Hanging in Midair…

That leaf from Friday? Hanging in midair? It’s still there. Some sort of commentary on life I think.

If you’re a sewing-machine person, maybe you know that part when you’re threading your machine, the skinny bar right above your needle that you put the thread behind so it will line up correctly with the needle? Mine fell off Saturday night. Granted, it was loose and I’d tried to figure out how to tighten it, then considered that the machine needed a cleaning and I would finish the stuff I needed to on this one and the next one and then take it in and all would be good. And then it fell off. Three parts actually. I did successfully continue quilting this…

Which makes you wonder if that little bar is truly necessary. I mean, I’ll call the shop today anyway (it needs a cleaning and the parts are now in a ziplock bag)…but if they can’t do it right away, will I try to sew without that part? I might.

OK, I finished the binding on this one…

Which looked a lot like this for a while…

And the owl angrily requested embroidery. So I started doing that…

Also needs eyes and a better beak.

I appliqued this onto the background…

It just needs sandwiching and quilting. Might embroider but probably not.

I also finally made it back to ceramics. The “fabric” she is holding bisque fired great. This one scares me because of the break. But I had fixed it before all the hospital/injury crap we were dealing with and then didn’t have time to go in. I fixed a bit more and then reglazed.

It looks OK, but IDK how to get it into the kiln.

So that’ll be in the next week or two.

I have a small piece I can work on until then, plus I have the neck started. If there’s room on the drying shelves, I could store that there. I’m scared to put this part on the shelves. One bump and I’m screwed.

I have two pieces at Quilts=Art=Quilts, but hadn’t seen photos of either of them until this one. That’s mine on the far right.

They might have sent some photos…I should look for that.

I was doing yardwork Saturday and found this china plate in my green recycling bin.

With half a croissant. Strange. I cleaned it up. Who throws away a plate? It’s not cracked or chipped or broken, and why my green bin? I suspect the pool person, but it’s still weird. Also the pool people do not understand the difference between trash and compost to save their lives. It’s mind-boggling. Or I’m just very demanding…don’t put trash in my compost!

Hiked with my brother, who’s visiting, on Saturday. Saw a single coyote.

There’s a lot of them in our yards at the moment. Kind of scary.

I got a cocktail on Saturday night. It was very pretty.

And my barn owl left me a gift Saturday night too.

And because it probably needs to be said…

Not entirely, of course. And things aren’t fixed. But they better be working on it day one.

OK, gotta call the sewing machine store. Hoping to go to ceramics today. The students are supposed to be finishing things today and doing one new thing. Some people were efficient on Friday and are ahead of the game. We had about 38 kids absent though…partially because FRIDAY and partially because of a shooting scare that diminished by Friday, but I guess parents were still nervous. Understandable, but also, bet more were out because FRIDAY and if it had been a Tuesday, probably not as many would have been out. Which reminds me, we have Wednesday out for Veterans’ Day…wanna take bets on how many kids will take a 5-day weekend on one side of it? Stupid timing. Oh well. Logistical issue for trying to finish a unit before Thanksgiving week off (excuse me, Fall Break) and giving two tests. I didn’t work enough this weekend, so I’m behind. Still. Again. All good. Will catch up. After school and staff meeting (oops, forgot about that) and ceramics, will grade some and embroider some or maybe attempt to find and put bindings on that other long piece? Or sandwich and quilt the little one? I could try. We’ll see.

Hopefully It Will Hold…

My oatmeal revolted this morning. I’m not sure why. I don’t know what I did differently, but it was like a hard cake of oatmeal instead of like a mushy cereal. I don’t know what I did to deserve that. Probably didn’t put enough milk in? But I remember measuring it. Cooked it too long? That is possible. I don’t remember setting it, wait, I did…I did the right time. Am I eating it? Of course I am. Not wasting food. Don’t really care about it that much. Not the tastiest. Could be worse though. Giant blobs of hard oats. Weird.

Also weird, what I’m doing artistically at the moment, which is mostly cleaning honestly. The studio rarely gets a good clean, and it’s not getting one now either…but I had a bag and a bin full of little tiny pieces of fabric that came from IDK where and I can’t deal with them taking up real estate any more. Some are precut binding pieces, and narrower than anything I would ever use, so they’re getting recycled. The rest are getting cleaned off (dust bunnies), ironed if necessary, and stacked up by color, along with some other monthly shipments I got for a while and I thought I had sorted into my bins, but hadn’t. So now I am.

My internet is being cranky this morning; hopefully I’ll be able to add photos by the time I’m done writing. Anyway, those are the piles so far; I’m about 1/3 of the way through the bin. I got all the way through the bag. I also need to pack a quilt and ship it. So that’s on my to-do list. Plus grades are due soon, so I’m trying to get through one class of tests a night, but really, I need to do two one night because camping this weekend. I think last night was the night I was going to try to do more, but it was errands, talking to dad (or trying to), because it was his birthday (86!), and then talking to my bro, his lovely wife, and his delightful daughter. All good things. Just can’t grade when life is happening. Sigh.

Top right of that picture has some fabric applique pieces I’ve made but not finished over the years. I was looking for a specific one and it wasn’t there. Sigh. I do have them on my list to try to finish, but I need to find all of them.

So I’ve been adding Inktense pencil layers to these two dye paintings. The small one needed a background color and the larger one, the two bottom heads needed stuff.

So I’ve been adding layers and then fabric medium and more layers. Last night, I ironed the smaller one, so I’ll wash it out probably tonight, see what holds. The larger one, I thought I was done, and then in the photo, noticed I’d forgotten the eyebrows.

And they’re totally obvious and bug me. So I’ll do that tonight. So it’s not an hour’s worth of truly art stuff, but the cleaning needs to happen. I’ll get there. The heads piece and another long skinny one need to be finished next.

I finally made it to ceramics and made some decisions. I was able to remove the ‘cloth’ piece from the arms and I’m putting it in the bisque fire.

Hopefully it won’t change shape much. I’ll try to glaze fire it in place. I just needed it out of the way so I could try to do a better fix on the arm. We’re at bone dry though and it’s problematic. It is a clean break though, so if I can fire it next to the main piece after I fix it, I’ll be able to make it all work I think.

I’d say I need to do something smaller next, but this was supposed to be smaller and maybe I just can’t do small? I also can’t finish things quickly. I do think the arm is more stable now, so that should help.

Speaking of help, here’s Scribble helping to grade tests.

She is ever so helpful.

I drove past this during errands yesterday. I like to let the GPS tell me which way to go, so I end up on random streets I’ve never been on.

Their reviews are average, but it’s worth a try to drag some kid there, yeah? Maybe just for coffee.

This is legit.

That man is so incapable of doing his job as it is.

OK. Today should be a chill day. Kids have an independent assignment to complete before a lab tomorrow. I have a million packets to grade and I really need to finish if possible. Or get close. Then I have pilates after school and need to set up a flood barrier for the rain that is coming over the next few days. I have an outside drain that isn’t working and needs to be cleared out, but I don’t have the time or the equipment. It’s on my list for Thanksgiving. The new gutter drains in an inconvenient location. Then I’m going to grade more than one class worth of tests, fix those eyebrows, and finish cleaning up in here. Maybe put a label on that quilt I need to ship (probably not; let’s be honest. There are only so many hours in a day). It’s all good though. At least I have a plan…hopefully it will hold.

The Alternative

Being sick sucks; being sick as a teacher sucks even more. The job is physically and mentally challenging on a good day; trying to do it when you’re feeling shaky is harder, but the alternative is writing sub plans, assuming your classroom will be a disaster and no one will get anything done, and betting on the fact that you’ll feel better tomorrow…like is THIS the worst day of this illness? Or will that be tomorrow. And it won’t matter tomorrow because it’s a lab day (not leaving that with a sub) AND back-to-school night and one teacher on your team is already going to be missing. Plus you don’t really know how you’re going to feel until you get up in the morning, and then it’s too late usually to get a sub so a bunch of random teachers will have to be in your classroom. So yeah. That’s where I’m at. Today is NOT independent work mostly. There’s a bunch of talking and excitement I’m supposed to be pushing out (with what energy?) and then lots of walking around and encouraging. Meanwhile, the honors kids are trying to work ahead on everything, because it’s how they roll. They don’t know how to just let something sit. And wait. I understand that. I want the blank papers done too y’all.

I’m still ironing…so very slowly.

Not sure why it’s so slow.

Last night’s…

I just laid out the 400s. Some of them were already ironed to flesh bits, but mostly not. I might be halfway; I might not. It’s impossible to say. I feel like I’ve done a lot and question why I am not done yet.

I washed out the dye painting that needed repainting…

Doing some crazy stuff with distilled water in the laundry room, because I think my really hard water bleaches some f the dye out.

After drying…much better.

So yeah, the dyes I mixed at the end of July are still working.

I also washed out one of the glue resist pieces…

It needed more glue removal. I think it’s good now. They’ll both go through a regular machine wash at some point.

And then I finally made it to ceramics.

I’m done underglazing. Just need to figure out when it can go in the kiln.

I have a neck that fits in that hole sitting in my damp box, ready for me to build a head. And maybe a bird. That was the original plan anyway. We’ll see how that flies. It’s nice to have progress at least.

This AI conversation…interestingly, I heard one pundit talking about how we needed to stop separating AI from the techies who built it/own it. To hold them responsible.

They designed this system to make them money, and in doing so, endangered the future of billions of humans. And the big dumb guy says all we need to control it is a smart president. Oh well.

I’m sick. Definitely worse than yesterday. Hoping the meds kick in. I’m supposed to have pilates after school and it’s too late to cancel without a penalty. I’m watching a squirrel yell at something in the neighbor’s yard. I need to be better tomorrow. Doing a lab while sick is hard. Labs are hard anyway. It’s not even set up. I need to go in this morning and try to get through that. I started yesterday and it got too complicated. I really just want to go back to bed. Too late for that. Time to bully through. Ugh. And grades are due next week, so I just grade nonstop at the moment. Also not fun. Hope it gets better…the cold at least.

The Drama

Ah blessed extra day off. I am actually in a union; nay, I am a union representative. So I gladly take this day and thank those who had the brains before us to make good laws about labor. Will I be laboring today? Unfortunately yes; despite putting in about 4-5 hours yesterday, I am nowhere near done. I did spend a chunk of Saturday doing art things (while doing school stuff in between, when I was waiting for things to heat up). I had some art plans for this weekend that may or may not happen, and the next three weekends, maybe more, are a shitshow. So yeah. I’m thrilled about being back at the day job. It wants to steal so much time…it will take every moment you allow. And even those you don’t. Because you can’t be in front of kids unless you do some work. So on Friday, when I realized our TA didn’t show up and do the thing we needed done for tomorrow, I stayed and did it. Because I knew Tuesday morning’s self would appreciate it. I don’t have everything copied for next week, unfortunately, but planned? I think so. I finished one rewrite of a doc I’ve hated for probably 10 years…on Saturday…while waiting for water to boil. I also submitted for a residency for next summer…I need a backup in case I don’t get in (very good chance I won’t).

Why boiling water? I washed out four more dye paintings from the residency. They had some washing in the sink in Oregon, but not at the right temperature. So they are good now. Two of them are for a show I need to enter in January. Need to figure out how to finish them. When this big one is done.

There’s a haphazard pile of them. I have two more big ones to wash out and some glue resist pieces that will need even more hot water. I’m paranoid about using our hard water, although the final washout is in the washing machine. It seems to be holding up pretty well. Definitely washout, but not horrible. I still have the dyes I mixed in July. I did a test piece and they are still OK. I have one piece, maybe two, that I want to dye paint. I don’t know where to do it though. I had this great setup in Oregon and I don’t have that here. I was hoping to do that this weekend…not sure I can pull that off.

Because I’d like to go into ceramics today too…I’m almost done with the underglazing…

Just need to do the flower petals. And some red around the hole and on the fabric. I keep forgetting about that. I have meetings all this week, so if I don’t go today, it’ll wait until Friday. It’s not the end of the world…I’d just rather get it done and start working on the head. No breakages (knock on wood) on this one. It’s been solid the whole time.

I trimmed Wonder Under Friday…

Side view…

And Saturday I finished…

Last night, I sorted them all out by 100s…

Scribble observed.

And then I came in here and started cleaning up and putting stuff away so I could actually start ironing to fabrics tonight. It was a mess in here. It still kind of is. Too much stuff. I still need to put all the fabrics away from the last quilt I made; they are piled up by color on the ironing board. Next on my list. After breakfast.

Saturday night, we went out to North Park…but here was the eastern sky from the house…

The western sky driving through town…

And the western sky from the parking garage…

The hurricane remnants that are making it hot and muggy as hell here (supposed to be 101 degrees today, 102 tomorrow) are making pretty skies at least.

We went out for a drink and listened to really bad karaoke and then had a burger and fries at Crazee Burger…always a good choice.

We came back to drama.

Oh no!

Go mantis!

Freedom!

That is one weirdass bug there. But pretty.

Katie is still holding it together. Sometimes she’ll eat where the food is and sometimes we provide personal delivery service.

She’s having a hard time getting up, doing lots of sleeping. We’d like her to hang around until my parents get back. Meanwhile, I do a lot of cajoling and lifting. She’s still enjoying dinner; breakfast is not as exciting (no green beans…seriously).

Yup. That’s September for you. If you’re a teacher, you know what I’m talking about. If not, buy a teacher a drink. Probably caffeinated.

OK. Today. Yes, it’s a day off work. I have a test to grade and some homework as well. I got all the posts done for the week on Saturday (water boil watch!). I need to put fabric away. I’d like to go to ceramics. I’m supposed to do two blogposts for art groups. I’m going to do one of them. I haven’t even dealt with the photos on the other one. They just got sent to me with no info. Sigh. Whatever. Then ironing to fabric tonight. More color, more fun. Looking forward to spending time on that, although this might be the hottest room in the house at night. And my fan is failing. It’ll be fine. It’s just sweat. Drink more water. It works. Oh yeah, finally got the blood sugar to stop crashing at night. Not really sure why it took such a drastic change in insulin (down, not up) after a year of being on that dose. Weird shit.

Give…or Explode…

OK. Deep breath. Wednesday. All I can think about is making art and applying to shows and residencies. My job is demanding though, so I keep waking up at 3 AM and going SHIT. I FORGOT TO DO THAT. This morning, I forgot I set my alarm early, ignored one of them, and reset the other one. SHIT. It’s fine. I got it. Just so many things happened yesterday and so many balls are in the air that something is gonna drop…and bounce. I’m not sure if bouncing is good, bad, or neutral at the moment…or just more chaos. I know that my nighttime art brain wants more time. And my day job demands more time. At some point, things give…or explode. Kinda like me. For now, though, I’m demanding an hour a night and hoping for more. The real problem is having all these more computer tasks for art, and not my personal art, but for groups I’m in, and it’s hard to give up my personal art time for that. I do have a 3-day weekend coming up though…hopefully I can do both. Plus grade. And plan. Ugh.

I finished tracing Wonder Under on Monday night…

Thanks Scribble. It’s a little more than 5 yards.

Trimming is usually about an hour a yard. There’s a lot of big pieces in this.

As of last night, I trimmed the little piece, one full yard, and about 1/2 another. So yeah, about an hour a yard.

On Insta I said I thought it would take another 5 hours, but I think it’ll be less than 4. One a night. Sometime on Saturday. Then sort, then start ironing to fabric. I don’t know if I have a background fabric that will work, so I need to start thinking about that, because that’ll have to happen Saturday if I need to buy some.

I made it to ceramics on Monday and it was quiet and almost empty and not as hot as it would have been last week. So I glazed all the ribcage.

I also started on the front with some details. I had some glazes dry out over the summer, so I rehydrated and am hoping they’re OK by Friday. Getting close to done with this part. Then I can work on the head, which is just a neck at the moment, sitting in my damp box.

This is Social Justice Sewing Academy…and I started the block in the bottom left.

Presumably someone embroidered it (can’t tell) and then it made it into a quilt. I made it at the first QuiltCon in Phoenix after COVID. It’s about trying to protect kids from all the things teachers have to worry about with them. Still doing that…the worrying.

Still worrying. Because this is sick.

Seriously, this is where every dystopian novel goes. And then real kids are caught up in it because the AI isn’t ‘good enough’ or the AI gets trapped in it. I’d be OK with the AI taking out the users of this when that happens. I just don’t get why the lawmakers don’t think this through. They won’t stop with AI…they’ll just use it as a jumping-off point.

Making the world a better place gets harder and harder every day right now.

OK, I woke up late, I have a meeting early, I’m teaching (ironically) about AI today, but mostly with the environment (bad bad bad) with brief forays into trade-offs. Then Pilates and book club, with a dog drop-off in the middle. It’s busy. I’ll be grading in there somewhere. And cutting out little pieces of Wonder Under.

Signed Up For…

Weekends feel so short. I mean, I work for 3 or 4 hours every Sunday, so that doesn’t help. But if I don’t do that, I can’t keep up. I’m already behind, and we’re in the 2nd full week of school. Welcome to the next 10 months. I did manage to keep Saturday work free, but then Sunday, I got an email about the upcoming school board elections and how I will need to give up 9 hours to canvassing in the next 2 1/2 months. Sigh. I signed up for that job. I know it’s important. Just losing those hours hurts my art self. My sleeping-in self! Which I need. I didn’t sleep last night. Too hot, too noisy (windows open due to hot). It was over 100 degrees yesterday, cooler today, then the surface of hell for the rest of the week. Fun times. Eventually I’ll sleep because of exhaustion. Rough way to start the week though.

So artwise, I finally made it to the ceramics studio on Friday; I’m going again tomorrow. I picked up these two pieces from the class I took in June. They fired well.

I’m just sticking them in the yard. They were fun. I might make more. Yes that’s a uterus.

I also did the 2nd and 3rd underglaze brown layers on this…

I really wanted this to go in the bisque fire before I left on the residency, but I spent 5 or 6 hours glazing those other two, so that didn’t happen. I also ran out of one of the browns and the local store didn’t have it, and it shipped after I left.

Surprisingly very few cracks, no breaks. Needs a lot more underglazing, but I’m getting there.

In new quilt news, I finished drawing this (although I added a spaceship later).

Saturday night, I numbered it…

I’d like to say that Scribble is helpful, but she really isn’t.

I thought it had 848 pieces but then I added the spaceship and found another chunk of pieces I hadn’t numbered, so I’m in the 860s somewhere.

And last night, I started tracing…

With the help of Scribble, who kept lying on the drawing.

She’s mostly easy to move. And then she left. But not until this happened…

I didn’t get very far. Big pieces take longer to trace. With a cat in the way. Not helpful.

I spent most of Saturday dealing with some of the dyed paintings, doing final washouts. I had issues with the last one…I washed it out in a hotel sink and the brown skin color completely washed out, and then I couldn’t get the blue to stop washing out. I’m not unhappy with the blue…it was meant to be lighter, less intense. The blue in the body was mixed in with the brown that didn’t stick, but all the other colors mostly did. I think the brown had been contaminated by the soda ash on the fabric transferring on the brush. So I’m going to redo the brown.

I ran a test on the dyes I brought back to see if any of them were still good. I forgot to wash it out yesterday, but I’m hoping these weren’t contaminated so I can just do the skin tones sometime this week…whenever that might be. Ha! Yeah. Work? or Art? Or whatever else?

I washed another out and there’s one head that needs more, so I’m going to try Inktense on that section…it’s pretty small. I have two long skinny ones I did on purpose for an upcoming show. So I spent a couple of hours dealing with dye paintings, which was nice. I have some blog posts I have to write for art groups; I started one. I’m a little annoyed by the other one, but whatever. Obviously I’m the only one who writes posts for them, even when I’m not there and didn’t get into the show. I did get into one locally in October though, so I’ll be there (more info to follow) and the big FIG show is still on in Oceanside; I’ll be there Saturday for 5 hours, so come visit.

While I was gone, Nova (probably) puked on a lot of things, including a ceramic frame I hadn’t hung up yet with a photo of my niece I liked…honestly, I might like it better like this.

I washed it. Yeah. The ceramic frame fared better than the photo paper.

The old man slept in on Saturday. Nice.

No boofing at me at 6:30 AM.

Saturday date night…

I did not buy any fabric this weekend. In fact, I haven’t bought any fabric since mid-July. No hiking Saturday…too hot. Miss that. Want to do that.

It’s OK; I probably will soon.

Good science meme; but my students won’t get it.

I did name one of my loaner computers Marie Curie.

As we get ready to go over appropriate AI use in the classroom (I’ve already seen a bunch of it).

Unfortunately, middle schoolers often don’t have the prefrontal cortex development to understand this graph. And why it matters. And it’s why all my tests are on paper now. Can’t use AI if you don’t have your computer. God knows they’re using it everywhere else.

OK. Today…is kind of a mess, but I think it’ll be OK. We’re doing an observation lab…followed by another more complicated observation lab tomorrow (am I nuts? I might be). Staff meeting after, but the boss has been super vague (which is kind of their thing) about the meeting after. He’ll tell us right after probably or ignore it completely. I have book club tonight but I don’t remember which book it’s for (whoops). I’m pretty sure I read it. Then I’ll be tracing on Wonder Under. I should grade somewhere in there too…in the heat. Ugh. Yeah. OK. I guess I have to.

Make a List…Another One…

Yup. Totally writing late today. Just woke up running and didn’t stop until right now. Tomorrow’s to-do list is equally nuts. I made it to ceramics Monday? I did one layer of skin color…

I ran out of the two brown colors (and forgot to do one hand obviously). I went to the clay supply place Tuesday and they only had one of the two browns…so I had to order them. I’m not going to finish the underglazing before I leave unfortunately.

The skin needs two more layers and then I can do all the bones and flowers and everything. So that will all happen when I come back. I’m going to go in tomorrow and pull the neck (which is a separate thing) and put it in my damp box so it doesn’t dry out too much. Also leave a note about the stuff that needs to be fired.

Quiltwise, I started quilting on Monday…

And I did more yesterday during the day…

I’ve only got a little more than 3 hours in. Last night, I spent over 2 hours cleaning, ironing, and packing 6 quilts for the Master Glitch show opening in Oceanside on August 15. I delivered those today, hallelujah, finally got into a show (OK, it was kind of guaranteed, but I’ll take it)…in case you think I always get it…uh uh, I don’t. I go through dry periods and the rejections pile up and I take deep breaths and enter more shows. That’s where I’m at right now.

ANYWAY, I want to get this quilted before we leave, or at least mostly quilted. I might need to buy the binding fabric tomorrow, because when I get back in August, I can’t go to the quilt store until Saturday, and it’s already pretty booked up. Tight deadlines. So I’ll be quilting tonight and tomorrow for a while at least. I might be halfway through the outlining…and there isn’t honestly a lot of solid background, so I don’t expect it to take forever, but tomorrow is kind of crazy.

Here’s the Open Studio announcement for my residency!

Excited about that. Although I guess I will have to have something to put on the walls then. Ha! I drove back from acupuncture today with all the things in my head that I needed to remember to pack. Clothing is in a pile on my bag. Not sure it will fit and I’m missing a few things. Last-minute laundry tomorrow night.

It’s been super warm here…and Simba was feeling it last night.

Poor crazy dude. Honestly, I think they won’t miss me when I’m gone…where am I supposed to sleep anyway?

Foot of the bed, obviously. Bowie eventually moved, but put his claws in my foot at some point during the night.

Little psycho.

I got this ad from somewhere…

They’re wool. Seriously? I’m allergic. I would die. Obviously they’re in my head though. I am packing light. Maybe. Maybe not.

By the way, the World Cup semifinal today between England and Argentina was all decided between my getting in the car and arriving at school (I had to copy some stuff for August). And Hegseth doing testosterone testing? I’m so confused by this guy. So confused. But if he’s overdosing on the stuff, it would explain a lot. Here’s where we are right now…

I am appreciating the lack of work thought in my head (OK, yes, I did copy something today, but it’s because I didn’t have time the day I left and it’s been bugging me, and I’ve learned that when things bug my mind like that, the best thing to do is find a way to make it go away. Now it’s gone. Poof!). But I have lettuce anxiety and voting anxiety and ICE anxiety. And anxiety about reproductive rights. And women and children and LGTBQIA in general…and POC. All of those. But you know what? I no longer have daylight savings’ anxiety?

Oh wait, I do. I don’t know if we are falling back in fall or not, and if we’re not, it’s apparently going to be dark until 9 in the morning. Or something. I’m not sure. I’ll let you know in November what that really looks like.

OK. Gotta go quilt or pack something or IDK what. Make a list for tomorrow. I’ve charged everything that needs charging. I’ve figured out what cord goes with each thing that charges, but I still have extra cords. Always. I think the Man just bought us something else that needs charging too. I’ll let you know. Next time I post, I should be in a car somewhere. The boychild will be here dealing with animals and watering for a bit, and then the ex. Then I’ll be making art. Hopefully lots of it.

Readjusting…

Officially panicking about getting everything done that needs to get done. Pretend you’re a teacher and you have 8 weeks to catch up on life and relax and reset…but then you don’t have all those weeks to do the stuff that needs to be done at home. I don’t usually go on vacations during the summer, so I’m not used to this. I go during Spring Break and accept that nothing will get done during that time. So I’m readjusting. Trying anyway. I’d really like some things to be done for sure, but I keep adding more things. Like this wonderful kid…

There’s the girlchild, backpacking in the wilderness (beautiful place), and I just realized today that her birthday happens while I’m in the middle of nowhere and I need to deal with that before I leave. Next week. Hmmm. OK. Add that to the list. I tried to deal with cat litter yesterday but there was a lack of information. OK. Well. I guess I won’t be dealing with that. There is someone else who can. This is where you realize how much you normally manage. And it’s OK to leave and let others do it (or not, and then it’s late), but the list is there, living in my head.

So I ironed a lot this weekend. By choice. I should have done some other things, but this is fairly normal behavior for me during the summer. This is Friday night…

Made it into the main central figure…then Saturday night, after all afternoon down at the bay (more about that later) and then fireworks…

Got the torso and arms done…then last night and afternoon…

The head is done. I’m in the 1000s at this point. I’d like to just sit home and iron, but a friend is in town, so I’m racing around a bit, trying to get some of the to-do list done (and mostly failing, honestly) so I can hang out with her for a while. I’m hoping none of the doctor’s visits/tests require followups at this point, because I don’t know when I will do them. Last night was the brain MRI for the ocular migraine; not expecting any changes with that. I’ve had two of them already. They are fascinating to look at. Then dermatology and breast MRI later this week. Plus another acupuncture appointment. Dammit; I think I need to book another one of those before I go next week. Crap. OK. See? It’s crazy. The stuff that’s supposed to be helping me is stressing me out.

The fourth at the Bay…with the Man’s band, Radio Thieves.

I danced for a little while, but then was tired and hot. I read a lot too, which was fine. I had to kamikaze down early because the Man freaked out about parking…it was crazy down there.

Those overalls. Yikes. Anyway, we booked out after the second band, around 6:30 PM, got home, I ate (he ate there), then we went over to the street above my parents’ house (no we didn’t tell them…we were out of it) and watched the fireworks with the dog in the car so he wouldn’t freak out. He’s good, but whines and barks with all the noise. He got a big treat afterwards for being a good boy.

I saw this…is that a badger? Really? They have badgers?

I’m excited about that. Weird, I know. I am.

Last night, I packed a few beads and sequins for the two quilted, dye-painted quilts I’m taking with me for brainless slow stitching. I quilted this at some point over the last three days.

Ideally it will get a binding sewn on before we go. I painted this last year on my self-directed residency while waiting for the post-biopsy notification (it took 10 days, but it was fine). I also have to pack the box to ship…I have piles on the girlchild’s bed and I keep culling. Don’t take too much! But also, I’ll need bandaids because I’m like that. I got a serious scrape at the grocery store yesterday. Took forever to stop bleeding and it’s not small. Not stitchable though. I’ve been cleaning it and putting antibiotic cream on it and plastering it with a huge bandaid, but the timing sucks for an open wound. Hoping it starts to scab up before we leave. Added to today’s shopping list? Giant bandaids. Of course.

In case you think I stop thinking about science over the summer.

Those hands though.

This is for the political idiots.

A lot of sci fi focuses on the ideas of communism…but I don’t think most Americans do. But someone is obsessed with it. Ignorant, but obsessed.

Here’s the second sculpture; I went in on Friday and finished glazing it.

I still need to finish my other piece…I wanted to be able to bisque fire it before I left. Not sure I’ll be able to do that honestly. Running out of time.

I’d love to be able to do this…

Working on it.

OK. Today. Is a clusterfuck. If I’m lucky, I’ll be able to get some of the shopping done that I need to do while dragging my friend along with me (sorry, not sorry…she just wants to see me and talk to me and get fed…those things will happen). I need to do one more thing before I leave for that. Hopefully I’ll be ironing tonight though…I need to get this thing at least pinbasted before I leave (ha! ha ha ha! Did I tell you I’m gone this weekend too? Yeah, I know). It’s hot here today; hoping it’s less hot at the beach; that’s where we’re going first. Not sure about the rest. All the museums I planned are closed today and most are closed tomorrow…which sucks, because it’s shows I wanted to see and they’ll be gone before I get back. Sigh. WTF world. Not doing a good job of relaxing y’all. Nope. Not. I’ll get there, but not yet.

More Fun Than Ladders

Whoa. It’s been seconds since I realized it is now July. It is July, right? WTF. How did that happen? I know, the inexorable march of time forward blah blah blah. I’m leaving for my residency in 17 days. I did start making a pile of stuff on the girlchild’s bed. I fall asleep to lists of things I need to pack or ship (I need an iron for sure…do I need a ruler? Unknown.).

I have been chipping away at all the things…the back deck railing is painted. The fascia is a mess; I’m surprised the people putting the gutters up didn’t say anything (then they would have had to DO something). So I’m doing something. On a ladder. Fun times. I started painting the other half of the east-facing deck wall. At some point, I will need a ladder for that as well. I don’t like ladders. I got my car fixed and got the radio replaced. I’m very happy about that…I upgraded a bit so my phone connects. Excited about that (weird thing to be excited about unless you’re about to leave on a million-mile driving trip). OK, it’s not a million miles. Short route is only 847 miles. One way. So it’s not a short distance. Longer than we usually go for a vacation, but the Man is only going halfway. The first day of driving will suck, but it will be fine after that. I’m really excited. Trying to control the need to take everything I own with me. Hard to do. I’m a hoarder at heart. Yardwork is slowly getting done, but since it will never BE done, it’s fine. A little every day. Mostly. I figured out all my medications and how to organize that…that was a challenge.

In quilt progress, I cut stuff out on Monday night…

Yesterday, I finished cutting stuff out in a couple of hours, forgot to take a picture, and then spent 90 minutes sorting them.

I’ll start ironing it all together tonight. I might put a small dye-painted quilt together first, so I can add it to the pile coming to Oregon. I think I’m going to bring two of them with me and try to finish them there; I have so many shows coming up that I want to enter and so little work that’s available.

I went to ceramics the last two days…when I took the class, I wasn’t thinking about (a) where to store these things and (b) the fact that I needed to finish them. So it took about 2 1/2 hours to glaze the smaller one…

It’s Stroke and Coat, so it’s one and done. It’ll still need to dry for about two weeks before it can go in the kiln though.

This is 2 1/2 hours on the second one…

Probably another two hours to go. Here it was before I started glazing.

I think they’re just going to go out in the yard to scare the squirrels away. I like the idea of these. I might make more? I don’t know. I need to finish the upper torso of the other one and get it bisque fired before I leave. Yikes. It seems like I have plenty of time, but I have a lot of stuff planned in the next 2 1/2 weeks. The Man has two shows, we have a weekend away for his birthday, a friend is visiting for two days, and I have four different doctors’ appointments? Maybe 5. Plus getting the fabric prepped and entering a few more shows. Plus all the house and yardwork. It’s a lot. Plus I sat in the library parking lot today so I could return a book. I like to NOT leave the house if I can get away with it. It’s nice here; there’s a breeze, it’s sunny, but not too hot, and it’s quiet at the moment.

Anyway. So the day is almost done, but the car radio got done this morning. I think I’m going to go put gloves on and do the kind of dangerous fascia wood treatment, so I can patch it this evening. Sand it tomorrow? Maybe paint Friday? The sun has to be in the right place for all the painting stuff or it’s too hot. For me and the paint. I’ll keep letting my brain percolate about what to take to Oregon. I found the cute little iron mom bought me…so it’s going. I thought about that at about 1 AM, when the Man’s snoring took a turn for the worse. Fun times. Tonight, I’ll work on some fabric stuff, probably ironing stuff together and quilting. That’s the plan anyway. Looking forward to it. More fun than climbing up and down ladders.

The Word of the Day Is Chaos

I’m trying to get my writing back on schedule. My brain has been summer break fuzz. I did realize over the weekend that I’m leaving for my residency in less than three weeks, and I have 17 thousand things to do before I leave, so there’s a tiny bit of panic in there. But also, I’m still waiting to get my car back…it’s been gone since Thursday. I’m glad I took it in, because the radiator probably would have died and maybe the battery too and that would have sucked big time. So it’s all good. Still don’t have the radio thing fixed though. Sigh.

OK, let’s start with fabric…I finished ironing everything to fabric last Thursday…

I used 176 different fabrics.

I like to sort by color; it gives me an idea of what I used more or less of in that particular quilt. Although sometimes if pieces were small in one color, it won’t be as obvious in the quilt as when I use big pieces of colors…like I know there’s big gray clouds everywhere and some big fleshy patches plus a giant sun. So those fabrics will show up more in the quilt than they might in this color sort.

I actually started trimming them during an art Zoom on Wednesday, but here’s the first official photo of trimming on Thursday night…

Top left is trimmed, top right is not, bottom is trash, which I hold onto until the quilt is done in case I lose a tiny piece and need to replace it. I also keep all the sorted fabrics until the quilt is done; same reason.

Scribble likes to sit on my lap while I do this, which is not always convenient. No way can I reach my tea in this situation.

But I will rarely say no to a cat on my lap.

Friday night…flipped

Trimmed stuff is on the right.

Saturday night…trimmed still on the right…

More Scribble assistance.

Sunday night…

And more Scribble…

She doesn’t stay for super long. And she does bat at the loose bits. So at this point, I am almost 13 hours into the trimming and I probably have at least 2 hours to go, if not more. I’m hoping to be done today, but there’s a lot of chaos today that needs to happen as well, so we’ll see. I need a car!

I also took a ceramics class on Saturday from Moni Blom. I had gone to a demo class of hers before. Her stuff is just fun and whimsical…

However, I didn’t consider that whatever I made in class would need to be added to list of things I needed to get done before I left! I made two sculptures…you can see another student’s piece behind my blurry ones (obviously badly focused in the moment).

Plastic is covering my Fallopian tubes. You know. Like you do. I made two because the first one (taller) was starting to lean. My hand is holding the second one. In real life, you’d make all the parts and let them sit for a day before trying to put them together. I’m hoping they are still standing upright when I go in to glaze them today or tomorrow.

I dropped at least two of the parts doing this anyway. Fun things though. Would look great in the garden, if your garden was less chaotic than mine.

My heart made it out of the bisque fire.

Oh yeah, they said the sculptures needed to sit for 2-3 weeks before firing. That’s when I leave. Yikes. I’m a little stressed at the moment at the timing of everything. I’m trying to enter shows too, and that’s kind of a clusterfuck…can I ship before I go? Can I deliver before I go? Who knows. I dumped one because I couldn’t tell…not enough info. Frustrating.

More art-related stuff. This is the Instagram of the newish group I joined at the end of last year.

You should go follow it; this is a detail from a piece by Luana Rubin. We have a show just finishing up at the New England Quilt Museum in a few weeks, then it travels to Festival of Quilts in Birmingham, England. There will be an exhibit at IQF in Houston, Texas, but I unfortunately won’t have a piece in that. I was considering going, but it’s all a timing thing. Then it will all go to Road to California in January. There are more exhibits planned, but I will be making a new piece to travel at that point.

Here’s a photo Margaret took of me in front of one of her pieces I really liked, when I was up in San Francisco.

One of my favorite shirts too.

I had two work-related events in the last few days; here’s my whole teaching team at the retirement party of one of our principals…

Almost mentally on break. Soon. I said goodbye until August to a lot of people on Sunday. I suspect I may be on Zoom with this crew at some point before that though.

Ah this.

I’m eternally frustrated by humanity…and the lack thereof. Because this…

And this…

FFS folks. We work our asses off. And it’s so hard starting break and having people tell us we’re LUCKY to need this time to recharge so we can go back to working our asses off. Unpaid too. I won’t see a paycheck until the end of August. But at least we have this…

Thanks to my solar panels and the battery. They help.

But this happened today…

And the more disturbing part of this is the far right’s argument that childbirths are down and we need more babies. From teens? Who need more supports? Which you have also decimated? What the absolute fuck. So I’m considering a quilt about this. Maybe. I have so many things I have to do in the next 7 months quiltwise. The topics are up in the air though, so if I can get my head around what this would look like. I think I can. Certainly there’s falling…lots of falling and flailing with no help.

And lastly, because it’s summer…

Although not potatoes; too many carbs. It’s summer and my blood sugar is a pain in the ass. Plus I have two MRIs next week, and though I’ve done one with my glucose monitor in, when I called, they said no for the first one…so I think I’m going without the monitor for a week. Which is a little scary with the numerous lows I’ve had. My body is in recovery from school still. And the heel pain is still there, though walkable. So I have another acupuncture appointment set up. And I have a pile of exercises to get through. Plus a pile of pieces of fabric that need trimming. I need to be ironing this thing together in the next day or so. Yesterday, I started putting the 20+ quilts away that had accumulated in the girlchild’s room over the last few months, as shows returned work and I finished a few. I got three rolls of quilts dealt with, but I can’t fit one of them under the bed any more. Not sure how I fit it before, because I didn’t add anything to it…just tried to put back the six quilts that had come back. I can’t lift the other roll up onto the bed, so I’ll deal with those tonight. But I think I need to start a new one and I’m not sure where it’s going to go. I’m still storing other people’s art for a possible airport show that hasn’t come about yet. I feel like I’ve had those hanging around for a year or so. Ah well.

OK. Today. Need a car. Need to go grocery shopping (see ‘need a car’). Need to paint the back deck railing for the third time. Need to finish cutting things out. Need to get to ceramics if possible and glaze. Definitely tomorrow if not today. I’m doing laundry. Need to put quilts away. Need to lay out stuff I want/need to take to residency so I can get a good idea of what I’m shipping and what is going in the car. Need a walk, honestly, but it’s warm. And no car, so that limits my walkiness. I do have a lunch for today though. And I have paint and stuff to cut out. So if I can’t leave the house, there is (unfortunately) plenty to do. I need someone to help me lift this quilt roll up. Should have had the Man help before he left for work. Oh well. Plenty of yardwork to do (always…never ending). You know what I don’t have to do? Lesson plan. Grade shit. Go to school. Whoop whoop for that.