I Did Not Buy This

This Friday kinda snuck up on me. Not bad. Appreciating its presence. Would appreciate it more if I knew what I was teaching next week in 8th grade. Spent a few hours last night Frankensteining a variety of labs together into stations and then searching through the house for materials to use…one of which was fabric…I know, I know, this shouldn’t be a problem, but it has to be two 24″ squares of fabric I don’t CARE about, and I care about a lot of my fabric. I did however find this…

I did not buy this. It came to me. I don’t know from where. But two chunks of it are going to school for science labs. Along with 9 plastic Easter eggs, which I had put out in the pile for the thrift shop, and 2 bowling balls that I liberated (with help from an employee) from a local bowling alley. THIS NEVER HAPPENED (he said, as he helped me put them in a bag). I’m waiting for 40 lids to 2-liter bottles (please don’t ask why I have bottles with no lids; I agree that it’s stupid, and it’s not MY stupid).

So yeah, work is complicated and requires a lot of work. Beyond my working hours. A lot more than last year. Probably equivalent to the Zoom COVID year. Although even then, there was already curriculum we had done; I just had to convert it to something they could do online. This year, the curriculum is mostly useless and boring, so I’m having to scramble. I have planned through Wednesday of next week, almost. Ha! Wait, not even all the way through Wednesday. Nope. FUCK ME.

So this may explain my slow status of the stitchdown. I’m not starting until after 9:30 PM most nights, and I need to go to bed at 10:30 or I don’t get enough sleep, so last night, as I was stitching and looked up and it was 10:38, you can imagine how this is going.

Wednesday night, I think I only got about 30 minutes in…

That said, it was a pretty good 30 minutes. No flags in uteri…

The thread is not happy though…it’s having spool issues and loopy issues. It keeps getting itself caught under the spool and then pulling every which way, or it loops up (just one loop) down below and catches on the foot. I’m not sure how to stop either of those things. I love that after a million years doing this, I still don’t know how to fix anything.

Last night, I started on an arm and the three young humans in the bottom corner, my titular folx…

I’m hoping to get a ton done this weekend, but please remember the science planning and wonder with me how that will be happening. Because I can do a little planning at school, but literally nothing NOTHING gets graded or done at all during the 2 7th-grade classes because they cannot self-start, self-maintain, or self-anything but yelling and drama. It’s really only about 6-10 kids per class, but that is enough to make me crazy.

Meanwhile, I got to school yesterday and the caterpillar had eaten everything and was (blurrily, sorry) waiting for me to get more food.

Which I did. Immediately. Also, I took pictures of their poop…

So you could see it. It’s actually sort of star-shaped. AND do you see the other caterpillar? I did NOT see it, which means it is currently in my trash. Ah well. Can’t save all the parasites.

Anyway. Fatso is hopefully going to be going to be liquifying themselves soon.

What else is going on? Sigh. Trying to figure out how to insure two pieces in a show that doesn’t have insurance. If anyone has any suggestions, let me know. Home insurance is not covering much. Also Katie is here.

She’s been good, but all the animals are a bit on edge with the newbie. Including her.

OK, going to work to feed the caterpillar, survive the last day of a unit with some classes, research day with some other classes, being super efficient with my time (ha! What a joke…I’m sure something will come up that fucks that over), getting a massage (short) and back pop later, plus need to water and pick up mail, plus finish all the planning for 8th grade for next week and grade all the stuff from last week that got subsumed under grades being due. LOSE MY MIND somewhere in there and maybe read my book. That would be good.

This is the Week…

THIS is the week where I get back to regular artmaking. I swear. I have two pieces to prep for delivery Saturday and three pieces for next Tuesday, but otherwise, school notwithstanding, I can art at night. Maybe. Ha!

The show I’m delivering for on Saturday will be at Liberty Station at the end of the month; first official opening is the first Friday in November…

I have two pieces in the show, and they’ll be up for a few months, so check it out. I’ve never seen this gallery space; looking forward to it.

I spent all weekend grading. And I’m not done. Well, I think I’m done GRADING…I just need to post everything and add comments etc. THEN I will be done. THEN I can try to plan Friday for 8th grade (I only got through Thursday in planning) and maybe even the next unit. I’m not crying. You’re crying.

When I grade, I have to constantly distract myself from how boring it is to just sit there for 5 hours straight, sifting through emails and docs and kid verbiage. So my eyeballs are constantly wandering…

Hummingbird through the weird coating on my windows where the kids tore it off.

Simba contemplating his hedgehog…

Simba contemplating ME!

Poor puppy. It’s boring when I’m working, I know. And I’m almost always working.

On Friday night, the Man had a show at the La Mesa Oktoberfest, which was pretty fun (albeit exhausting)…

It was their first time playing there…

Pretty crowded. And then Saturday night, his band played at the birthday party of one of the bandmates…

Nice location, although I was too exhausted by then to do much…

Except draw and read my book, amusingly enough…

Honestly probably should have stayed home and finished grades, but he wanted me to go. They played well. And I’m not going to the next show…it’s a school night and it’s some Battle of the Bands thang…nah. I’m good.

Last night, I headed up to PHES Gallery in Carlsbad, where FIG has its current show, Portals, to be part of the artist talk.

Ellen Speert ran the panel and Paul Henry took photos and found more seats.

We had our token mansplainer in the audience who tried to tell us women have all the same exhibitions that men do and there are no gender issues in the art world. I love it when that happens. NOT. All in all, though, it was a good talk. I hope.

Meanwhile, my sourdough starter is still alive…

Oh yeah, and we got a gift for doing the artist talk…

Best kind…homemade stuff from the artists’ yard.

OK, school calls, loud and clear. Grades. Two-hour staff meeting that better be cut short. The potential for some crazy in science. Ugh. I’m tired. But my goal is to get it all done during the work day so I can drag myself in here tonight and start the stitchdown on this piece. I’ve got three more I need to make before March apparently, and that will be tight. So gotta get going.

Just Some Part…

My school district sends out this “motivational” email every Wednesday and most of us groan and immediately delete. Today’s is about high achievers and how they push themselves. But then it tells us to be humble enough to embrace the power of small things to make a difference. I’m not sure how those are connected? I know I am a high achiever…it’s a pain in the ass sometimes and I wish I could let more things go or suck (well besides cleaning house and maintaining the yard). But that doesn’t mean I don’t know about the small things. I came home from staying late at work yesterday, and spent 20 minutes drinking a fresh cup of tea while reading my book. Then I did more work. Unfortunately, any time I want (or need) to take a day off, the school prep work going up to it is heinous. Plus knowing I won’t get any school work done for three days, so that puts me even further behind. This is why I don’t take time off during school. But for this? Making art stuff? Listening to artists? I know my art self needs it and wants it, so it’s telling high-achieving work self to fuck off, and so work self has been dominating in the evenings. The stress of taking time off to make things better! Sigh.

Monday night, I did treat the art self to an in-person talk at my quilt guild by Valerie Goodwin.

I missed book club for it. I did grade homework during the main part of the meeting; got through a week’s worth, so I’m almost caught up on those (almost meaning I just have last week’s to do). I did full on listen to Valerie though. She’s fascinating and so is her work. I took a Zoom class from her last year and really enjoyed her mind, so needed to hear the talk, even though I was exhausted. On a Monday! Yeah, I know. Came home and worked some more and didn’t manage any of my own art at all. Ah well. It was for a good cause.

Last night, I stayed late at work, trying to get sub plans written. Then came home and graded all of the Unit 1s that had been lying around for the last two weeks, not getting done. Put all that in the gradebook and then realized I had never finished one of the assignments that needs to be pushed out while I am gone. Huh. OK. Did that. Then it was 10 PM. No way in hell am I not doing art for two nights in a row. So I hustled (slowly and exhaustedly) in here, found the background fabric, ironed it, cut it, and got it ready to sew together. At that point, it was 10:30 and I needed to go to bed. But it’s ready for the next step…

Tonight I need to prep my Visions quilt for delivery this weekend (if someone ever answers their email), and then maybe get started on ironing this together. Realistically, it might not be tonight. But I will try.

And then I’m taking two days off to nourish Art Brain and escape the crazy 7th graders…the 8th graders are fine, it’s just the curriculum that’s driving me nuts. The 7th graders though…whoever decided those 60 kids should all be together on the same team must have been doing crack. There’s some wonderful, super high-level kids, some OK kids, and some brats from outer space. We always have that, but I think it’s usually spread out over 5 classes? I don’t know what the problem is; I just know my whole team is over them and it’s not even the end of the first progress report period. Although that is coming soon.

My parents’ dog visited Monday to Tuesday. It’s a practice run for when they are on their trip to the UK and she’s here all month, which might kill all of us. OR…we’ll all adjust over the first week and get on with our lives (cats, I’m talking to you. Also, Katie, chillax.).

She needs a good brushing (she sheds horrendously) and maybe some CBD oil. Same with the cats and maybe the Man. Even Simba gets jealous…

Although this is his chill self.

OK. I’m tired. What’s new? I have sub plans; just need to set up and clean up my room a bit so it’s easier for the guest teacher to find and manage shit. I need to contact admin and tell them to police my 7th-grade classes. I need to plan and grade like a crazy woman (crazier than usual). I have pilates (hallelujah…because I didn’t make it to the gym yesterday, no thanks to the day job), I have to cook dinner and the chicken is not defrosting fast enough (give it time…and perhaps a hot-water soak later). Then prep a quilt and hopefully iron stuff. We’ll see. AND pack up supplies for my workshop, some of which haven’t arrived yet, and Amazon sent one of those “it’s late but you could reorder it” emails (dammit…no time for that), so who knows how that will roll. Probably not well. Whatever. I’ve got some part of this. Not all of it. Not “I got this.” Just some part.

All the Pieces

All the pieces are done, ironed together. I just need to make them fit. Ha! That’s always the issue. I love it when the quilt top is just one giant ironed-together piece with no holes in it, because it’s easier to get onto the background. Pieces like this with a little bit here and a little bit there, and they all have to fit together, which implies I ironed them together really well (ha!)…those are the hardest. I’ve got two big heads (here’s one of them from Friday night)…

Then there’s the head and upper torso of the main figure with the arms, then the lower torso with the rest of the three figures and the body of one of the big heads. They’re all attached in some way. It’ll be a challenge. It’s not a small piece, so doing it on the ironing board won’t work. I finished the Earth last night…

That was the last bit…and I found the missing ‘s’ finally. It was in the box of 1300s, even though it’s a 300. It has aspirations…

In other art news, Coronawood got into Quilts=Art=Quilts, which is cool. And I’ll be part of an artist talk on October 2 at the PHES Gallery in Carlsbad.

Should be interesting…a wide variety of work.

I spent a huge chunk of the weekend working on school, which is funny, because I only just got my nose above water and my mouth sometimes. Meaning 8th grade is planned through next Monday and is a disaster after that. I spent 5 hours on Sunday just dealing with that, and then the other 3-4 hours was grading stuff and posting stuff and trying to make sense of stuff. I brought home 5 things on paper that I didn’t touch, needed grading. I’m taking some of it to my other quilt guild meeting tonight. Valerie Goodwin is talking. I took a class from her last year on Zoom and wanted to hear/see her in person. Also I won’t be at school for two days this week, so hence my panic about school stuff. But I’ll be at SAQA Summit listening to artists talk and then taking a 2-day workshop. I still need to write sub plans.

That whole 5 hours yesterday was on this chair with this cat behind me…

It wasn’t particularly comfortable.

Later we walked the little dog. Not sure why I call him that, since he’s the only dog we have at the moment. I guess I have a wishful big dog.

We only did 2 miles because all of us were tired. The boychild has been gone a lot lately for work, so Simba has been needy. And a shitty sleeper. I’d like to thank the local coyotes for my lack of sleep today. Boychild may be back Wednesday…depends on local fires. He was on one over the weekend, but seems to be off it now. I told Simba; he understood nothing.

We managed dinner out…

So I drew something very basic that I’ve probably drawn some version of about a million times. Which was fine, because at least I was drawing.

This school year, man. I’m hoping I get a better handle on it soon. It’s been shit. I should say the 8th graders are mostly fine. They are a decent group of kids. I just don’t have the curriculum down until like 5 minutes before class. The 7th grade, I’ve taught this curriculum enough times that I’ve got it, but the kids are a challenge…and not all of them. Just a significant enough number of them that it is hard and exhausting and sometimes they behave and sometimes they are shitheads. Because they are kids, yes, but also because of COVID and not being in school and still figuring out how not to be immature and some of them don’t HAVE to behave at home, so why behave at school? Some days are good, most are ok or tolerable, and then some are just shit. And because I end the day with them, it just throws me. And then the curriculum is stupid, the stuff I’m using for 8th grade. Hate Amplify. It’s lame. So repetitive, only one right answer, hardly any hands-on stuff. There are simulations, but it’s not the same thing. The kids need something to put their hands on, to mess with. Hopefully the next unit is better. I guess it’s only as good as I am, and I don’t feel up to it by myself. I don’t have any other curriculum that I can do with them. And I don’t have time to go searching for stuff, or the brain power, because I would have to be able to get the big picture to do that, and I’d need like a 40-hour week of planning to get there.

On top of all this, some messy shit with adults happened last week at school that still is pissing me off. I need to drop it, let it go, but it’s shitty and I can’t get it out of my head. Thank you brain for that.

I did finish one book, read a whole ‘nother book (the Man hates it when I use ‘nother)…

A Prayer for the Crown-Shy…second book in a series, but basically I love anything by Becky Chambers. Reminds me of why I don’t hike the PCT as a thru-hiker.

Anyway. I’m on yet another book now. It feels good to read. I do love to read. And draw. And sleep. I love sleep so much and I suck so bad at it.

Today is chaos. I’m giving assessments to both classes, although 8th probably won’t finish today. 7th will if it kills me (and it might). Staff meeting after school, plus counseling, pick up the parental dog and bring her back, then off to the quilt guild meeting. I’m not sure I can do all that, but I’m going to try. I should eat something in there sometime. I’d like to say I’ll iron when I get home, but odds are that I will just collapse. We’ll see. A girl can hope.

Weighs on You…

Ah yes. Back to work. It’s been a weird interim. In the last two days, I’ve had the brain power to grade stuff (and input it, because my kids think nothing counts this year) and plan about 4 weeks out of 8th-grade science, which is a blessing, because I have no one to plan with at the moment except my poor overworked co-teacher who is managing all the things. So it was good to have the mental space to tear apart the existing curriculum and decide how to actually teach it. I’m curious how the other 8th-grade teacher will handle 6 pages of reading assigned as homework to our kids, but that’s something I can worry about at another time. Today, I am going back to piles of paper, shit I was supposed to do but didn’t because I wasn’t there, and kids who aren’t used to me yet, except for the ones who already had me. So yeah. Chaos. It’ll all be fine. If I can remember all of it. Spent the hour this morning after the man woke up and before I had to get up (he’s loud) trying to remember how to do the labs I’m doing next week…haven’t done them in years. I’m sure it will come back to me.

I have not been spending hours and hours making art mostly, because the day job is significantly hefty enough that even when you feel sick, it still weighs on you. I have been cutting stuff out every night, though…

Yesterday I had a couple of Zoom meetings, so I got a little more done.

I also lost a letter R in that pile of trash. Can’t find it. I really shouldn’t cut over that pile…I usually use a lid and cut into that, so there’s not a huge pile of stuff for a tiny piece to dive into and completely disappear. My fault. I’ll re-iron it tonight. I’m not going to be done cutting anytime soon…there’s a lot still there.

This was the weekend I needed to be done with this piece…completely…if I wanted to meet the deadline. Ah well. Not happening. It’s OK. It’ll get done and go somewhere. The Man has a show tomorrow (hopefully he practices better masking) and will be gone most of the day/evening, so I’ll have plenty of time to cut stuff out and maybe get it sorted. We’ll see.

Simba likes a morning lie-in on the deck before the sun hits it.

And Nova just likes lying on chairs…

At least I only have to go in for one day…it’ll be fine. Next week will be a bigger challenge…everyone else has had a week plus to adjust…I feel a little off on procedures and stuff, but I’ll figure it out. Also have a weekend to remember what exercise is, maybe go for a hike, do some pilates. That would be nice.

Stapled

Well here we are. Back in. The saddle. School. Meetings and prep today and tomorrow, kids on Wednesday. So incredibly not ready. I would be much more ready if I only had one grade level this year, but that’s not happening. I spent 5 hours over the weekend just finding and trying to make sense of my bulletin boards (gotta get two grade levels up on the wall). It’s all about the staples…

I’ve had to move everything so far to get room for an additional 6-7 units (IDK even how many units I’ll be teaching because I can’t get that far ahead right now). Which means I unstapled everything and then stapled it back up in a different place. It’s all about the staples getting picked up by something other than my feet. Today I have meetings all morning and then this afternoon and most of tomorrow to prep for realz. We’ll see how that goes.

Here’s what 2500 people at a school district conference looks like…

Actually, that picture was probably less than 2500…I didn’t take a photo of the actual conference room (ballroom) we were in (this was breakfast), but it was a lot. Wore a mask. I don’t want to be sick for the first week of school. Was it worthwhile? Eh. Some camaraderie, sure, but we could have done that in a smaller group. One speaker was interesting (because he was funny). The rest? I’d rather be setting my room up. The reason I had to go in over the weekend was because normally they do about 90 minutes on Friday and then we get the rest of the day to prep. We didn’t get that. So that sucks. That’s tone deaf, honestly. But it’s done.

I’m still proofreading. SO CLOSE TO DONE. Hopefully today, although today is kind of a mess. Maybe tomorrow.

I’m also still ironing. I did NOT meet my goal of finishing the ironing this weekend…maybe if I hadn’t had to go in to school over the weekend. And yes, sure, I could have NOT done that and tried to get boards up once school starts, but using last year as an example? I never did it. Never had the time. This year will be similar with two different classes. I will never have time. So I did that. For my sanity. This is Friday night’s progress on the piles of fabric and pieces…

On Saturday, I focused on the main figure, so here’s what she looks like when I’m picking fabrics…

Although I forgot to do the head. Whoops. This is what one fabric of that run looks like…

Not much left of that one after this gets cut out. Which is fine. There is always more fabric.

Saturday night’s final count on the piles…

When I pick the fabrics for the flesh, I lay out all the other pieces too (bones, heart, lungs, hair, etc), but they don’t get ironed down right away. Fleshy bits first, then the rest, which can take a while…

Each pile is some discrete object on the quilt…there’s a pile of arm hair, a needle and some thread, some fingernails. I know those because I ironed them last night…

Still ironing those, honestly. Will be tonight as well. I have no idea how far along I am. I’ve pulled flesh through the 900s, but haven’t ironed all the missing bits in there, back to the 200s, I think. Maybe the 300s. Quite a bit to go. Revised goal? Work as fast as fucking possible this week.

Kitten loves it when I leave these drawers open for her…

She’s still not eating much, but seems perky enough. Comes out for her meds anyway. Wants pets. Still eating pine needles, because that’s a thing. If I could make her food smell like that, maybe she’d eat more of it? Or is it the long stringy stick-like-ness of it? Who knows.

Oh yeah, I drew (and read my book) at the district conference. It made it more bearable…

Too many people. Even if there wasn’t COVID, I wouldn’t have enjoyed being in a space like that with that many people. Lots of bugs in the drawing though.

OK, need to get going, wake up, ready for a meeting with a lot more people, then a smaller meeting, then lunch out (because we don’t get to do that during the school year), then work my ass off in the classroom. I went up and down off the counters about a million times in the last two days, mostly thinking that the next time I’d have to do this…well, I could do it every year, but I’d rather not. So maybe this is it? I spent a lot of time telling myself to be careful and not fall off anything. Oh yeah, and the boards aren’t anywhere near done…I’m missing all the vocab and posters and big ideas and essential questions. For 8th grade, those will get filled in all year, because they flat-out don’t exist yet. So there’s that. Knowing that.

One of the baby owls keeps coming back and hanging out in that tree outside my office window at night. Screeches occasionally. I talk to it. Say hi, how are you, thanks for coming back. Probably it’s coming back for our mouse/rat population (which it is welcome to eat), not for my dulcet tones. I haven’t named it yet. Betty? Betty the Barn Owl? Eh.

Most important part of today…send a thought out to Simba…he’s being left alone all day for the first time in a long time.

Poor pup. OK. Wish me luck for the 2022-2023 school year. I think this is my 20th year teaching? Something like that. Or my 20th starts in February, because I was a mid-year start. Yup. Either way, it’s a lot.

Almost Traced…

Currently I’m eating breakfast, in a virtual science conference (Science Is Cool), drinking tea, waiting for the boychild to tell me when to go get gas and pick him up. I’m mostly awake, thanks to dog shenanigans. The little black and white cat that I’ve seen around the house was in the front entryway (outside) this morning, and Simba lost his mind. I’ve thought about trying to catch the cat, because it’s around a lot and we have coyotes, but IDK if it’s actually homeless or just wandering and very lucky that it hasn’t been eaten yet. Also can’t put food and traps out for that cat unless I’m willing to catch all the other animals out there, including whatever it is that’s eating tomatoes off my plant.

I traced for about 4 hours yesterday, and am now almost done. Which is good.

I had a Zoom meeting for about 2 hours of that after a school meeting that probably just increased my anxiety about this coming year. Ah well. So yes, I traced during Zoom.

Because there are some really big pieces in this piece, I’m having to use some big chunks of Wonder Under…

I don’t know how many yet…I’ve got about 150 pieces left to trace, and then I can count the yards.

I traced all those hours without taking any photos. I was focused on getting done. Staying up too late. Gotta get myself trained back on 10:30 bedtime and 6:30 wakeup. Ugh. My brain doesn’t like that, but it’s what it needs for school.

The girlchild left on Wednesday, but I got the requisite kid-plus-grandparents picture before that happened.

Boychild is probably in the county…was supposed to be home yesterday, but there were vehicular issues, so he’s coming in soon. I need to go get gas so I can actually pick him up. I’m also still proofreading; I made it through the first read, and then a second read for chapter titles and numbers. Gotta go all the way through for at least one more full read, maybe two. We’ll see.

Simba’s face when he can’t figure out why the boychild’s car is here and he isn’t.

Girlchild took a good picture of him before she left…

So much happier.

I found this praying mantis in the yard…

So cool. What else is cool? Kansas. Kansas is cool.

And with the huge-ass conference my district has planned for next Friday (2500 attendees), I throw this out there…

I spent 90 minutes last night doing Active Shooter Training…I got an 80% on the pretest (I feel like that should opt me out for the training, but whatever)…

It was their specific titles for things that kept me from 100%. It’s done now. I still have another hour or so of bloodborne pathogens, cybersecurity, integrated pest management, and mandated reporter training. I always try to have it done before school starts, which means yes, I am working before the year starts. I do actually have to do these trainings outside of work hours. I don’t get paid for those hours, but if I don’t do them, my pay gets docked. So that’s fun.

Anyway, so more caffeine. Take meds. Go get the boychild. Finish tracing. Proofread more. Go watch the Man’s band play tonight, hopefully with a sketchbook. Sleep more. Do the rest of the stupid trainings (they’re mostly the same every year; can’t pretest out, can’t skip ahead and take the posttest). Keep watching this conference (that’s cool, actually; currently talking about how to increase eyeballs on women in science so girls know they can do that). By tonight, hopefully I’ll be cutting out Wonder Under and moving on to the next step. And Simba will be sleeping in another bed, which will be good for both of us. I have less than a week before I have to be back at school. Not fun. But also, I’ll get a paycheck at the end of this month, finally. That will help. Right now though? Going to get the boychild.

Loading and Filling…

I spent a chunk of time on Etsy yesterday trying to get 8 new pieces on there. They are all pre-COVID pieces; they just needed to be mounted in a way that made them able to hang. You can find these on Etsy.

My friend Susan talked to me and crafted (she was supposed to be cleaning…but I think we’re always supposed to be cleaning when we craft unfortunately). Plus Kitten was trying to help me do the computer stuff…not.

I’ve been drawing every night…after doing other stuff during the day. Drawing brain seems to prefer nighttime.

I knew there would be swallowing heads in here…kind of a symbol for anxiety or being swallowed by society or government or a political party that doesn’t like women except when they do like them (pussies and pregnancy yes, autonomy and rights no)

I didn’t realize until the middle of the night while trying to sleep that the heads would be filled with words. And then I tried drawing that bottom left bit about 4 times and finally cut that section out and taped a new piece in. I’ll try the redraw tonight…and then it might be done.

Then I can start numbering.

We’re still quilting this beast. And the machine is still possessed. Plus we need to replace some O rings.

More signs of demonic possession.

Kitten is wherever I am.

Simba misses the boychild but appreciates his elephant.

I started this at home and have been trying to write while being at mom’s with the quilting machine. We got to the bottom and have to go back to the top to fill in some wide apart areas we had in the beginning. Not today. Gotta go proofread some stuff, ship one quilt, and deliver another. All good.

Headspace for Drawing…

I went to the eye doctor yesterday and he recommended a book for me, after having a long discussion about Comicon and our shared nerdiness. Gotta appreciate that. Especially as school LOOMS. I write every year about how it looms; usually it waits until August 1st, but not this year. LOOMING. And not in the good way with weaving warp and weft. In the dark and doomy way where it’s leaning over you and breathing hot and heavy onto your shoulder. Maybe even a little moist going on there. Yuck. All this followed by some truly disturbing dreams (not about school, for once, but like an alternative lifetime that was obviously wrong wrong wrong but was weirdly right in the dream, so fucking awful). Totally creeped out by last night’s attempt at sleep. Plus the boychild left for the Oak Fire yesterday, so Simba was in the bed all night, perturbed as fuck and hot and furry and then would randomly lick my leg and wake me up. I’m just not cut out for sleep. I need to be knocked out instantly and then zapped awake at the right time.

So Monday was delightful. I went to lunch and for a walk on the Silver Strand beach (away from all the people) with two friends from school and just really enjoyed walking, cool temperatures, and BIRDS!

Some of these birds have made it into my quilts. Wish I could tell you which ones…

Tiny snowy plovers…

We stalked the birds really…

And then the shells…these still had the snails in them, so we put them all back in the water.

Probably they would have been fine, but in a year when the climate is getting more and more fucked (thank you Republicans and the Supreme Court for continuing that shit), it felt good to do something that might be good for the environment.

Fascinating walk. This gull had a flatfish and was trying to alternately wash it and peck it.

Plus it kept running with the fish to get away from us.

Good times. We had some discussions of bizarre animals that humans made up and how it happened (found weird bit on beach, assumed animal was massive, hence our drawing it in the sand).

Like you do. Anyway. More of that this year. Less of the stressful shit.

I finally got the headspace to start drawing for real. Did a lot of sketching in pencil first as my brain got in the mood for this drawing…

Trying to keep it relatively simple. I keep wanting to add shading to the figure on the right, but my simpler brain is like NO IT DOES NOT NEED IT. Art brain is not convinced. Then last night, I inked everything that was in pencil…

And started adding more…

First time the Statue of Liberty has shown up in a quilt of mine…

Got more to do up here. That big head has some words going on it. Her arms need stuff. Stuff in her hands too. Getting there. Also, my proofreading project showed up last night…and I’m going to mom’s today and tomorrow to work on the bed quilt, plus the girlchild is coming in tonight for a visit, so I had to clean her room (not done) and the bathroom, because the boychild left for the fire yesterday. He works for the California Conservation Corps but is currently on a CalFire hand crew. Apparently you sleep in coffins (not really, just looks like one)…

He’s in Merced…heading in to the fire west of Yosemite.

He sends sunrise photos with fire trucks. Seems fine. Unfortunately, he got called out right before the girlchild comes to visit and probably won’t be back before she leaves. Bad timing, fire. WTF. I’m glad she’s coming though…not only because I haven’t seen her in a while, but also because Simba can sleep with her and she’s on Boston time, so he’ll be happy with wakeup time. I tried to explain to him that I was on summer break and got to sleep in. Did not care. Not a bit.

Last night, he just barked for hours at every sound, convinced it meant the boychild was home. His car was home (we went and got it), so the confusion was large. Massive really. Tiny brain in that dog.

We’re up to three caterpillars on the milkweed.

Exciting stuff…

I hope we get a chrysalis out of it.

This is part of the current drawing…at least the idea behind this.

And this is for my district…

I’d take Reduce Workload too. They’re gonna feed me lunch for three days. I would rather bring my own lunch and go home earlier, but that’s not how they roll. Luckily my district/principal don’t give a shit about jeans whenever…and we don’t get free coffee (wouldn’t care about that anyway). We do get the other shit though and it’s usually right before they tell us the 17 new things we have to do and why we have the wrong attitude if we’re not excited about them. Eh.

OK, so I’m going to aim to get Etsy stuff done tomorrow and Friday. Today is packed full of stuff, including getting the girlchild from the airport. I’m supposed to be at mom’s at 10 and I haven’t eaten or taken a shower. So I gotta go. Like now.

So Much Quilting…

Well I sort of slept in today. After two mornings of regular work-time wakeups. When I put the pillow over my head, I can apparently drown out a lot of things that would normally wake me up. I don’t feel more awake though…I feel sort of braindead. Which maybe I am. Monday, I spent a lot of time working on science for the upcoming school year, and I have a hard time turning that off. But we have a healthy start to what will be an interesting clusterfuck of a year. I’m working with some good people though, so hopefully that helps. Makes my stomach tighten in uncomfortable ways, though. I still remember last year, two preps, no common prep with my science co-teacher. It’s hard. She’s really good about not bringing work home with her. I don’t know how she does it…I certainly haven’t been able to. I think a lot of the hard part with two different preps is that you have to switch your brain between the two and it’s almost twice the work. I have fewer things to grade for each class type, but the switch between doing this class type to that class type is hard. At least this year they will both be science? I don’t know if that helps. Art and science was hard, for sure. But we will not have a block schedule this year and every day will be the same schedule, unlike last year’s insane rotation where I had no idea what I was doing each day. Advisory, Science block 1, Art, Science block 2. It was hell. So none of that shit this year. PRO! Cons may bury me, but for now, I’m hoping for a planning prep with both science grade levels (unlikely) and my 7th-grade science classes fully separated from 8th grade so I don’t have to bounce back and forth between the two. Knock on wood. I don’t think that’s likely either, but I’m hoping. Also either early lunch or a morning prep. For the diabetes. I don’t ask for much, do I? Sigh.

So what am I doing today? Another science meeting. I know. Sigh. But this is with friends from other schools in the district, one who has taught 8th grade with the new curriculum and will hopefully give me some serious insight.

What else am I doing today? Well I have a quilt that needs to be done by Saturday for my photographer. Yeah. I know. But I’m doing OK on it. I’ve been putting in a few hours a day…

In fact, I’m almost done with the outline quilting…just have the two guys on the right there, the cloud, and a bunch of bombs on the other side. Then I can do the background quilting hopefully tonight and tomorrow morning, buy some binding (I might have some that works, but probably not enough), put it on, and then get it done. It’s totally doable. Even though it will be in the high 90s today and I have to put two fans on me to sit in this room when it’s hot. It’s fine. I just sweat.

I do prefer quilting at night for all those reasons, and this quilt is not as dark a blue as I normally use, so I can actually see to quilt at night. What a concept.

I also spent about 5 hours plus at my mom’s yesterday trying to figure out the short-arm and get it working right so I can quilt this bed quilt. We practiced a lot…

Then after lunch, finally got the actual quilt on the machine…

Not a quiet and calm quilt at all. I know. The Man says it looks like a kid’s quilt. I’m OK with that. I’m not trying to impress anyone with the quilt on my bed.

I think we figured it’s taken about 8 hours to get to this point, where there are two rows done and they’re not quite nested appropriately.

I’m also OK with that. I did some math, and based on this rate (not the 8 hours, but the 12 minutes to do each row, which doesn’t count trying to figure out where to put the next one), it will take about 8 hours of quilting for this to get done. So here’s my plan. Get the current art quilt to the binding stage, then do the handsewing portion of the binding during the 12 minutes that each bed quilt row is stitching out. While watching for breaks. It’ll be interesting, but I think I can do it. So that’s Thursday/Friday? Maybe? I don’t know. At least it will be done. I’m not sure I would use a short-arm again. I’ve tried a long-arm and they don’t really work for my art quilts. I guess if I ever did another large bed quilt, I’d do this? Or hire someone, because they’d be more efficient and they deserve every penny.

Katie wanted pets while I was at Mom’s…

She will be with us in September/October when my parents are traveling. She’s a good girl, but sheds a lot, talks a lot, and bugs the cats. Plus she’s awfully fat right now. But we love her.

Yesterday, the boychild noticed Kitten hunting in the Crocs (we have a pile of them in the hallway for outdoor and standing work). After he left, she moved into hunting in the hallway, where I figured out the prey…and saved it, minus the tail…

It is always lizard-saving season in this house.

Simba had to have his teeth cleaned yesterday. He was a little out of it when I picked him up…

Very droolio. He has horrible teeth despite everything we do to help him, so it’s easier and probably cheaper in the long run to just have them cleaned every year. Big expense for the month I don’t get a paycheck though.

I compost my kitchen waste. I use that compost in my yard. This is a compost tomato growing among the milkweed seedlings that I planted over a year ago.

Don’t know what kind of tomato it is…doesn’t look like a Roma, too big for a cherry? Might be whatever the standard grocery store tomato is. Looking forward to seeing them all grow. Probably they will be stolen by raccoons…which is what usually happens.

Last but not least, this is horrifying…but I had to fact check it.

I found this as an interesting summary of how it could be calculated over 20 years…and I also found this…

No matter how you look at it, the US has a problem with guns. And there is a solution to that. Certainly, I didn’t sign up to be a target to protect my students. And I will protect my students. Because we care about them even when they drive us bonkers. They’re children. They shouldn’t even have to think about this at school. School should be the safe place for those who don’t have that elsewhere, yeah? Anyway. There’s that.

So I need to go make and freeze a big batch of pancakes (it’s been a while), then shower, then hopefully quilt a bit before going to the science meeting, come back, do Pilates, cook dinner, then quilt some more. Busy day. Damn. Needed to put some yardwork in there; don’t think that’s happening. Oh well. It’ll get done eventually. I’ll leave you with the three juvenile (and loud…the neighbors finally commented) owls…I think only one is really hanging out here still. The others seem to be branching further out. Which is good and what they’re supposed to do.

Just like all teenagers.