Weekends just aren’t long enough for all the things. I suspect some people do some of the things during the week, but all I do during the week is work on school, work on art, eat, sleep, and occasionally exercise. A few social things on Zoom or in person, but not many. Today I have a 2-hour staff meeting and a drive to my photographer’s after school, so it will be a long day. Ironically it is a short teaching day. Ah well. I’m giving an assessment (quiz?) in one class and showing a movie in the other. Should go fine.
What did I do this weekend? Lots of school work, a hike, dinner out with the Man, an art meeting almost an hour away (lots of drive time in the last week for art), groceries, laundry…maybe 50% of what I needed to get done. As usual. It is what it is. I did read my book too, so that’s my time. And pilates. Necessary but my time.
I ironed all three nights…not getting enough done on this thing. Haven’t had enough time on the weekends to spend a few hours ironing, unfortunately.
I had these tiny little overlapping veins/arteries to deal with on Friday night. They were a pain in the butt.
And then I had filled up the teflon sheet, so I was going to need to move the whole thing off and reattach it, which is always a bit scary.
Plus I ironed an incubator. Gotta be way easier than giving birth. Although not very portable. Should’ve put a handle on it.
Added an in-leg phone with apps, plus a fleshy knife pocket for dangerous situations.
Tried to consider all her needs.
She’s got some sciency experiments going on.
Some are turning out fine. Some maybe not so much.
Some protective breastwear.
Last night, I ironed the little froggy boy plus some additional tech for her arm.
Really she’s got everything she needs…except maybe a body fridge for storing sandwiches and drinks. Didn’t think of that until just now.
Really enjoying this piece, which is nice. It’s a little twisted and dark but fun. Political, but some wouldn’t see that. Not like most of mine, which bash you in the face with politics. And I have hit the halfway mark…which just means I need to go faster. I really need this one done sooner rather than later. Sigh. Ah well. There’s 12 hours into the ironing, probably 12 more to go.
And it finally warmed up enough at night to switch flannel out for the quilt I started a million years ago and finished last year.
Still need to make matching pillow cases. Haven’t done that. Have the fabric, have tons of the fabric, but time…that’s another issue altogether. I have a baby shower coming up and there’s no way I’m going to be able to make a baby quilt. Sigh.
We hiked at one of the local spots we regularly do, but haven’t been to since December.
The water moved the bridge a little off…it’s meant to move. There’s a lot more water than normal.
Lots of flowers…
We keep doing these close to sunset due to all my stuff during the day. It’s nice out, but we expect to see more coyotes and don’t. Not sure why.
Then dinner out and the drawing I started last week and couldn’t finish.
It got weird. So did the Man.
Kitten’s hiding space behind all the things.
A friend got me this…
Totally appropriate. I can’t sew with shoes on. Or slippers. The Man thought she had gotten this specially made, and I’m like no, this is a thing…I’m not the only one. I still don’t think he believes me. Finding space for it in here…
Starting the week out tired. I know, what’s new. I got a lot of 8th grade stuff done yesterday and then realized how far behind we are in 7th grade stuff. Whoops. Plus grading. I can’t lesson plan AND grade, and progress report grades are due next week. I didn’t grade any of the late work or redoes…didn’t have time. I don’t know when I will have time. I have dueling meetings this Saturday. Can’t be in two places at once. Oh well. Plus I’ve gotta fit that hike in. 33 days of school left. Getting there. Losing my mind on the way, but getting there.
Yo! April is almost over. That was fast. May is coming…one of the longest months of the school year. A vast expanse of days with testing and kids’ brains already on summer, plus grades, hurtling toward the end of the year, which alternately comes too fast (not enough time to get everything done) and not fast enough (please make it stop). Much like my weekends.
I did start ironing the quilt together…fun stuff. I did some Friday night and a goodly chunk on Saturday, which made up for only 32 minutes on Sunday. Long day there. Friday night in the dirt…
Saturday started in the green…
Got the rakunk done…
Reference to Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood…here she is with the whole dirt area…
So that was Saturday afternoon, followed by Saturday night, when I did a few of the DNA bugs I drew…
Sunday I finished those and added a few more bugs and one of the skull flowers.
Definitely progress.
We also hiked on Saturday…we hadn’t been to one of our regular hiking spots since December, and the rains had definitely affected it…lots of flowers, for one…
The path being covered by water, also a thing…
Ducks in there as well. So we wandered around to find the crossing.
And then wandered through the rest of the overgrowth…I don’t think I’ve ever seen a tarantula at the reserve. I’m sure they’ve been there…just not so obviously.
Lots of flowers…I said that…
And caterpillars…
All in the middle of the path for some reason.
And as we were coming back, there must have been some moisture reflecting rainbows in the clouds…
Hard to get photos of rainbows with an old phone camera. But it was there. Just a piece of it though.
Last week, there was an artist talk at the FIG Climate Reckoning show. I couldn’t go because it was during my school day. But my work got in the photos from the talk. There’s You Pollute Me, next to Cindy Zimmerman talking about her work.
And Beyond the Concrete near Jennifer Spencer discussing her piece.
That show comes down next week, so if you want to see it, you should go this week.
Kitten trying to see the dog next door…
Back in her cave.
This describes school and life all too well.
I didn’t sleep well last night. Couldn’t fall asleep. Couldn’t stay asleep. Every Sunday at the moment.
Yeah, I’m a little like this.
Maybe more than a little. Ugh. Gonna go crawl in a hole with my book. My book that is due in two days, so I need to finish it.
This is just damn disturbing.
I don’t know what the fuck we’re thinking at the moment.
Followed by this.
Too many attempts to control women, but not guns. I know what the bigger problem is. Unless the plan is to make women have more babies so we can shoot them? Is that it? Seems silly.
OK. It’s Monday, y’all. Monday with the week stretching out in front of me. Lots of work. Lots of meetings…one art meeting yesterday. It’s where I finished grading all the week’s homework (a plus). I panicked about school a lot over the weekend, mostly lesson planning 8th grade. After Tuesday night, I’ll probably be panicking about 7th grade too, thanks to the idiotic school board members. Dumbassery. Yesterday, I went to the art meeting, which was about 45 minutes away, so drive time and sit time. It’s a good group of artists though, so it’s nice to have that in-person connection again. Then came home and worked on school stuff, took a break to make lunches for the week, more work, then made dinner, more work. Was going to go iron and remembered one thing I hadn’t done for school that I needed for this morning. Damn. More work. Then a bit of ironing.
Today is work then meeting then Zoom book club. I liked the book, so that’s good. Plus more work in there somewhere, because there’s always more work. Plus I need to finish reading that other book. It’s big and I’m only at 78%. A challenge! I like those.
43 days. I often come back to school after Spring Break with some sense of exhaustion, sometimes burnout, although usually Spring Break helps with that…and it did. I can’t imagine how burnt out I’d feel right now if I hadn’t had two weeks off. This year seems worse. As I was making new seating charts last night, the thought of actually being in the classroom, trying to impart knowledge to some of these totally checked-out kids, of the daily war to get stuff out there and have it matter on some level…plus stress about finishing grades and the school board being stupid with the sex ed curriculum, because that means having to come up with something else at the last minute, the last TIRED minute, plus realizing I should have spent HOURS on 8th grade because it wasn’t planned out past tomorrow. All that. I needed to not think about it for a while, so that’s what I did. And now I have to think about it again.
43 days.
Meanwhile, I finished quilting…
I did a marathon (not really…I’ve done longer) of almost 4 hours on Friday…
Even did a different color for once. I didn’t want the words to overpower the lab coat.
I only had a little outlining left…here on the head. So mostly I did background scribbling.
Stayed up a little late to finish. It’s OK. Saturday was chill. Well, I had to ship a quilt (did that), buy more boxes (did that too), and buy binding (yup). The quilt store I like has never gone back to pre-COVID hours, so I can only go on Saturdays before 3. It sucks, and sometimes means I don’t go there…I shop my stash. Which is a pain sometimes, to find enough…this one, I probably JUST could have found enough if I’d had the right color of batik (they’re wider than most of the others). But I’m glad I didn’t have to spend an hour dealing with that. It’s not ideal to buy more fabric or spend money, but it’s nice and easy.
Saturday, I trimmed the damn thing. Had to clean the floor again, but this time I had knee pads!
A friend sent me a link while I was camping after seeing the pinbasting post. It helped, although getting up and down with them on was a challenge. Probably I’m doing that wrong.
Then last night, I got the binding partially on…
Still need to sew the sleeves on and then handstitch the rest. Yeah, I do that. It’s OK. I don’t mind. And I’m fast. Emailed the photographer already. Then it’s time to do the next one…which is half done already. So I will start with sorting all the cut-out ironed-on pieces and go straight into ironing it together. Which means cleaning up the disaster of fabric that is behind me right now. Yup. Not looking forward to that part.
But first, I have to go to school and get my room back in order. They cleaned floors and luckily put my tables and chairs back, but the rest is a disaster. I’m gonna sweep it all behind the counter and trip over it for a few days until I can find a place for it all again. Yesterday was 6+ hours of school stuff…yes, because I’d ignored a lot of it for the last week. I did some on Saturday night, stuff I’d forgotten about. Whoops! And one academic assignment I knew I hadn’t done. But yesterday, I realized I had needed to probably spend another 6+ hours on 8th grade. I tentatively have stuff for the whole week now, but previously, only had through tomorrow. I need to figure one thing out for sure, but need time for that, and a 2-hour staff meeting about literacy will not help with that. Although it’s important. I hope the meeting is helpful. We’ll see. Part of the planning required me to draw three strands of DNA…here’s one.
Like you do. It was easier to draw it than find what I wanted online.
Persuaded the Man to hike on Saturday. I needed to get out of the house and we need to get back in the habit…
His back was bugging him, so we did flat…
Flowers were out though. And it was 3 miles of flat. Better than nothing.
I also finished the May Sue Spargo Homegrown blocks…
I have June and July left…
Not going to be done anytime soon, that’s for sure. But I enjoy stitching them.
Luna being sweet…as a counterpoint to putting her claws in your body parts when she panics and runs away because of some strange noise or movement she didn’t like.
Kitten being very needy.
Right there, in my face, as I’m trying to eat or read.
And Nova…
Taking up my whole chair. I think she moved a little bit to let me sit down and work…but not a lot.
OK. Need to go deal with my room. Get my head in the game. I think I’m doing genetic traits today with 8th and ecosystem cover page with 7th. Changed all their seats, more for my sanity than anything else. Two-hour meeting after school. Maybe a walk after that? Another habit I need to get back into. Zoom meeting tonight…I would have gone to the meeting, but the speaker is Zooming instead of coming, so it seems pointless to drive all that way. I can listen on Zoom and finish the binding. Easier after a long first day.
From Organ Pipe, we went up to 5500′ in elevation, higher where we hiked. It was cooler, but not enough during the day to really matter. We considered (and deconsidered…unconsidered? Removed from consideration) one hike due to the climb with the heat. We’re out of shape and heat is hard. But it was still a nice place to be, Chiricahua National Monument, which might be a National Park by the next time we go. Which will be hard for it, because there are only 26 campsites or something like that. We had a great campsite when we were there in 2018 (minus the loud kids in the two sites next to us), but I couldn’t get that one, so this is the one next to it.
Not as good. Lots of sun issues during the day, lots of moving chairs to get shade. But not bad. The amphitheater was right next to it, though, and people kept going there to have private conversations and/or entertain children. Notes for next time.
The last time we were there, we had the energy to hike after we set up camp (WTF, who were those people?); this time? Not so much. We did sit through an hour-long presentation on paws, pines, and poop that was totally worth it. I know more about animal poop now than I ever did before. Did not help at all when I was on the trail, staring at scat, trying to figure out who had left it. Ah well.
There were many Mexican jays in camp.
They were pretty ballsy about being on the tables…
Good reminder to put shit away, which is good, because this is bear country…and jaguar, mountain lion, and bobcat territory, plus!!!
Our first time seeing a WHOLE coatimundi in the wild (last time we only saw the tail disappearing into the brush). This is a single male. We still haven’t seen a whole group of females wandering around.
Last time, we also saw deer. We saw them while driving this time…
But our evening attempt to hike to the meadow they like to hang out in turned into a mostly dark night hike, not so good for seeing deer. We were really bad at timing dinner this trip…either too late or too late. Really, we were always too late even when we tried to be early.
The first night, after the very long poop talk, we ate freeze-dried things and then the Man tried starting a fire, but it wasn’t in the mood and neither was he. I did draw by the dying fire…
The wind picked up while we were there.
The last time we were here, we missed a shuttle up to the top with a hike down to the visitor center (we only camped one night), so this time, we wanted to do that. The shuttle picks you up in the campground and drives you up to Massai Point, so you don’t have to come back to your car.
Last time, we went down into Echo Canyon and then had to climb back out in the heat, which was not fun. So this was more fun. Although it was still hot. So we have saved the longer hike for the next time, when we will either have to start earlier in the year or earlier in the day. Not sure which is going to be easier to pull off. PLUS be in better shape going into vacation, so no job shit that takes up tons of time, no scarlet fever or nasty colds. You know. Ha! Because we have control over all that.
Chiricahua is known for its hoodoos.
It’s different than Bryce, if you’ve been there. But still cool.
That said, it was warm and we were glad to mostly be going downhill.
Lots of different pine trees out there too, a nice change from saguaros.
Also these things are fun to consider drawing.
So this was about 5 miles down…
Mostly exposed…
Reminded us of home, honestly. But there was a breeze, which made it bearable. It really was only in the 80s, but at 6500 feet starting, the sun just feels hotter.
There was still water in the stream at the bottom though. We did another mile and half at dusk to Not See the deer, so we got our 5-mile Hike to Health pin from Chiricahua too. Cool beans. And we have reasons to come back.
I worked on this block in the car from El Cajon to Organ Pipe, in the campground at Organ Pipe, in the car from Organ Pipe to Chiricahua, in the campground at Chiricahua, and in the car home to El Cajon…
I go back and forth during the day between stitching (mostly brainless) and reading (requires slightly more brainpower, depending on the book)…nighttime is for drawing.
I finished it somewhere outside of Gila Bend, I think. Or going into Gila Bend. Hard to say. It all looks the same.
Is that Interstate 10 or the 8? And then I started the next one…got about that far in the car…
And almost finished it…
Crooked tree trunk and all.
So when we got home, we were there for less than 24 hours, and then left for a They Might Be Giants concert at Humphreys. We had reserved a room as a treat, and they gave us a balcony overlooking the venue! So I stitched there a bit…
If we’d been smart, we would have watched the whole show from the room, because it rained and rained (drizzle, but solidly wetly constantly drizzling)…
It was fine in that picture…
But no. We wanted to hang out and bounce around down where we could see the whole thing.
Although trying to see over the people in front of me got harder and harder. Ah well. And this video was because everyone was singing along to this, but you can also see the rain going sideways through it.
Amusing. And no, we didn’t bring raingear. This is freakin’ San Diego, y’all. In Spring. So I think I had 4 layers on, including a hoodie. The Man didn’t. We didn’t think it through. It was fine; we had fun.
Foggy/cloudy view of downtown.
We wanted to test out some of the AI art apps, just to see what they did. I find them frustrating, and gave up pretty quickly, but from that picture of us above, and the text “woman covered with cats”, I got this.
I couldn’t get it to do anything with my art. Ah well. I went back to stitching. The Man has 20 tries with mice with mushroom hats.
Here are better pictures of the four drawings I did on the trip…
Some were more complicated than others. Oh wait, there were five. But I abandoned this one.
It was after I’d seen a bunch of news articles about shooting and pregnancy laws and stupid political bullshit. Like this shit…
Which then turned into this one…and anytime they want to pull Viagra? I’m good with that.
Which I might make into something.
Here’s the windy night drawing…
I was reading about all this space stuff, which might explain her head. Might not.
And the last night, when we were both in pretty irritable moods honestly…
Although it’s not apparent in the drawing, unless you look at the really bad coatimundi drawing. Ah well. Shit happens.
I also managed to find the energy to quilt on Tuesday night…
It took a lot of caffeine…
And a certain amount of panic about the end of Spring Break always coming much faster than I’m prepared for. Yesterday, I spent most of the day working on a artist’s grant application. My CV is now up-to-date, I’ve found some relevant press releases, and I submitted the whole damn thing around noon today…probably about 10 hours in that thing, but if I get it, totally worth it. If I don’t? I can try again. I’ve done the hardest part already. Plus maybe it’s time to try for some artist residencies too, although they would need to be paid for in some way.
More quilting last night after staring at that damn CV for about 5 hours…
I’m more than halfway through the outlining. More today. I was expecting to be done with this by today, but reality is always a slap across the face. I have four things to grade, all the makeups and redoes to grade, lesson planning for 8th grade, posts for 7th and 8th…ugh. I will have to do some of that today or tomorrow, but the goal is to finish the quilting, pack up another quilt for a show, do some house and yard work? Maybe. Eh. Floors need cleaning. I want to go on a hike tomorrow. We’ll see.
Kitten has been stalking me. She’s very glad to have me back.
The other two are as well…
I’ll finish off with this…
Made me laugh.
OK. Yard? Because it’s still daylight and a little moving around won’t hurt me. Then quilting. I’m not cooking tonight (hurrah!). Then more quilting. Yeah.
Well we’re back; told you it was a short one. A short one with limited cell service. I’d be sitting in camp at night and 3 texts would ping in but whatever service had brought those in whisked away with the wind. It was all good. Nice to not be tethered to all that for a few days.
The landscape, as always, was gorgeous, as are the animals and the stars and the moon (although we lost that the last few days due to the landscape). I do get tired of eating the same stuff and having to clean up at bear level (better than having bears in camp though). And if I had to camp for more than three days with no shower, I’d probably shave my head because I can’t stand my hair anymore after that. Last night’s shower was a delight. Usually we camp for a while and then get an AirBnb for a break, but because this was a short trip, we skipped that part. Which is why we got up yesterday morning and drove all the way home (from the Eastern side of Arizona). We needed a bed, a fridge, and a shower. All good.
We stop at weird little parks to eat lunch while we’re driving, just like I did when I was a kid and my parents drove me across the country to see every historic landmark in the US.
This mural was in one of those parks.
By the way, the landscape described as “high-density cactus forest” that is Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument is absolutely gorgeous in spring…all flowery and green and weirdly amazing. Totally would go there again, even though the daytime is hot. They say April is the end of the hiking, and I would agree, unless you are hiking at night. Warm. Some shade, not enough.
I’m not really a desert lover…it’s hot and dry and often flat, but this was beautiful.
We were lucky to have gotten one of the few campsites with a ramada, which gave shade at certain times of the day, mostly the hot times.
You had to keep your car hood up and start the car at least once a day to keep pack rats out of the engine. I never saw any, but I did see a lot of hoods up.
Mostly flat desert makes for really nice sunsets…especially when there are some clouds out there.
We went to one of the ranger talks, about the moon, which I just finished teaching about.
No fire pits, but we managed fires in the grills. Good thing…the Man can’t stand camping without the requisite staring into the fire and managing the fire. It’s fire TV. I do a little staring myself, but mostly it’s my drawing time.
The moths were particularly happy about my headlamp on the first night.
It was warm enough to not even put socks on for a while. It’s been a while since we’ve camped anywhere that warm. And of course, that means it’s even warmer when we’re hiking, which is harder. But hike we did. The Arizona parks have a Hike for Health thing going on right now where you get a pin if you hike at least 5 miles in the park (proven by photos), so we did that in both parks. But honestly, we’re out of shape after a particularly un-hikey winter (health plus work plus weather). Normally we’d be in for 10-15 miles a day, but we did less.
We did Victoria Mine, which was close to 5 miles when we finished; we should have started two hours earlier to beat the heat, but we didn’t. The ocotillo was just starting to leaf out, so some had flowers and no leaves, some had new reddish leaves, and some had green leaves.
It’s a fascinating plant. I keep trying to simplify it for the quilts I make, because making it realistically is a very time-consuming thing. If I JUST made a quilt about one ocotillo branch, that would be doable. Anything else would be nuts. Says the woman who regularly makes quilts with over 1000 pieces.
I do love me some ocotillo though.
In Organ Pipe, we had pretty good cell service, so my Seek app for identifying plants was working. Since I just made my Desert Mother quilt last year and had researched all these plants, many of which I’ve seen before but never ID’d, it was cool to go around and see them in real life…the Organ Pipe cactus themselves…
Plus all the different chollas…
Saguaros of course…
So many saguaros…
I’d never seen the inside of one…
And some of them had fascinating growth patterns…
Lots of flowers because…Spring…
Spring is such a short season that I often miss the blooms that happen.
By the time I have a free weekend to go down to Anza Borrego, it’s done.
I called this Introverted Cactus.
Stay the fuck away cactus. It’s actually some thorny spike cactus (like no duh, look at that thing). In bloom, nonetheless! This was on the kamikaze half-run up a hill to see the sunset. We didn’t time dinner perfectly, so it was a bit of a rush.
The mine itself had these weird little ceramic sculptures that the rangers said they’d found elsewhere too.
Not original to the park probably.
Requisite photo of us, me looking very red and sweaty (’twas warm!) so we could get our pin.
It was a fairly easy hike, in terms of elevation etc. Just warm.
So that was almost 5 miles…then we rested for a while, cooled off, I took a shower with their solar collectors, so warm sometimes, sometimes not.
Then we realized how crappy our cooler was (seriously needed daily ice infusions, which was a pain)…so we drove into Why, Arizona, to get more ice plus drinks plus snacks.
Lots of cool mural stuff at this convenience store…with a quilt motif!
Pretty amazing…
And fun.
We tried a drive, but the ‘better’ dirt road was enough to persuade me that the 21 miles of ‘not so good’ dirt road would be a pain. The other drive was closed for repairs, unfortunately, but reason enough to come back.
Camp was fine. I had a book, cold water, a chair, and shade. I also had friends…this trapdoor spider by the water spigot…
A round-tailed ground squirrel who came up to my feet until I jiggled them.
Then a run up to the sunset…
Another proof picture…where I force that smile…
Yeah well. Still warm.
But beautiful…
Drawing on the second night…
I had actually started another drawing (I’ll post better photos of these once they’ve downloaded off the cloud), but couldn’t get my head around it. Something about protecting unborn children more than the actually born ones. And guns. And teachers. And banning medications for women, but not men. It was frustration. This second drawing is better and has the potential to be something. When I’m traveling, I just draw to draw, not to potentially be a finished quilt. I usually focus on the landscape around me, which is how this started, but I couldn’t get past the other crap going on in our country.
Which hello…this truck was in one of the campsites down from us…
I finally got all the way around it…
Nice sentiments…
Beautiful. I hope she was safe as she drove. I hope no one made it unsafe for her. Because that’s our existence too, more than half of the nation: women, LGBTQIA, children, people of color. Not safe for any of them. And it should be. I’m not sure when the politicians will realize they are outnumbered. I hope it is soon. As I make my work and it becomes more and more relevant with time instead of less…which is what I want. I want the problems to go away, for the world to be better, and it’s not going that way. It’s getting harder for all those groups and that’s just wrong.
OK, with that happy finish! Ha. Oh wait, I did start working on this on the road…
Just so you have a comparison to later. I always take too much stitching, and that’s OK. No one ever wants to run out of something to work on when you don’t feel like drawing or reading.
Today we are going to a concert, They Might Be Giants (my Xmas present to the Man), and are staying near the venue to make it easier for us old folks, so I need to get a bunch of stuff done, laundered, put away, etc before we leave. Early. Because we are old. Plus school stuff and other stuff…like shipping a quilt to a show! I got into Form, Not Function with The Way Out…
So that’s cool. More politics. Nothing like a Nida quilt with a uterus AND a giant vagina with a landscape in it. Originally made for a show called Portals. So there’s that. Good news all around. I have some work to do this week; even was quilting last night, despite being exhausted, so more of that today as well. First to make sure the pool guy put everything back after trying to flood my house, then another delightful wonderful shower, and then stuff to get done. It’s still Spring Break for 5 more days. More about Chiricahua and the second half of the trip tomorrow. Or Friday. We’ll see.
Well. Here we are. The first day back to work. No kids today (which is good, because I’m not even ready for a room full of educational staff, let alone a school full of tired and cranky middle-schoolers). Introverts love this sort of all-school meeting. Really. We do (want to just crawl into a corner under a desk with our books).
I can’t say that I’m ready. There’s a bunch of stuff I should have done over the weekend, and honestly, let’s be straight up, I didn’t do any of it. Which means it all has to be done today. Ha! That’s not happening either. I do need to copy one thing (there was no more paper last week) and do my seating charts on paper (they exist in the machine). I didn’t grade two things so far…I’m thinking I can do the easy one while I am supposed to be reviewing my strengths and how they will help me do my job. I didn’t grade all the late work and redoes…just about half of them. 20/48 left to go. Plus 6. Ugh.
Stop thinking about work for a moment and think about art! The California Fibers’ opening at the Cannon Gallery was Saturday afternoon. Here’s my two pieces in the show (for some reason, I was relegated to the corner).
And here’s the Man with the quilt he inspired…
So there was that. There were a lot of people at the opening and it felt overwhelming, but there seemed to be a positive response. Honestly I was surprised they took any of my work because they are one of the ‘family-friendly’ galleries (it’s city-owned), but of the three I entered, they took the two that were less nude than the other one, so I’m happy with that. It’s something.
Meanwhile, my goal was to finish the current drawing…so on Friday night, I had inked this far, but had penciled in the bottom right as well…
I love a really complicated drawing. Although I forgot that the handle needed to go OVER the fingers. Ah well. Liquid paper is my friend.
Saturday night, I inked the bottom right…but in typical Nida fashion, did not take a picture of it. I still had some details to add to the bird and last night, I added the tree to fill that space. Plus a few more bug things and another bone.
That’s 9 hours and 17 minutes of drawing there.
Then last night, I started numbering…
And then (after more than an hour) went OH SHIT because it was late and I had to go to work this morning. Fuck. So I stopped at piece 938, which might be halfway? And might not. Tune in tonight to see the total. I’m guessing 1800 pieces. Which is fine. It is. Really. It is.
I did the second figure on this dinner drawing Saturday night…
I’m still not sure it’s done. And I think the one on the left was supposed to be male, but now has a uterus, which seems fair to me.
One of the reasons I didn’t get any schoolwork done yesterday is that I was prepping some quilt sandwiches for a friend of mine who stitches but does not quilt. She did the cross stitch, and I’m making 9 of these and basting them for her.
She’ll do the handquilting, and then I’ll stitch them all into a quilt. Somewhat time-consuming, but not horrible. I’m a little less than halfway with the basting. I’m hoping to finish it tonight or tomorrow night, so I can deliver them to her, and then she’ll take 6-9 months to quilt them before I have to worry about the next part. Which is harder, but still doable. I’ve never done a quilt-as-you-go quilt. There’s always a first time.
I noticed we had more caterpillars on the dying milkweed…
But not all of them are monarchs…
Or are they? That said, the internet isn’t helping much with this one. Too many variations. Anyway, I’ve got about 4 or 5 of them at the moment, all sizes, and the Man says he saw a monarch lay an egg the other day, so I need to get more milkweed. I planted what few seeds I had left, but it’ll be a while before they’re big enough to feed anything.
Meanwhile, when your owl pellets are all gross and covered in stuff, just leave them out in the weather to clean themselves up. They look great after a few months.
Gopher on the left? The right is something else, I think, but it’s still got too much fluff on it. I’ll have to go check the owlet skelly I left out and see how it’s cleaning up.
I forgot the WTF list from the curriculum we had to reconstruct on Thursday and Friday…these were all (well, most) of the things that made us think (or yell) WTF.
This curriculum comes out of Stanford University, by the way. Really shouldn’t have to deal with this. You can see the frustration increasing as we get down the list.
I went to my quilt guild meeting on Saturday and worked some more on my body scarf.
It’s slow but enjoyable. It may never be done.
Can’t go wrong with this stuff…
I almost bought that book to take to work today. But I do give a fuck. That’s the problem.
Kitten enjoying a hint of Spring before the next Winter storm kicks us in the butt…
She likes to sit there.
And last but not least, if I’m going to have to get up at ugh in the morning, you might as well give me a sunset worth getting up for…
My camera missed all the pinks in there, but it was glorious. Unlike the rest of the day. Sitting in a big room with a ton of people. I don’t hate my job. I’m just finding it incredibly overwhelming the last three years…worse each year? No, the 2020/2021 year was bad, last year was slightly better (block schedule, 2 preps, and still COVID made it hard), and this year is bad for the workload…similar to the 2020 year. I just need a year that is less about creating All New Stuff and more about refining stuff, making it better, focusing on behaviors and academics, not so buried in trying to learn new things AND do the old things AND all the other stuff the district continues to throw at us. Yeah. We’re not even at the halfway point…that’s in two weeks? Three? Something like that.
Anyway. I do have to go. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.
Hello 2023. And Happy New Year to those who make a mental shift about now for that reason. We made a nice warm dinner, played a wordy game for a while (until someone got tired of losing), and then I mentally flailed while watching Serpent Queen until 11:57 PM, when we searched for a fake ball drop that happened 3 hours earlier, kissed, and went to bed. It rained all night.
The mental flail was more about what to work on…this is why I don’t like a lot of down time between art projects. It makes me uncomfortable to just SIT and not do anything. That said, I have a book I need to finish by Wednesday at 7:09 PM. I think I’m going to make it, but I had to stop reading the one I was almost done with and focus on this one, which I wasn’t expecting much of, but it is proving more interesting than I thought. I joined a new book club with my friends in the old one, this one focused on mysteries. Hoping for some more recommendations. Hoping to read more, actually. It’s been hard to fit that in once school is in. Too much visual stimulation, reading-like, for school. Not very interesting stuff most of the time. But I managed 55 (almost 56) books last year…not bad…could be better.
So I made a goal to do better in 2023. Things I care about right now: reading, art, travel, my family, my friends. My job is pushing it this year. I obviously care about it because I don’t blow it off. I just think it is taking more than it should from me. Yeah.
Anyway, what else has been going on? Well you know that drawing I started the other day? I rolled it up and put it away. I have two deadlines I’m looking at that are pretty far out, but I find both of them interesting, so I had picked one, the one I’ve been thinking about for months, but then when I got to the paper, I felt like I didn’t know enough to draw it yet. I do have a rough sketch on that paper and I’m not giving up on it; it’s just that the other one started talking to me. Mostly during this hike we did on New Year’s Eve (trying to avoid the rain and the people who like to hike on the first day of the year, by hiking on the last day of the year instead).
Hollenbeck Canyon out past Jamul…
It was nice and cool…well, actually cold and rainy at times…
Totally great for letting your brain wander around…
My knee behaved fine…I’ve been doing physical therapy and trying to exercise enough. I find it’s hard to get out of the pajamas right now. Easier when it’s cold and wet to just stay on the couch and not do anything.
But I feel worse after that. So this is better. I think today is officially the last day of break when I have nothing that I have to do on my calendar. Which sucks. Lots of work and medical stuff over the rest of the week, with a little art stuff sprinkled in. I guess I have to think about work. Don’t want to. As usual.
ANYWAY, back to the drawing, I had done some research (I like to research stuff) and came up with some things tickling my brain, mostly Margaret Atwood’s MaddAddam trilogy (my goodness, how DO you spell that…ah, one more capital letter). And some other stuff. Anyway, I cut out a piece of paper, walked away from it, and then started drawing.
So far, I’m all in pencil.
Yeah, I need to put the Xmas stuff away. Didn’t want to pull the boxes out yesterday with all the rain and wet. Maybe today.
So I will probably start some ink tonight, then some more pencil. Today is the boychild’s birthday. He is getting old enough that it makes ME feel old. Until it doesn’t. Because I’m not that old. Anyway, I don’t think any of that will stop me from drawing tonight, but I do want to get to a stage of this piece that is easier to do with less energy before school starts, because I know I will HAVE less energy when school starts, both mentally and physically. I’m having to full-on STEEL myself for going back (you can do it, one day at a time, you will get through it). Maybe that is always the case, but it seems worse right now. Certainly I feel in giant flail mode.
I have been slowly trying to stitch my way around this giant-ass quilt…
And I finished the April Homegrown blocks (Sue Spargo) finally…moving on to May now.
That sun in the lower right block took a goodly chunk of time on New Year’s Eve. And thread!
Oh yeah, more of the piñata show at the Mingei…
Not what you would expect from a piñata show…
Definitely worth going though…
Just think of it more as papier-mache sculpture. Plus the Mingei has other funky craft work all over the place…
Gotta love a giant Earth covered in beads.
Nova would. If she were allowed to.
Instead, she loved me.
Right up there in your face.
OK. I dreamed (nightmared?) about not having a shower last night. I’m not sure why, but it made me really want one this morning. I have a quilt to quilt, a drawing to draw, and a lot of work to work. I’m hoping to do some of all of it. Also need to pack up a fabric donation box or two, plus cut up more blocks for a donation quilt. I’m liking deadlines that are a long ways out so I don’t have to be so single-minded about making, although it freaks me out when I don’t have something to be single-minded about. I also need to read another third of my book so I finish it before it’s due (I figured a third a day would work). And enjoy the last day of break before the have-tos really kick in. Seems doable.
Good morning. Or as I am feeling it, Morning. So incredibly never ever ready to go back after time off from school. Plus the dog barking at a skunk last night while we were trying to sleep did not help. Luckily no spray…the skunk was outside and the dog inside, but the obvious intrusion into our personal area seemed to drive the little guy nuts. Eventually we got him settled and then tried to sleep again. Ugh.
In good school news, I finished grading the last of the stuff (except for homework, which will be quick), but lots of one grade level didn’t actually do the assignment in the first place, so there’s some issue with that. I don’t have time in the schedule to make them do it in class, so I made a video for those who want to improve. We’ll see if that helps. This year is certainly causing me to jiggle my expectations and revisit how I teach, just because they have COVID brain and can’t function in a classroom. Or maybe it’s just too many devices. Hard to say. Certainly it’s one of the hardest years I’ve taught…and I thought the Zoom year was gonna be that. Ha! The universe chuckles.
I was reading my old blogposts yesterday…sometimes I do that to remind myself that this is all cyclical. And sure enough, Thanksgiving week was a lot of food crazy, not enough exercise, plus a lot of grading, but didn’t finish it all, made some art, but it’s never enough…and it was Santa Ana windy hot! Just like last week. Some things never change. I don’t know if that’s a relief or annoying. Hopefully next year, I will look back at this year and think, oh hallelujah, it’s not that bad. That’s my hope anyway.
So besides grading, we did hike on Saturday…we went out to Barnett Ranch in Ramona…
This is not a hard hike or a long one, but we had the pup with us, so I was aiming for new and different but not too hard.
It’s a nice enough hike. Could have been longer…
Looking at our schedules, I think that’s it until Winter Break for me anyway. We’ll see. Got too much shit going on.
I also ironed both days, but not much…like an hour each day. Back to that sucky schedule…
Although I was more efficient last night…got all the way through the 300s (almost), so I’m about 2/3 done…
Just have the head and all its stuff and then the vomit. Like you do. I was hoping to be done with this part before school started, but no. Maybe I can get the rest done tonight, but it’ll probably take two nights. We’ll see.
I did get these out for the teachers’ manual for our curriculum.
I hate how I have to comb through tiny little print and multiple sources to get what I need to actually TEACH this thing. So frustrating. Plus have to have the headspace and time to figure it out. Hence when it takes an hour to plan one 51-minute class…that’s too much. There’s something wrong with that.
So yeah. Did not plan all three weeks out. Got 6 1/2 days done. Maybe. Not a good sign. Well I don’t have to grade anything but homework for a few days, so maybe I can plan a bit more. Ugh. Really just want to be able to come home and NOT do any of it.
Because that.
OK. It’ll be fine today…starting two new engineering projects on the same day…one I’ve taught before and one I’ve never taught before. Plus 2 meetings. Or 1. Depends. Ironing tonight. After cooking. Hmmm. Might be a tad on the exhausted side by then. So yeah, probably not done until tomorrow.
Good morning. Less sleep than usual. My fault. My desire to sleep in is not matched by the dog’s desire to be awake, fed, and peed. I forget this. Unfortunately.
Also unfortunate. Or at least things to consider: Red Shawl Day on Saturday, which I noticed because I follow a ton of National Parks, and they were all posting about it…per their website, “American Indian and Alaska Native women are missing and murdered at a rate of more than 10 times the national average. Red Shawl Day is an annual national effort to bring attention to the horrible acts of violence committed against Indigenous people, particularly women and children. Throughout the week surrounding November 19, people are encouraged to wear red as a symbol of the loss of sacred lifeblood through violence.” Just proof that justice is not the same for everyone.
Then Sunday was the Transgender Day of Remembrance…”an annual observance on November 20 that honors the memory of the transgender people whose lives were lost in acts of anti-transgender violence.” More people who do not receive equal justice. That followed by the LGBTQ-hate shooting in Colorado Springs by the grandson of my former Assemblyman, Randy Voepel, MAGA all the way down.
They redrew the district lines about 10 years ago, but this is one of the guys I used to email regularly because he didn’t represent ALL of his district, just the white conservative faction (and honestly, the far right). There’s a lot of that dumbassery out here, unfortunately. But sure, let’s make sure all the haters have guns.
I’m currently working on an environmental issue quilt, but guns are ruling for the next one. Or something. Hate? I don’t want to do another hate quilt. We’ll see. I’ve got a while before I’m done with this one.
That said, I finished tracing the Wonder Under last night…
By staying up way too late…
I guess the dog let me sleep in an hour after the Man left for work…that’s a plus. It’s only three yards…much smaller than the last one.
Oh yeah, and this bit…
The vomit. Hence its nickname in my data collection app. So that was 8 hours and 40 minutes of tracing. My hand and shoulder hurt last night…this morning, they are somewhat recovered. The next step is to cut stuff out. I really want to be ironing to fabric by Thursday. I have a lot to do in the next three days, including grades, a dentist’s appointment to finally get the crown I needed back in August, and a Wednesday Thanksgiving dinner…so clean the house and cook. Lots of cleaning and cooking. Plus walking the frantic dog? Yeah, probably. He’s losing his mind right now because the boychild just arrived after being gone since Thursday AM.
I spent most of Saturday grading science units…but we did manage a short hike…
Mostly to try to tire out the barky dog so he’d do less of that…
Plus drawing at dinner, finishing one from last weekend…
The two younger cats have decided to be friends again…less fighting. More cuddling…
The old lady is sleeping a lot…
She had gained weight by the last checkup, but she’s lost weight again this time. One of her meds is for her thyroid, and we’ve had problems getting the right dosage. Plus whatever is going on in her gut causes issues. The truth of it all is that she’s old. But she’s relatively happy and playful despite all that, so that’s a plus.
Oh yeah, Friday’s field trip was OK. Could have been an hour shorter and I would have been OK with it. Expensive place to go, Old Town. The Scavenger Hunt part was good. The kids participated and all. Apparently the 7th-grade group was not as good. I guess that’s the plus of having 8th grade this year.
The graveyard in Old Town…and some diorama thing where the little plastic dog had fallen down.
Anyway, not a bad end to the week. I am enjoying hanging out in my pajamas and not panicking about posting assignments and lesson plans…yet. That’ll be later this week. It’s not a stress-free week, though…never is. Need to catch up on grading and planning so the next three weeks aren’t insane. Need to do Xmas shopping and shipping. Need to catch up on cleaning and yardwork that’s fallen by the wayside while teaching. Plus read 10 books. Is that a thing? I also need to catch up on sleep, which isn’t going to happen if I keep staying up late. But my brain works better then. Sigh. OK. For now, I have one more class of science units to grade so I can take them back to school today. Easier than dealing with them next Monday, plus I have counseling today and need a space that is not inhabited by multiple humans for that. And I need to check the stash for the lab I’m doing next Tuesday. So I need to read the teacher manual for that. Busy week. Always is. But still thinking about all the hinky shit people are doing to other people instead of getting along. Sigh. May there be more to be thankful for as the week progresses.
Well we’re back from nature. Into cold feet and a house that perennially needs cleaning. So much easier to control a campground’s worth of stuff. Although even that can be a pain. The meat didn’t defrost…it was too cold! Well there we are. Years of mom experience to the rescue.
We left for camping around 2:30 PM…drove a little over 90 minutes to a campground in chaparral, mostly, dry, but with oak trees for shade. No showers, OK for a couple of days. It was already cold when we got there and started setting up. It seemed like I kept going into the tent and putting more layers on, or trading out my current layers for better ones.
We had a simple dinner planned the first night…probably a good thing. Mostly we tried to get the fire going…and wondered why people in campgrounds feel a need to play their music loudly.
I managed to finish a drawing I started in May in Ridgecrest, the night before I dropped the Man at Kennedy Meadows to continue his hike.
In bed early, because sleeping bags are warm. Parties around us continued until 3 AM, although we were pro the coyote parties, not the human ones.
We went hiking the next day, although 4 miles was our max.
It was all up. Well the first two miles were anyway. We’re both out of shape. The Man broke his toe in July and wasn’t hiking for a while because of that, and the weekends have been busy with either openings, shows, or my day job sucking up the weekend. We vowed to change that, although my left knee is being cranky and probably needs something.
This was the night of the non-defrosting meat. Warm water baths to the rescue, but my hands are still paying the price today with the repeated dunking in water in dry, cold air. My drawing started in the afternoon, which was a lot of reading and drawing…
This was a big one. I’ve had an idea in my head for the next quilt for about a month now, and this is the first iteration.
After dinner, I did another drawing, not related…
In the smaller sketchbook this time…
Watching the firewood make faces…
The cold chased us to bed around 9 PM again…where the Man had bought lights for the tent…
Fairy lights it is.
Morning dawned cold.
That was after we’d been up for 40 minutes. The cell service was more than we expected, in that it existed, mostly, although not always. The weather app was quite willing to tell me I was actually freezing. We ended up packing out early and eating breakfast at home. There were dark clouds and I didn’t want to deal with rain. Plus I had an artist Zoom at 11, so it made sense. Here was our last view of the area…
Those were not the dark clouds…they were behind me.
We got home in time for the Zoom, managed to shop, do laundry, clean out the tent (the Man did most of that, thanks), and get everything packed away. Every time we do this, we plan to make a list of things we should take, and then the day jobs take over and we never do it, which is how we forget stuff. Ah well. And I’ve misplaced my flashlight too. It’s here somewhere; I just don’t know where I put it down.
I did a bunch of school work yesterday, none of it grading unfortunately. Got a ton of that to do this week and next. More unfortunately. I did pin the bindings on the big alien quilt for the bed…
I’ll be stitching for a while. A bunch of people recommend using those clips to do this. I know I have some…just not sure where.
Earlier, I had enlarged that drawing from the fire…200 and 250%. I started taping it together to see if this is it, or if I’m going to (a) redraw a clean one over the top of it or (b) cut some bits out and redraw them. Don’t know. Will look again tonight. I had to go to bed. A warm bed. Squished between two cats and a dog…a little TOO squished. But warm at least. And not an air mattress. Old bodies.
Work today. Can’t say I’m in the mood. Only five days though. I’d like to get as much work as possible done this week, so I don’t have to do it all next week, but I don’t know how that will play out. Just wish for the best, be as efficient as possible, stay on task, get it done. Art at night…got 8 weeks to finish this next quilt. Don’t make it huge and insanely detailed (might have already blown that edict). Work on it every night…that I can probably do.
Kathy Nida 