There Needs to Be Balance.

When the texts came in at 11:30 PM and continued at 6:30 AM and somewhere in there, your new diabetes sensor decided your blood sugar was low even though it really wasn’t because it takes it a while sometimes to behave appropriately (much like oh so many people I can think of at the moment), so it kept buzzing until you put it on the floor, and then you know you have a difficult meeting in the morning, and one of those texts told you something that explains a lot of the bullshit at school and now you’re PISSED, ffs, why why why. Well it’s not the best way to start a Friday. But it IS a Friday. My weekend is too full and I have feels about the No Kings protest and I’m in a place in my head where protest is legit and so is self care and promises I made to people and I’m trying to do all of the things and probably semi-failing at quite a few of them. So I’m processing all that and potentially editing the weekend to-do list to manage that.

How can I be the best American this weekend? Still working on that.

I’ve been tracing every night…well for the last three. Big time.

Not. I’m still in the 100s, although I’ve traced some of the 200s. Probably a mistake that. Might end up with an extra traced bug somewhere. But the bug parts are small and it’s easier if I trace them and cut them all in one space so they don’t get lost. Makes sense to me anyway. And the big pieces of water are a pain to trace. I remember now from the last bathtub quilts. I like how it looks but it’s a pain to make.

Ah yes, so if you don’t know, I think this is the fourth bathtub quilt, definitely a series. It’s actually the 6th drawn bathtub. I was looking at Frida Kahlo’s bathtub painting and then George Bush Jr did one and I don’t know, it hit me as a way to document a life. Or in the case of this quilt, a life and an unalive. All four bathtub quilts will be at the Virginia Quilt Museum January through March, along with a few others. I will be there the last weekend in March too, along with the other artist in the show, Lena Meszaros. Should be interesting.

Yesterday, I underglazed the tree, which miraculously did not break again.

It took an hour.

Which is crazy. This is going on top of the head that hasn’t been glazed yet. I also signed up for a handbuilding/slab sculpture class in November. It looked interesting and I need more tips on building stuff. I always feel like I’m doing it by the seat of my pants…because I am.

Um I should probably send this to someone in particular. But it’s true! We need to vent. Especially if your job is a whirlwind of crazy all day. Because that shit festers.

Our trees were trimmed this week and the guys somehow broke like 6 pots and full on disappeared some with plants and I’m upset but I get it. I moved the ones I thought they’d hit and they full on hit others instead. So I’m also sad. It’s OK; the tree guy is paying to replace pots but there was this adorable little succulent that had just bloomed and it’s just gone and I’m sad about it. I’m also sad about my kitty being gone, even though it’s been two months. Bowie keeps coming in here looking for her, and I’m like SAME dude, I keep looking for her too.

Oh my. So sucky meeting in the morning, teaching net force all day with a simulation; let’s see if the day chaos can NOT. Then errands woo hoo love errands ugh no I do not. Then dinner and grading and tracing and deciding what I can deal with this weekend. There are things I WANT to do and things I NEED to do and things I HAVE to do and there needs to be a balance. And I don’t know what it is right now. Peace and love to the protestors and the marches across the country. Because this shit is crazy and needs to stop and yes, it’s easy to say that and as always, I struggle with the how to make the crazy shit stop and/or make sense (that’s not happening). We need a Day of Remembrance for our democracy, for empathy, for American values, because this ain’t it.

Today the Oatmeal Exploded.

Monday was burning oatmeal. Today was exploding oatmeal, all over the side of the bowl, where it will stick like concrete. Fun times. And yesterday kinda felt like that. Or maybe Monday. Or both. The workload is a challenge. Too many parts to it. I’m pretty sure I was supposed to have some literacy thing done by the 27th but they haven’t provided a calendar for it, so it’s just not gonna happen. Or they’ll tell us on the 20th that it has to be done by the 27th (‘it’ being something where you schedule admin to come watch you do it), and that’ll be the end of me.

Teaching-wise, the content is fine, the kids are OK (except for the dingbat who couldn’t shut up yesterday about all the reasons she didn’t want to sit where she was put). I just can’t get far enough ahead to not feel like I can’t breathe. Might be a me problem.

Monday, I made it to ceramics, where both pieces were out of the bisque fire. I tentatively put them together (it’s a little wobbly, hence my hand)…

I go back and forth about what to do next. I know these colors won’t survive a glaze fire, so the plan is to iron oxide, darken it all up in the crevices, and then use a satin matte glaze on some areas for color. Or all areas. I don’t know.

The only crack in the upper torso is where that finger attaches to the breast. And the crack in the bottom piece got smaller in the second bisque firing.

I fixed this, which will hopefully go on top of the head. Scary to get to the point where I have to put it all together.

Not sure where to store all the parts at the moment. I don’t have enough shelf space for any of it at the moment. I could move the head out, but there probably still wouldn’t be enough room for more than the base. I’m hoping to go Thursday to underglaze the tree and maybe put the head in the bisque fire.

Meanwhile, at home, I finished drawing the big piece…added that target and a few other things.

Numbered it Monday and Tuesday night…it’s a little over a thousand pieces. Not bad for trying to keep it simple (ha!).

And then last night, I started tracing…

I didn’t get far. But that’s OK. I’ve got fewer meetings at night this week. Should help. Although I’m trying to catch up on grading still. Always.

We got a chunk of rain yesterday…my app had been saying 0.04″ so I wasn’t really prepared for being sopping wet after school…just walking to the car.

And at home, checking all the new gutters (one had an issue) and digging a trench…in the rain. Fun times. Then pajamas on and finally finishing the book I had left in the morning, under duress.

So many uses for this.

I stayed late at school yesterday to document all the behaviors from the beginning of the month on our digital system and to call two parents, one of which didn’t answer and his voicemail was full, so I texted, used our parent communication app, and sent it to the translator, so there’s no question of their understanding the issue. The other one tried to say “you know he’s ADHD” as an excuse. Ah ma’am…I raised one of those, and you better stop enabling that shit right now. I always counter with, oh yeah, I raised one of those.

I love Gemma Correll’s drawings…

And they feel very real at the moment.

Especially that…I’m thinking of some specific buildings. Empty of humans of course.

I feel like I post this every year. And it’s true every year.

OK, trees are being trimmed today (stress!) plus I think I have to come up with something for the kids to do for the last half of the period, because I’m ahead of my co-teacher. Or not. Just have them finish their cover pages. There we go. Simple. Then pilates and grading and tracing. And reading. All good.

Earth Is in Retrograde

OK, maybe just the US. Maybe the rest of you are okey dokey. If so, send snacks…and help.

I don ‘t feel ready for the day. It’s too early. There are too many meetings. I wrote 7 emails in Spanish yesterday. I talked to a kid using Google Translate. Imma do that today with another kid, if she actually shows up. Sigh. When I care more about a kid promoting to high school than their parents do…then I know their parents have way more on their plates than I do, and that’s saying something. School is a challenge. It’s always a challenge. It’s hard because we’re redoing a unit for the fourth time (for me), and we’re using ChatGPT, but (1) it uses natural resources, which bugs me, and (2) it’s not particularly smart or helpful sometimes.

Sigh. I know it. And I guess I’m not using it to write this (as if you couldn’t tell…I ramble worse than a baby lamb). My school district is really pushing it. At some point, maybe with a different government in place, there will be limits…but not for a while. Not until the damage is done.

Time is difficult too. I had a meeting before and after school yesterday, and before I went to the afterschool one, I drove out into this…

Which could have been way worse (I was on the freeway that isn’t all yellow and red). And after that, I went to an opening at Hyde Gallery, which was cool. More about that later this week. Pro: the quilt is being photographed and I did the other things. I even came back (and collapsed for about 30 minutes) and got work done. I sort of set up a worksheet I need for next Tuesday (sheesh) and then started grading stuff. Always behind on that. Significantly so at the moment. That said, building roller coasters has been relatively good, except for some minor stupidity (ah, middle-school boys…operating without a frontal lobe). I got a little grading done even, which rarely happens (and won’t today, I suspect).

Ceramics update: I went on Monday, despite the two-hour staff meeting before it, and amazingly, the woman in charge was there and all the kilns were empty, and the upper torso had NOTHING BROKEN (OMG, this never happens), so it must have been fate, so we loaded it in.

I also refired the base because it needed some refinement on the underglazes. Understand that it’s probably $75 of firing fees right there, but I don’t feel bad, because I haven’t fired anything since like March. I’ve been working on the upper torso since fucking January 8. It’s about time I fired the fucker. And it survived! IDK if there are cracks, but it came out of the kiln last night; I saw it in the video. So I might go see it tonight. Maybe. Then I have to make decisions about glazing it. I’m conflicted on that. So many of the underglazes go super dark, so I’d have to put something on them. But I might want to do some iron oxide as well? Not sure. Might have to sit on that decision for a while.

Meanwhile, the head is done and drying…

And in photos…

In case your video is annoying.

I did go a little weird on the head. And yes, I had to make a base and will fire it in the base. And then throw the base away. It’s OK; it’s reclaimed clay.

And then I worked on the very top bit, the tree on the top…

I wrapped it up with like 20 paper towels, hoping it would hold up as it dried, and not dry too fast.

Pain in the ass. Seriously. Why do I build this crazy shit? So this comes out the top of the head. Wish me luck.

In between that and packing up two quilts for the photographer, and driving all over town, I managed to tape two big pieces of paper together on Monday night and start drawing last night. The taping and drawing was complicated by this standoff.

Bowie wanted to play and Nova decidedly did not. But eventually they left, and I started with one of the campfire sketches (I’m changing it a bit as I go)…

There’s a little pencil on there, just to make sure stuff isn’t a stupid size. I can’t make it too complicated or I won’t be able to finish it in time. Bathtubs (yes, there will be more than one) and politics. Perfect mix. I’ll be doing this for a while. Hopefully not more than a week, but you never know.

From the book I just finished…which was eh.

But I liked some of her sentences. Like that one.

This is probably relevant to my quilts…because people sometimes say that to me about my work.

Make the world a better place and I’ll make prettier quilts. Also this…Goodall didn’t mention me at all. And I’m OK with that.

So the barn owl is still here, shitting all over the entryway steps and shrieking occasionally. I accept that as part of the wonder of having barn owls. I also accept the dead gopher they dropped in the driveway. But now we have romantic Great Horned owls…this is one of the males.

Horrible picture, at night, with a flashlight aimed at its horny self.

Not that the video is any better. At least they’re quieter than baby barn owls. But the female…holy crap, the most scary noise you’ve heard. I don’t have video of that. So there are two males and the one female, and the other night, they would not shut the fuck up. IDK how gentle hoots can keep me awake, but I guess it says something about me.

Last meme…

I blame my feeligs on the US actually. Well, and Russia and Israel and a few others. And billionaires. And people with no empathy. So there’s that. Earth does seem to be in retrograde though.

Meeting this morning, another after school. Last day to build roller coasters, so lots of yelling and ‘get on with it’ and recording videos of successful runs. Then two days to shut up and get the rest of it done. Ha! While I try to catch up on grading AND plan the next unit with my coteacher. Fun times. Long day. No pilates; couldn’t get into the class. Sigh. Ah well. Maybe on the weekend. Things my body appreciates…exercise, reading, peace and quiet, nature. Some of that.

Another Hole in My Finger…

No matter what I do, I’m always sitting on the couch on Sunday night, wondering why I didn’t get more done over the weekend. Like I shouldn’t have gone to ceramics yesterday, despite not being able to get there all week, because I should have graded more. I should have finished that one assignment (I have a class and a half left to grade…at least an hour, probably closer to two). I should have finished grading the homework from two weeks ago (I have two classes left, maybe three? Can’t remember). I’m two weeks behind in grading advisory assignments. Ah well. And I’m going camping this coming weekend, so I won’t be grading then. Unless I can get the Man to drive (then I might get sick…hmmm) so I can grade homework on the way up. Meanwhile, I’m trying to not waste my ceramics studio membership by not going, I haven’t made it to the gym in weeks, and I have a quilt I’m trying to finish so I can start the one that has to be done by mid-December. Minor panic. I did manage to pick a binding from the three and get it sewn on…

Although Friday night, all I did was trim it. It was all I could handle. I graded a lot Friday night. On Saturday, I had more mental energy…so I got the binding sewn on and pinned down, and found a cat to sit on it.

Thank you, Nova. Then last night, I started the stitching and ritual poking a hole in my finger until I give in and find the sticky thimble things.

So I’ll be here a few more nights, then contact the photographer, and start the next one, which has been simmering on the Art Brain stove for a few weeks.

Ceramics has been frustrating lately; I can’t get there (I don’t have the energy or the time) and then when I get there, someone has bumped the big piece shoving stuff next to it, and it’s broken again. This is the head, though…and it’s almost underglazed…

Still some work to do on the hair…

And I think I did the teeth too? Maybe? I can’t remember when I took the photo. The mid-torso piece is hopefully ready to bisque fire, but that takes coordination with the person in charge of the kilns, and I haven’t been able to show up during her work time for weeks. I could just text her, I guess. I’m hesitant to commit to putting it into the kiln. I’m afraid it’s all going to fall apart, honestly, and if it does, I’m gluing it all together. There is a piece that goes on top of this, and the base needs to be bisque fired again, so there’s a lot going on…I just haven’t been able to get there enough.

When we go out on Saturdays, I draw until they bring us the food. I don’t always get much time (some places are super fast).

But it helps my drawing hand remember the things.

And sometimes people comment…this one got some random guy telling me it was good. Thanks random guy.

This one was two restaurants, two date nights.

The first one served way too fast.

This one too.

But it seemed mostly finished.

And yet, here is what I get from students…

I could just about read his writing. There were a couple that I really couldn’t read. This is the con to putting stuff on paper. The pro is that they can’t copy and paste from Google. The con is my brain explodes. This is what I didn’t finish. It’s not hard to grade, really…just time-consuming. What is that, you say? A person falling out of a moving car. If you stare at it long enough, you might see it. I only know that because the horrendously mostly illegible writing to the right explained it.

So more of that.

While I was grading, I was watching stuff, as you do…and this amused me. ALMOST?

So you have 26 pairs? Or you have part of a pair? Also, yeah, so do I, at least.

This after a conversation on Thursday with two staff members who admitted to originally being afraid of me.

It’s OK. This was found on Saturday’s hike before dinner…

Also the sun is going down earlier. I forgot that would happen.

Same cat (Nova) on another quilt.

It must be fall, the cat-sitting-on-quilt season.

This after the Man went out with man friends. Although they did actually ask some questions this time.

I ask stuff when he gets back, and he’s like, “We didn’t talk about that” over and over again until I’m like, WTF did you talk about?! I’m not invited anymore (it’s all just guy stuff, no gaming mostly), and I just wanna know how everyone is doing. And I can’t ask them.

Let’s finish up with my favorite disappeared female aviator…

Go Amelia!

OK. It’s a short week because our school board has set these idiotic 3-day weekends (the next one isn’t even a 3-day…it’s entirely stupid) because they say parents want them. It’s true that a bunch of our kids are absent on Fridays or Mondays…but it makes it harder to teach. I’ll take this one though…we’re going camping up in the local mountains. It’s a full week though…three Zoom calls at night (none are work-related), plus at least three meetings? Four? Not sure. I give up on keeping track. Teaching something today…ah, reviewing potential and kinetic energy for roller coasters, which they’ll start designing on Thursday. Fun times. Then two meetings or three, not sure (principal says one thing then says something different in the weekly email that comes whenever he feels like it…I miss the principal that scheduled them for the same time every week). Then I’m either going to ceramics or coming home and grading, because I have book club tonight. Good book for that one. And then stitching a hole in my finger. NO! Finding the sticky thimble pad, so I DON’T stitch a hole in my finger. That’s the plan.

Iterations.

Tuesdays have gotten so much harder lately. Not sure why. I feel like I’ve run a marathon in only two days of work, and then there’s a slow slide into the weekend. Sometimes that slide upends me into a pile of steaming compost before the weekend, but it feels like the hump, getting over that, is now Tuesday. I mean, the work doesn’t stop after Tuesday? There just seems to be an inordinate amount of it in the first two days…well, include Sunday, because I work then too. Maybe that’s why? Nah, I’ve always had to do that…well, always in the last 5 or 6 years? I didn’t always have to put in so much weekend time. Not sure why. So far, I haven’t managed to grade anything in class. Like the kids won’t chill out enough to allow it. That will hopefully change today. We’ll see. Some groups do well, some are incredibly needy (some for good reasons, lack of English skills and all), and some can’t stay on task to save their lives. I’m looking forward to October, when things seem to chill out a bit (weather and school)…but it’s still an awfully long way away.

The stitchdown is coming along slowly. I’m not getting a full hour at night…I’m coming home later and eating dinner later and then it’s 10 PM and I know I have to go to bed around 10:30. So I made it up to the sun and planets last night, and that’s all that’s left. I should be able to get that done tonight, but I have a union meeting after school and pilates late, so maybe not. Trying to fit in all the things I want to do with all the things I have to do and then the things I should do…ugh. But here’s Monday night’s stitching…

I got through one arm and most of the left side of the torso. I don’t remember where I was before that though. Last night, I finished the torso and the head and the hair, the hands on top of her head, and the barn owl…

And I found this in my yard…

There’s two great horned owls nearby, but I still hear the nightly screech of one of the barn owls, plus the occasional feather. Nice that they’re hanging around. They can all have the rats and gophers. Please.

This piece, Portrait of One Self, got into Quilts=Art=Quilts, so I’ll be shipping her later this month.

She’s got a lot going on too, much like me. Not often you see a fox sleeping with missiles. Or bunnies on body bags. Kitten is in there too…apparently I knew she was near the end, because she’s got angel wings. I miss her lots still. The Man says I can borrow his cats, and sometimes I am a good substitute for them, but mostly, they choose their daddy (of course). So I miss the kitty time. I don’t have the time or energy for a new kitty right now, though; the two dogs are enough. Katie is here! My parents’ dog has been visiting for over a week. She’s pretty chill these days, as long as you give her what she wants. She misses her people too, I’m sure. They’ll be back Sunday.

I have been having a hard time finding the time and energy to make it to ceramics, which sucks, because it’s very meditative when I’m there. I mean, the piece that needs to go in the kiln stresses me out, because I’m not even sure I can lift in into the kiln without breaking it…but the freeform head piece has been loads of fun.

I just keep adding weird shit to it. I actually need to go in when the owner is there so I can put the base back in the bisque fire and then try to get the torso in as well. Then I can just focus on the head, which is now going to have a tree coming out of it? I don’t know how that’s going to work. Shhh.

It was great being there yesterday…one other woman was there who I see on a regular basis, and about three other people just stopped by to drop off or pick stuff up, and then it was just me. Unfortunately, I only had about 90 minutes and then needed to pick up mail at my parents and then go home and cook dinner and do schoolwork and eventually get to stitch stuff down. Busy fucking days. I feel like I wake up running and don’t stop until late at night. And then the CGM has been off again. I’m wondering if my body is fighting this one even longer before it settles, and if that is the new thing. The numbers are still completely off and the alarm kept going off last night but it was like 50 points off. And I don’t have time to call them and go through all the phone call shit again today. Ugh. Why can’t things just work? Why does my body need to make it so fucking difficult. This thing has been really helpful for keeping my blood sugar in the right place. I’d really like it to keep working.

Sweet boy. Needs attention. I reread the same page like 5 times while he kept flipping around and smiling at me. Dork.

This is too true. Also, I think the Man is the caterpillar in Alice. At least right now. Maybe he’ll be the White Knight later on.

OK. Teaching energy while lacking it. Actually transformations today, which is different than transfer. Gotta make that distinction today as well. Then they get an INDEPENDENT assignment, for some definition of independent, right? Then union meeting and pilates and dinner and schoolwork and stitching, then sleep. Repeat some iteration of that. Ugh. September. Double ugh.

Hot and Ironing…

There is a delightful breeze coming through the window of my office right now, unlike the last three nights, when it has been hot as fucking hell in here and I remember again why I consider putting a room air conditioner in here every year around this time. And it was only in the 90s yesterday…last year, it hit 109 degrees during September (knock on wood; it’s only September 1, so it’s still possible). This room holds heat like crazy and the sliding glass door is a combo of unusable and unreachable, which is silly. Need to remodel this room with A/C and a slider on a remote. I guess one or the other. It does cool down at night…outside…but not in here. Bad design and/or no insulation in the walls. Certainly we didn’t see any when we did all the fixes to the rain damage. Houses built in the 1970s…they still didn’t build them well. So enjoy the breeze (and the day off of work!) because it’ll be gone and/or hot as hell in a few hours.

So it’s really hard to iron when it’s hot, y’all. I don’t even try until 8 PM and then I sit in here and sweat anyway because the fan can only be pointed below the level of the ironing board, or I’d have pieces flying everywhere. Plus the iron is putting off heat in a room that is already warm. Just since I started writing this, the room temperature has gone up 2 degrees. Anyway, on Friday, I came home after ceramics and ironed for 3 hours.

I was working on all the body pieces and the stuff around or attached to the main figure.

When I went to bed, I was missing some hair pieces, but I found them in the trash bin (which is why I don’t throw that out until the quilt is finished). Then Saturday night, I did the head and some other stuff around it.

I did an explosion and one of the Starlink things and part of the swamp. Here’s a better view of the head…

So many of Musk’s things blow up. All the pencil cups and the stapler and tape are there to keep the weight of the fabric from pulling the teflon sheets onto the ground. As it gets heavier with more pieces, this gets to be a harder balance and I need more weights.

Last night, I worked on the swamp and got all the base parts done; just the trees are left on that.

There’s some embroidery of the police/ICE badges to go on later. This puts me in the 1000s, so about 300 pieces left to go. Two or three nights? We’ll see. I mean, I could finish it today if it weren’t supposed to be 95 degrees in here and I didn’t have a thousand other things to do. Next up? Input grades. I think I finished most of the school stuff yesterday though. Besides inputting them. Oh wait, and advisory. Fuck. Forgot about that. Ugh. I have not fully found my routine yet. It takes me about 6 weeks usually. And Friday was super stressful for trying to get all the things done. This week is back-to-school night, plus two morning meetings, plus 7 new kids (ugh) and 3 kids moving classes and whoa…just found the fly yesterday that was buzzing everyone in the house. Either it died or Bowie killed it and didn’t eat it. Mmmm. Dead fly.

I need to try to get to ceramics today (oh my, it’ll be warm)…I got things attached and underglazed and felt really positive about this project that is more than a little stressful at the moment.

Not even sure how I’m going to get it in the kiln without breaking it…again. Ah well. Hope survives. I need to underglaze the flesh, fix more cracks, and fix the one piece of the flag that keeps popping off, which is better than the entire flag popping off, which is what happened last week. So frustrated with this right now. Remind me to do some smaller, less complicated things next. Really. OK, still need to finish the head. Ha!

I crazily hiked on Saturday, by myself, at like 5:15 PM (still 90 degrees, I think, but there was a breeze).

Three miles. Then I can eat things that might kick my blood sugar up…because they are less likely to have that jump. Well, they should be, but I ate too many fries and blew that. Ah well. Still working on it. Definitely more under control than it was three months ago, but the blood sugar still crashes kind of randomly at times, like last night. No reason. Definitely think my Saturday night glass of wine does it, but I didn’t have any last night and was still awakened at 4:30 in the morning with a low. Ugh. Sometimes if I get up (to pee and check my blood sugar with a finger prick), it’ll pop back up, like it thinks I’m getting up (no fucking way I’m getting up at 4:30 AM; you’d think my body would know that), but then it crashed again an hour later. Fuck me. I’m sure eating skittles at 5:30 AM is not a good life choice, but I don’t have another solution at the moment. And when I asked the diabetes nurse about it, she didn’t either. She wanted me to get up and have a real snack, and I’m like, no, not doing that unless it’s really bad and continuing to crash. I’m TIRED. I work during the day…with KIDS. I need a full night’s sleep. And I already reduced my insulin…so if it happens again this week, I’ll reduce it again. Supposed to be contacting doctor about that stuff, but I haven’t yet…maybe this time.

So the baby owl finally got chased off by mom…well, or did she? She has finally stopped hungry squawking though…but the other night, I hear noises on the slope and then a screech, so I look out there and two owls are in the tree outside my office window.

The lower one is looking up at the other one…and is smaller. Might be baby? This was the same night but I think that’s one of the parents, probably mom.

They were staring intently down on the slope, where this opossum was digging around…

I’m totally OK with the owls prowling the slope. I’ve got gophers and they’re tearing it up. Annoyingly.

I mentioned it was hot, yeah?

Cat evidence of temperatures.

And there’s this…

Also, let’s talk about how many of them are white men. But sure, y’all will pick on the one thing you think made them do it. We could just take the guns away from the mentally ill (well, honestly, mostly everybody), and that might help.

OK. I don’t have to work today! Well, I do, but not all day in a classroom. This is a short but painful week; I will be mostly dead by Friday. Good times! It will also be cooler by Friday, which will help. It’s September! A fun month for school…where things change daily for no apparent reason sometimes. Also we think our A/C at school might be out. They’ll have to fix it quickly because there’s a new state law about maximum temperatures in classrooms. But the rest of the day, I can read, iron, plant things (I did some of that already), anything I can stand in the heat. Working on a wool quilt has been out (ha!). I keep thinking I’ll start the embroidery on the border flowers on Homegrown, but I’d have to have the whole quilt on my lap, so that is not happening. I’ll just keep sewing little things down on blocks I can hold in one hand. I have a huge to-do list in my bullet journal, but I won’t get most of it done; let’s be real. It is nice to have a day off…thank you unions! And no, I didn’t make it to the protest march today because I didn’t know about it until too late, but yes! Protest the bullshit! Also the Zoom yesterday…I’m so glad that the closing ceremonies for my dual show at the Virginia Quilt Museum will be during Spring Break, so I’m planning on going out there and meeting my co-exhibitor, Lena Meszaros. Should be an awesome show, opening in January…come see us in the last week of March!

You’d Be Wrong…

At some point in the week, I’m tired enough to sleep even with the heat, the panting dog, and the squawking baby owl, not to mention the overactive brain. Last night was that. Only two days in. Hmmm. I also spent over three hours on art yesterday, which was delightful. I’m sure I’ll pay for it later with stuff I have to plan and grade. Actually, totally yes, because we start a new unit next week and it’s not really planned at all. Minor issue. Panic much? Yeah maybe…like right now. But sure, otherwise, besides the blood sugar crashes in the middle of the night, I’m doing fine (adjusted meds; hoping that solves it). For some definition of fine.

The ironing is going very slowly because crazy art brain drew some tiny shit in this piece…this group of five people for example is 5×8″.

Pretty much ironing them took an hour. I also got them ironed down to the background in that hour though.

I also put the stars on the flag and did the volcanic bit on the right. But mostly those tiny people.

You know I put the Vax guy in there because of RFK and the measles vax, but now it looks like they want to pull the COVID vax? These people are idiots. You’d think after the Black Plague and the health disaster that was the Middle Ages that we’d have learned that science knows shit that brain worms and dementia patients do not. You’d be wrong.

Here’s last night…looks pretty damn similar.

In over an hour, I did the arm behind the people on the right, which was fussy as hell, plus started the graveyard on the left…also fussy due to all the letters, which aren’t matched up, because a lot of them separated from the paper, and then some are missing, who the fuck knows where they are. I think we’ll move the living room couch some day and find a pile of fused pieces that belong to 50 different quilts.

SLOW as molasses on a cold day. I’m in the 400s, but barely. The graveyard is at least one more night, maybe two. Then the Statue of Liberty being stillborn. Then the swamp. I love this stuff; don’t get me wrong. I love putting all these little pieces together and ironing them down and making a picture. This is bliss.

I also went to ceramics yesterday. Still fighting the torso, trying to get it to stay together. But also I gave the head some teeth and carved the ears.

I want to build a tree off the top but I kind of need to get the rest of the stuff out of the way and fired to do that. It might need to be a separate piece. It’ll be so damn fragile. I need to think that through. I think I could just make weird heads from here on out. Maybe.

From the book I’m reading, Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Canas.

It’s an interesting story, although so far less about the vampires and more about the ‘Yanquis’ taking Mexican territory in the southwestern US (formerly Mexico). Which is an enlightening view, considering current politics. I loved how that sentence was written.

Oh my, I currently have so many books out from the library and so little time in which to read them. Sigh. I’m working on it.

OK. Today, we are in the middle of diagnostic testing in reading and math, which sucks, because the kids hate it and it takes too long. So that’s how we’re starting every day. Then I am giving a short quiz about AI and when you can use it in the classroom (meeting that problem head on this year so it’s not a surprise for kids when they get a zero), plus trying to get them to consider planning as a skill. Fun times with that. Next week, we start actual science, which will be a relief. Maybe. There are definitely some bad behaviors they learned last year that will have to be ripped out of them, but in general, they’re a decent batch of kids. A few I’d like to leave on Survivor Island, but that is always the case. Then pilates after school and ironing after dinner. I need to grade stuff in there somewhere, plus finish the vocab slides, plus plan for next week. Somehow. I might be missing that part of my brain. Gonna go look for it.

Totally Forgot…

Hmmm…there’s nothing like waking up on a Monday morning, getting ready for school, sitting down to the computer, and realizing there was something you were supposed to do over the weekend and you totally forgot about it. Oh yeah. I totally remember how school feels. Like that. Like this morning. Damn. It’ll be fine. Really. It will. There’s always tonight. Sigh. Even yesterday, I knew I had work, some work, and normally I would have done it in the afternoon, but I didn’t feel like succumbing to school on the weekend yet, so I didn’t do it until 8:30 PM. Not the best plan. Oh well. It’s done now. I will go write this other thing on the to-do list (which I made Friday and did not look at all weekend). Also, there’s nothing like food prepping a variety of breakfasts to get you through the next two months, and not wanting any of them when you get up in the morning. Score! Fun times.

OK, first full week of school with kids. Always a challenge. I think I mostly prepped today’s activity on Friday, which is good, because Advisory is only 6 minutes and I have to be on duty at 8:30 and I’m rolling late already. On Friday, I was amazing! I made it halfway to school before I remembered I hadn’t taken my insulin. OMG, yes, I had to turn around and drive back, so I didn’t have the day prepped, and first period suffered. I too suffered. I’m going to take my insulin right now. I used to take it at night and it was much easier to remember, for some reason. Morning brain foggy? Sure. That’s probably it.

I am still chugging along on the trimming…closer to done. Here’s Friday night, when we were going to go out to see a band, and that totally didn’t happen…

I can see some of the main figure pieces in there. Saturday night, I cut some more…

Saturday, we vacuumed the whole house, washed all the cat bedding, and I got the special pleasure of washing all the cats. Fleas. Ugh. The meds the Man was using were totally not effective. More meds are coming, but blech. It was a lot of work. So I’m glad Nova still loved me enough to sit with me. She made the most amazing yowling sounds during her bath. I think I started cutting out the flag there.

Sunday night, I’m definitely in all the little people and the gravestones.

And some veins and stuff from the main figure. I can see the bottom of the box, but I still think I’m two or three days away from done. I have almost 12 hours in at this point.

I went to ceramics on Sunday afternoon (hence part of the work chaos)…I need to get this part of the torso in the kiln, so I need it to stop breaking. Fuck me. Here’s me with everything laid out to reattach and reglaze.

Luckily, there was only one other person in there. She was spread out even more than I was. I have over 75 hours into this piece. Crazy. That’s the head in the front, under the plastic. I’m hoping to work on it today. But also to finish fixing things. I think there’s only one unattached thing right now (knock on wood), but some glazing needs to happen. Depends on how crowded it is. Hard to do with a lot of people around.

I did a little stitching down of things on Friday…with Nova’s droolio help.

I am really hoping to get these all stitched down soon. Too many other things to do. I delivered two quilts for a show up in Newport Beach on Sunday…the show opens September 12, but I can’t get there for the opening (it’s a Friday night…can we talk traffic?). So I cleaned those up, put a label on one, cut slats, packed them up, etc.

I hiked 3+ miles on Saturday…trying to make sure my blood sugar stays down for date night! And they moved the trail…

I hadn’t been here for a while and the entire middle section of the trail moved…not a little bit, but a lot. Weird. Maybe there was a sensitive environment over by the river that they were trying to protect? I could probably figure that out eventually.

This crazy ass caterpillar was in my yard this morning…it’s apparently a Rustic Sphinx moth…

Or it will be, if a bird doesn’t get it. It does seem like it’s ready to cocoon itself. Massive.

OK. School. I’m already getting texts this morning. Fun times. Teaching safety today. Then going to ceramics, then doing the work thing I forgot to do this weekend. I took pictures of all the kids and I need to put names on them. Ugh. It’s fine. I do it every year. It’s just time-consuming. Useful though. Helps me learn names and faces. Time to go. Get out of here. Go to school. No really, go.

Remember Your Why!

Heyo. It’s halfway through…well, there’s one more prep day and then kids. That’s the hard part, although the first few days aren’t too bad…just a lot of talking. I could do without that. My voice could also do without it. I’ve actually enjoyed the last day and a bit in my classroom, because for the first year in a long time, I’m not panicking. I’m not unpacking everything out of a locked cabinet because they used my room over the summer, and I don’t have a lot of newbies to deal with, so I’m doing things that have waited for years. I moved some stuff in my room to be more logical. I put together a shelf thing I brought from home two years ago. I actually looked at the bulletin boards I never finished for 8th grade (I only looked at them; it’s OK). It’s been pretty chill. Hopefully that bodes well for the new year. Today I have a meeting and I need to copy stuff (the copier is not so chill, but that is always the case), but otherwise, I’m going to pilates. Yesterday I went to ceramics. Almost like a normal person. They let us sign up for afterschool duty for the first time ever, and I got an easy one. I never get an easy one…I’m always walking a long way because my classroom is closest to the front of the school, so I get the crappy duties, while other people waft through the easy ones for years. I get the same ones over and over again. But this year, I picked the easy one. I chose. I know, it’s silly, but let someone else do the light or the crosswalk or the bike rack. It’s time. I’m sure next year, I’ll get assigned something else, but the new principal wants to do things this way and I’m going with the flow. There are some things where I’m not going with the flow, in typical Kathy fashion. But whatever. I do my job and I do it pretty well most of the time. And when I don’t, it’s because I’m tired and burnt out. So yeah. Aiming away from that feeling this year.

Artwise, I haven’t had a ton of time each evening. Things like cooking and dishes…not so fun, but have to be done, ya know? And less time at home affects that. Always, it’s a bit of a shock to go back to the long days, although we are still in that sweet spot when I can come home and NOT work (well, I did on Monday). I can sit and read or stitch a little. Or go to the ceramics studio. I’m still breaking things on the torso. So frustrated with it at the moment, but I’ll get there. I’m building a crazy head for it though.

I’m gonna need room for the tree on the head though; it won’t fit on my shelf. Problematic. I’ll figure it out.

Monday’s staff meeting was long and mostly boring. Some new info, but they read the slides to us. And the ones they didn’t read to us were small and hard to read. But they won’t give us the slides until the end of the meeting, because they don’t want us on our computers. But there are still people on their computers. So I drew for the first hour or so.

I can’t just sit in meetings. My brain doesn’t work that way. It needs entertainment. This was good for that. The next hour or so, I read my book on my phone. I did listen. I heard most of the things. I just wasn’t particularly engaged. A lot of it is stuff I already know. It’s hard, because we have so many new teachers who know nothing but I don’t need to hear all that again, but we also have a new principal and some fairly new assistant principals who don’t know or remember how things work here. Like there’s a reason we don’t let kids in the hallway behind our classrooms. We used to and it was a behavior disaster. So now we have to deal with that again. Whatever. I won’t be responsible for the hallway; I already told them why. They can deal with it.

Certain parts of the quiltmaking process look the same every night. I mean, I can tell the difference, but when all I cut out are tiny pieces, the piles don’t change much in an hour. I think I’m in the 900s mostly? Going backwards…so not even halfway done. So here’s Monday night, right before I started cutting out the swamp trees.

And here’s last night, as I start cutting out the people in the swamp.

Still some swampy bits in the top bin, but there’s progress. I can see it. I’ll be here for a while though.

I’ve been stitching this stuff down all summer…in bits and pieces.

Most of the wool pieces are on…I think there’s a few more, but mostly I’m appliqueing cotton now. Which is maybe faster, IDK. And after they’re stitched down, they all need embroidery. I’ll be here for a long while.

We are back to one juvenile owl, I think. I could have sworn I heard a second, but I’m not seeing it, so I feel sorry for this lonely. It’s very loud.

That’s the moon, believe it or not.

It’s started flying around and squawking from other trees, so we are a few days to weeks out from it leaving. It’s weird how loud they are as babies and how mostly fucking silent they are as adults. They do squawk as adults, but it’s different and mostly threat related. And it’s usually just once, not all night. I apologize to the neighbors. A little.

OK, I have a morning meeting to deal with team stuff, plus meet a new teacher for some of our special needs kids. I get to ask why I have paraprofessional support in one class with only one kid who needs it when I have another class with six of them and no support (that actually goes over the 20% mark, so they will have to support in there…they just don’t know it yet). The email thread back and forth yesterday about one of the kids with the admin in charge of scheduling them ended badly. I’m just not going to sit and not say anything when what they’re doing is not best for the kids. Or me, for that matter, or honestly, the poor para who is sitting there with only one kid to help…which is fine if the kid needs that. I’m just curious if there was thought behind it, because last year, there wasn’t.

Then pilates after school…my body will appreciate that, even if my blood sugar doesn’t necessarily go along with it. Transitioning to school and stress and a different schedule has been interesting. I did very well yesterday. Let’s not talk about the other three days around it. It’s fun. My doc wants me to check in with a nurse once a month about the diabetes, and I’m like sure, here’s my first question about crashing sugar in the middle of the night (again). They have not called yet. Probably trying to decide which nurse will have to deal with me. I’m having positive results…I’m hoping to keep that going as school really goes. September is the best test of it…it’s usually absolute daily chaos. Then after that, I get to read and stitch and cut things out. Bliss. Remember your why! (teacher in joke)

Meetings…

First official Monday of the school year. Yesterday was the first Sunday and I totally ignored it…went to ceramics, prepped breakfasts (OK, that’s not really ignoring it), cut stuff out, stitched some things down. OK, I also did laundry and grocery shopping, so still not ignoring it…just not sitting down at the computer and sending emails. I did that Saturday briefly…wait, no, I did that yesterday. I so often end up in charge of things that I’m wondering, when I’m retired, if I will miss that. I will probably find something else to be in charge of. It is the way of my people.

Still need to get used to getting up at 6:30 in the morning and functioning. Not there yet. We night owls have a hard time with normal work hours. I do anyway. Today is an all-morning meeting about things, then nothing in the afternoon but classroom and prep. I’m sure I will have a few meetings pop up; they always do, but I’m going to try to leave everything at school for the rest of this week. I can do that for one week, right? Then my weekly emails from my team start, sent on Sundays. No grades until next weekend; that’s a plus, but I will have to do rosters and that stuff. Let’s hope there’s no other crazy stuff about to rear its ugly head. Here’s my team; apparently this is our 10th year together…

Mostly we get along. No really, we are like any group in that there are people who do certain things, and we work really well together and support each other, but sometimes, we need to isolate. So we do. That’s probably how we made 10 years.

I ironed Friday night; I really thought I’d finish, but then I looked at the clock and it was midnight and I was tired (up at 5:30 AM y’all)…so I stopped.

With about 5 planets to go…

So I did finish ironing on Saturday, despite having a long, mostly unproductive day, wallowing in Kitten missing. I’m still doing that daily…she was so tiny at the end and I held her until the end. And like I said before, here I am, in her space. Bowie keeps coming in and looking for her. Ugh. It’s fine; I’ll get used to her not being here. Maybe. So here’s the 187 fabrics I used in this quilt…

I love to sort by color. And here’s what I’ll be working on for the next week or so…trimming all of those.

I started that Saturday night as well.

Didn’t get very far; did another hour last night though.

It never looks like much at this stage. I’m going backwards through all the pieces, unless I flipped the pile at some point (which I did). But right now, I’ve cut out most of the planets, the stars, the sun, and I’m working on the spacey pieces in the sky. I barely started the barn owl. It’ll be a while. But it’s delightfully relaxing to sit on the couch and bingewatch stuff and not have to think too hard about anything. The sitting will help with the first two weeks of exhaustion too. Seriously.

I’m making a very strange head with a tree coming out of it for the ceramic sculpture I started in November.

Still needs eyes and stuff. Ears. Maybe. Yeah. Ears.

And I actually drew at dinner.

I’m going to have to start hiking on Saturday afternoons again so I can eat the dinner I want to eat. Revised. Blood sugar was high all day and then crashed Sunday AM at about 3. Fun times. When my body decides to be logical about how it deals with food, I’ll let you know. I think I’ve got it, and then it’s like, NO. You don’t.

Always true.

OK, meeting, then prep, then other meeting, then meeting here about trees, then collapse with a book. Then cut things out and repeat. Well, I don’t have to meet about trees again, but I’m sure tomorrow will be more meetings, just not full-school meetings in the library. For 3.5 hours. Ugh. Remind me to skip long meetings in retirement (which is still years away, but I’m still gonna think about it) unless they’re about things I love.