to try to find the source of my visual disturbance, which has been there since March. Annoying. I guess I’m more used to it than I was, but it still freaks me out when I’m trying to sleep. So it’ll be in this drawing too. Along with LGTBQIA rights, banned books, medical and reproductive rights, missiles piling down upon us, and who knows what else. Angel cat. Everyone should have an angel cat.

Tonight is the member opening at Visions. It’ll be crowded and overwhelming, which will be awesome after a long day at school…actually seeing the show and the artists is usually pretty cool. Tomorrow are the artist talks at 1 PM…those are my favorite. I get to hear what other people have to say about their work. Last year, I showed up late and didn’t realize I would have to talk about my work. Luckily I’m a teacher and that’s all we do…talk without a plan half the time. Luckily the stuff lives in my head for free. My piece, Nowhere Else to Go, is about climate change and climate migration…

This picture is missing all the little people running for their lives in the lower section.

A tornado in this one.

Not a hurricane. Plus fires. I live in California…wildfire country. Although lot of other places are becoming wildfire country that weren’t previously.

Lots of people displaced by our need for oil and drilling and coal and big SUVs.

We need to work on being proactive and not just reactive. Two hurricanes in the last month, so much destruction. I don’t have solutions…I just know what we’re doing, denying climate change, not trusting scientists, not thinking critically about how we live in the world and what it does the futures for our kids and their kids…that shit isn’t working.

Welcome to my TedTalk. Also donate money somewhere. I chose CERF+ to help the artists who have needs because of the hurricane damage.

OK. School. Assessment today. On friction. Hopefully they are focused and on task. Ha! It’s Friday. When is the full moon? It was last night (laughs hysterically). Figures. That explains a lot from this week. After school, coming home…no ceramics this weekend, I think. Ah well. The greater good of art, right? Although two things were supposed to come out of the kiln. I always assumed they blew up if I don’t see video on Instagram right away. Lots of Visions activities this weekend. Probably a little school stuff, although I’m sort of caught up…but Trimester 1 grades are due soon, so there’s that. My dad’s birthday is Sunday…he’ll be 84…so there’s that happening too. Busy. But with good stuff. Hopefully I’ll get to read my book a little bit? The things that sustain me…and draw! Eventually. That too.

Drawing at the End…

Hey. Wednesday. You never feel like far enough into the week to be a relief. Sorry. I know it’s not your fault. It’s the 5-day workweek thing. Lots of people think of you as hump day, and maybe that’s it…once I get over the hump that is you, it will feel like a slide (it’s never really a slide if you’re a teacher…unless it’s a slide like those cheese wheel races down huge hills where you’re just rolling head over heels trying to beat the wheel down the hill) into the weekend. This weekend is the Vision opening…so member opening Friday night, artist talks Saturday at 1 PM, then artist dinner at night. Lots of art things. Hopefully cool. We’ll see.

Not a lot of art happening…at least it looks that way. Monday night, I had to label and pack two quilts for a show up in Glendora that’s coming up. I won’t make it to that opening (it’s midday on a Wednesday? or something like that). I still need to pack up the Quilt National quilt…I was going to do that last night, but didn’t feel like it for the second day in a row. Ah well. I did do ceramics on Monday…picked up two fired pieces…

They look pretty good, yeah? Well there’s this…

It ran like crazy, stuck to the biscuit. It’s OK. I’m going to glue it back together and then put it outside. Maybe bury it in the ground even, just a bit. The boot turned out fine! All ceramics is a guess sometimes. I even wiped this up a good bit…but not enough. You learn some; you lose some.

Still doing this…

A peaceful couple of hours working on this…the orange ran like crazy, so I had to fix some stuff…not sure how to make the underglazes less runny once they are.

I’ll be here for another couple of hours before she’s done. And I bought more clay finally…gonna try a new one. I have ideas. I always have ideas.

Last night, I was supposed to go to the gym, but I ended up running late finishing stuff at school, then doing more work at home to try to catch up and maybe get ahead, and then I bathed the old lady cat. She’d gone to the vet because we thought she might have a UTI (accidentes), but it doesn’t look like she does. She hasn’t been cleaning herself well for a while, and I worry about stressing out old ladies with baths, but she needed it. She’s so much cleaner now. I even combed her a bit, which she likes…until she doesn’t. She’s still cranky as shit…and probably was the source of random poops all down the hallway last night (sigh)…but she’s still kicking. When I had finished making dinner (and next week’s lunches coincidentally), I just wanted to draw. I love drawing. I miss drawing more. I just can’t fit it in. Either I draw or I read and even that is a fight…always work is calling. And the house. So much stuff. Ugh.

So I drew.

There’s a rough pencil drawing of the body, just because it’s hard to get everything on there and semi-proportioned right…for some definition of right. Then I stare at it and decide what I want to add. I know what this piece is focused on (everything?), so I think about how that can be portrayed…you can’t see all the hands on her thigh from here. It’s still in pencil. Anyway, hopefully I’ll be communing with this most nights for the next week or so, trying to wiggle an image out of a tired brain. It’s where I love to be. And though there are other things that need to be worked on, for now, this is it.

Is 9 the average women’s shoe size? I do always feel like I am huge-footed. Maybe not? Seems wrong.

OK. School. I’m doing a lab that I’ve only done once and it was two years ago. I don’t remember HOW to do it. I’m sure it will be fine. Pretty sure I made a video. I have pilates after school. I’m tired already. I don’t have to cook tonight. I do probably have to grade things…or prep things. Last night, I recorded things, so there’s dogs barking, cats meowing, men coughing, and timers going off. Like normal. Then more drawing hopefully. Plus reading. I’ve been reading at lunch instead of hanging out with my team. They are stressing me out, I guess. Probably I need to check in up there. Plus I had to set up a lab yesterday during lunch. So that took time. Whatever. Drawing at the end.

Under Control…

OK. So my butt is wet. The cat did something on my chair. This is not a nice way to start Monday. Actually, I started with randomly low blood sugar. Always fun. The cat is old. I’m hoping it’s not…fuck…I’m pretty sure it’s pee. Sigh. She’s looking pretty irritated right now. Maybe because I’m accusing her of peeing herself. I guess I need to call the vet. Sigh. She’s old, it’s true, but that doesn’t mean I’m ready for her to be gone. She has been getting worse…unfortunately.

So artwise, I finished all the bugs. Except I need to repaint one for like the fourth time. I delivered 4 to Visions Museum on Saturday. The rest will hold for a bit (maybe?) and go on Etsy (maybe?). I took official photos of them; I’ll put them on the website later too. Here’s the last one though…

With the one that needs repainting in the background.

I finally started drawing the next big one…it’s been in my head for well over a month.

Not that you can see much, and the boobs might need redrawing based on this. I just get the general shapes with the pencil on something this big. I don’t usually use pencil on the smaller drawings. Here’s a pre-drawing for it…done in two restaurants before dinner came…

Not quite all there. But a vague idea of it. I drew this too, with no purpose…

On Friday, I did some underglazing…

This stuff takes forever…

But it’s relaxing…

Apparently two of my pieces came out of the glaze fire, but I couldn’t find them on Friday. Ugh. Maybe today.

I also finished the center panel of Homegrown…

So now I can piece all the houses around it and spend another year making the borders. It’s also relaxing, but in a different way.

My piece Stop the Murder Madness made it to Miami for the opening…

A fellow artist took a picture of it for me…

Her name is Eden Quispe and you should go look at her work because it’s amazing. And I appreciate her recommending this show to me in the first place and sending me photos as well.

I managed NOT to work most of the weekend (on school stuff), which I think is pretty healthy. We walked the dog on Saturday.

I also blew leaves off half the roof, terrified of being up there, trimmed a bunch of stuff, dumped plant matter in greenery trashcans, finally rehung the art in the hallway…

Drove to a sketch location and bought a recliner for my kid, who may or may not actually want it because he was in Pinnacles with no cell service. Long weekend. I finished a book! That was good. Wait, I actually finished two. So even better.

For some reason, all the animals were giving me judgy looks this weekend. Here’s Nova.

Bowie…

You already saw Kitten up at the top…and Simba…

Luna avoided me mostly, so I guess I didn’t wrong her too badly.

I’ll finish up with two new skull finds…

The one on the right is a new type…I don’t think I’ve seen it before? I’ll wait for nature to clean it up a bit. We get a lot of rats and mice…this is not the right shape for that. Wait and see.

OK, today is teaching speed and velocity…pretty easy stuff. Then a 2-hour staff meeting about literacy. I’ve been prewarned that the scientific content is factually incorrect (oh good), so I’m prepared to be irritated. Then to clay, to hopefully underglaze some more and find my two glazed pieces. Then back here to pack up three quilts for shipping. Fun times. And more drawing, hopefully…get those boobs under control. On the drawing. Those are the only ones I can control.

In Space…

Up early again. Legit reason today. Emergency kid meeting. I’ll volunteer for those, if it’s my student. Not a fan of getting up early if I don’t have to. That was yesterday. Lack of communication. There’s a lot of that. Yesterday was also a pre-fight…apparently I walked right into the middle of it without knowing who was about to fight. I still don’t know…I told the APs to go check the cameras. Hint to kidlets: don’t try to start a fight right in front of the damn cameras. Thank goodness we have them and they work. Thank goodness one of the APs answers when I call.

Today will be fine. Yesterday I worked with this one kid who fell off a second-story roof when he was 7 and was in a coma and shockingly now at 13 has learning issues. We’re trying to get him help. Dad says his brain is weak, but it’s not…it’s traumatized. And that might be the theme for my whole school sometimes. I saw him sitting yesterday, trying to do the independent practice, and just shivering at the table, so I sat with him and talked him through it…which meant the rest of the class kinda went to hell. Sigh. They’ll be better today. Or else? I can’t solve all these kids’ problems, but I sometimes can help. I have no help in that class and he’s not actually on an IEP to get help (YET)…I wish I could move some of these kids around so they were in a more supportive space without all the official paperwork. Sometimes we can…

ANYWAY. In amazeballs news, I’m still not done with the bugs. I painted more canvases on Wednesday night…after I sewed these two, there were two that needed touching up…

The wrist brace is a thumb thing…from too much tech…mouse plus holding phone and ipad plus IDK what. The embroidery doesn’t seem to bug it…I sewed these down with the brace on.

Last night, I did one with the brace on and two without.

And then repainted one that didn’t seem to be the right color. So there’s one left. That’s tonight, plus making labels for them. Then I’m delivering some to the Visions Museum of Textile Art, and IDK what with the rest. Etsy? Maybe.

The opening of We Got the Power is tonight…I finally found the invites everyone was posting…

I still haven’t seen it in the gallery…they’ve been posting pictures but not of the whole thing.

I’m just glad it made it there.

So I’m about to start something new! And big. This little stuff drives me nuts. The Man was trying to figure out how many bugs I’d have to make a week to make up for my salary…and it’s not how many I’d have to MAKE…I’d have to sell like 300 of them a week. And that’s so not happening. Every time I make a little batch of quilts like this (I’ve done birds and cats before), I realize about halfway through that I don’t like doing it. I like to make big things. I like to make things that matter. It’s not that they aren’t cute or cool (they are cute…for bugs)…it’s just not why I make art. And when I retire from teaching, I don’t want to spend more time doing that…making little things that might sell but take up all the time. I want to experiment, explore, make different things, like I’m trying to do with the clay. AND make the big beautiful quilts I really enjoy making. All that.

Anyway.

It’s gonna be a while. And I don’t like chocolate.

Today. Today I will finish the last bug. I will watch that kid I helped yesterday completely fail the quiz because no matter how much I tried to help him, his brain doesn’t get it, and that’s not his fault. And I hope we can get him more help. Same with the emergency meeting this morning. I just want them to get help, and I can’t always do that for them. Which sucks. I’m also going to ceramics (hopefully the hand will play along and be OK with that). And I’m going to read my book, maybe finish it. And label the bugs. And finish designing the academic assignment in space. The assignment is set in space…I don’t have to be in space (unfortunately) to do it. That might be fun too. It is Friday. That’s a thing.