Overthinking It…

Hey. Friday is finally here. I haven’t slept well all week (I know, when do I ever) because I’ve been overthinking. I’d like to thank my brain for that. Actually, that is the part of my brain that’s good at the artmaking too…it figures stuff out while I’m doing other things. And it does the same with lesson planning, runs simulations in the background and then shuffles solutions into my working brain. It’s useful…until there’s a personality issue, and then it overthinks the FUCK out of it (what did I do wrong? what could I have done differently? how will this be solved in the future? am I just being a bitch? why is she such a bitch?). You know. All the things. I guess I need to focus on the good things my brain can do and try to meditate through the others…which has meant more meditation than sleep a couple of nights this week. Could do without that.

Also a slow simmering anger and frustration about my school board and their ignorance. Bullshit tactics. Now we are designing our own sexual health curriculum, designed specifically for our kids. Um. Code words for remove the stuff they think is inappropriate: Gender, LGBTQIA…what else is going to set them off? They will have to follow Ed. Code. They’re making a committee of parents, teachers, and health professionals to create this thing from scratch, more work, lots more work, mostly in fighting the ignorance, needs to be evidence-based and science, not your late-night searchings on the internet (seriously, this one guy has way too much time on his hands). At some point, they wanted health professionals to come in and teach the curriculum, and I’m sitting here going (1) because we’re not capable? Nice. I’ve been teaching sex ed for 20 years, dude. (2) There’s a shortage of health professionals already…where are you going to get 5 of these per school for a week to 5 weeks every year? (3) And can they deal with middle-school behaviors (I already know the answer to that). Can they deal with 30+ kids aged 12-14 at the end of a school year that they have never met? I know the answer to that too.

So yeah. I’m making a quilt right now that is mostly not political (well, it is, but lots wouldn’t see it) and it’s fun and full of bright colors, and I feel bad because books are getting banned, women’s bodies are being controlled, LGBTQIA people are losing rights, my trans kids are losing their rights, it’s not safe for them in some places, and where I live may well be one of those places. People…kids…are still being shot. I read that the ERA was in danger. I know all this shit will end up in a quilt eventually, but it feels weird to be making one that is so NOT about those things.

Ah well. I did the same thing last year. Made a bunch of political stuff and one not, and it got into Quilt National. So I guess that’s a thing.

So that’s the mood I’m carrying around inside me today. I’m glad it’s Friday. I’m OK with what I’m teaching today. I think it won’t be too stressful. I’m so incredibly not ready to teach next week in so many ways. I’m fairly sure I will still be butting heads with this other teacher, probably until she leaves our school (she says she hates it here, so yeah, she should leave), so maybe forever. But there’s a weekend coming up and that is some respite. An art meeting. Some more artmaking time. Some reading time. Hopefully a hike. All the things.

I iron every night. I try to iron for an hour. On Wednesday night, I did leg parts…one of the parts was this baby in a pocket. A leg pocket. A pocket of flesh…

Because if you’re not going to put pockets in my clothes, then I’m going to put them in my flesh.

I also did the knee, I think…can’t remember. Wait. I can look back and see.

I did the back foot, and then all of the legs. Obviously not done. This isn’t fast. But it is enjoyable. This was a good choice for working on during the end of school. Although I need to go faster. As always.

Last night, I found and ironed one of the spare arms (another thing we all need) and a snat (snake/rat, also from Oryx and Crake, by Margaret Atwood).

Deciding what animals to combine is one of the interesting things in that series. I’m not sure the snat makes sense at all. But that was part of the point. Humans make a lot of shitty choices. I can easily see our current society in Atwood’s Handmaid’s Tale and Oryx and Crake. They are way too close to reality.

Yesterday, I was inside this during my last two periods…

It was an interesting change. I sent half my kids to another classroom because they’d already done this, and I took the other half through with my co-teacher’s kids. The first group was a little rowdy…as time went on. The second group seemed better. Or maybe I was so exhausted by then that I couldn’t tell. Cool experience for them though. Maybe they never see the world from the inside.

Anyway. So I am not ready for all the things. I need a whole ‘nother cup of tea before I even consider going to school (don’t have time for that…I can make it, but I’ll have to drink it on the way). I have a ton of work outside of teaching to do today, so that is weighing on me, but it will happen. Somehow. And there’s reading and art on the other side of it. All good. Overthink THAT.

Speak Up…

Glad it’s Wednesday, positive thoughts, exercise, art, and my book at the end of it all. Also I got into the Interpretations show at Visions with Same As It Ever Was, so that’s cool. See you at the opening in October.

Hey not only is my school board trying to manipulate our human sexual education program, they compared conversion therapy to a conversation about gender, and it appears they’re in the book banning business as well. Fun stuff. This is the shit that makes teachers quit (or go to another district, if you don’t have a ton of years invested in this one and can’t leave). This quilt is about a lot of things, but started with us white women getting upset about Roe v Wade’s demise, but realizing that for a lot of BIPOC and LGTBQIA people, they never had the same rights anyway, and their rights are eroding at a hundred times the speed of us white babes. So it’s angry but also very focused on what the US is doing, the Supreme Courts, the politicians (that’s Brett Cavanaugh there y’all, if you can’t tell from the beer bottle). Come to the opening and you can READ the big dumb heads.

For my next political piece, maybe I’ll add my school board and book banning for fun.

I am working on the other piece, although last night was not the most efficient. I started late because, well, my day job. I had a ton of work to do for school, still do, and I listened to the school board meeting last night to figure out what’s happening with sex ed because I’m supposed to start teaching it in like 3 weeks and no letters have gone out etc. I think we’re not teaching it, which means I don’t have curriculum for 5 weeks in 7th grade and a week in 8th grade. Well, let’s not kid ourselves…I’ve never really had a usable curriculum for 8th. That’s been the fun part about this year. FUN.

I did do a chunk of weird flowers and bugs on Sunday night, though…

The big background areas have a lot of tiny complicated things on top of them.

But I got those mostly done Sunday. Then last night, I ironed a foot down and realized I’d never ironed the other foot to fabric. I’d obviously forgotten to number it, because every piece had an ‘a’ on it (when I miss numbers, I just pick the closest piece number and add a bunch of letters instead of starting from the 1500s…mostly because I iron in number order most of the time and it’s easier). So I had to trace those pieces, find the fabrics that were in that flesh run, iron them down, and cut them out. Which was not quick. So last night, I didn’t get much done. But here’s the second foot ready to go…

Sigh. More tonight, hopefully.

This morning, though, another meeting. Love meetings. This one will be short and sweet. I have about three things to say about another teacher and then I have work to do. Not fun. Also still necessary. This job has not been fun for most of this year. Sometimes with the kids…but also so much work.

So disheartening. Although this popped up on my Facebook feed last night from 13 years ago…

They all look related. Sweet Calli.

This show is still about to close…at the Hyde Gallery at Grossmont College.

There’s You Pollute Me, hanging strong.

Just keep going. Read books, exercise, get outside, make art. Talk to people, check your reactions and make sure you’re not being unreasonable (I did that before I called this morning’s meeting). Eat well. Or as well as you can considering the circumstances. Speak up for those who can’t. Or shouldn’t because of the repercussions. Hope the eye twitch goes away in June.

More Work…

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.

I Will Be a Grownup

Woke up this morning to a really annoying noise. My alarm. All right all right all right. I hear you. Ugh. My fault for going to bed a little late (time flew), but also Friday. The first week back. It should be an interesting day…Ramadan ended and there’s this big party that goes on, Eid, after Ramadan, and a lot of our kids don’t come to school. Interestingly, a lot of them didn’t come yesterday as well. I’m not blaming 420, because that would be crazy, but it’s certainly an interesting coincidence. We’ll see if they show up today…or even next week, because some of them just don’t. I guess that’s OK, because a goodly chunk of those showing up have forgotten that grades exist, which will be a bit of a shocker for them when their parents see their grades. You know. It’s been a rough week for all of us, sure, but for some special kids, I’m not sure what’s going through their heads.

I’ve spent most of the week trying to plan next week or even a bit further ahead than that. Can’t get too far, though, because the school board is still stupid. Also trying to get stuff copied (paper and copier issues). And graded! I’ve been doing a little every OTHER night. Last night was a big no…by the time I got home and done with my Zoom and dinner, I was too exhausted. Wednesday night I managed it though…so hopefully tonight will be a yes? If not, the Man is working tomorrow as well (ugh) and I can just do it then. Knowing you need another break from your job when you just had one? Hmmm. Yeah. My co-teacher and I were finding work examples from times gone by, and reading the names on the assignments brought back feelings of goodness…plus man, the work was so good. Yeah, I know, we only saved the good examples (true), but still. I don’t have as much faith for this crew on the same assignment. We’ll see. I have a really hard time giving up on any one kid…which I guess is a good thing considering my job, but I will be surprised if I get more than two good examples each period this year. We’ll see. They have three more days. The pro is that because of the Zoom year, I have a digital version, so I’m pushing that out to all the absent kids. Back in the day, I would have just excused them from it because I didn’t have another option. Then they miss the learning and the potential for a grade. Now? Not so much.

In quilt news, the last one is at the photographer after last night, and this one has been sorted and is ready to iron together. Which is exciting. The sorting was NOT exciting…it was a long pain in the ass, a necessary pain, but a pain nonetheless. It took two nights and almost 2 hours and 45 minutes.

That’s a long time to be dealing with little tiny pieces. I had to pick it all up, stack all the boxes, in between the two sorting times or cats would have been living in these, jumping out with a million pieces stuck to their fur, dropping them all over the house.

The first night, I got all the bigger pieces out and sorted, which left the tiny ones for last night…

Luckily I had a quilty Zoom call to force me to keep going. There’s over 1500 pieces sorted, ready for ironing.

That’s some tiny shit. And that purple v-shaped one on the left? I’m pretty sure it’s in the wrong box. I do that. I read the number, think about what box it should be in, and then between reading and thinking and actually putting it in the box, my brain rewrites the number. It doesn’t do it often, luckily, but it does. Need the brain firing correctly to do this stuff. How do I know it doesn’t belong there? There’s a whole bunch of them in another box. Probably it should be there. I’ll figure it out while I’m ironing.

So tonight, hopefully I’ll have the energy to start ironing it together. I want to. It doesn’t feel like it right now, though. Right now, I’m not sure I have the energy to walk down to the car.

Ah well. Gonna have to, whether I feel it or not.

Yesterday before school, I remembered I needed some enzymes for the DNA activity, so I made those…

And at the end of the day, I knew I’d need a snack to get me from school to the photographer, and I had this little pie we’d bought as a treat on the Arizona trip and I’d never eaten, so here it is…

It was OK, considering it cost $0.79. Yeah.

Wednesday night, I was trying to meditate before sleepy time, but these guys…

I wanted to turn the light off, but couldn’t reach it without throwing them both off…

Eventually Luna left because she heard her Daddy, so I could stretch out a bit for the lamp switch without tossing the old lady off. Not so much last night…she settled by my head and I tried to encourage her down the side, and she got pissed off and left. OK then. My bed anyway, y’all.

Legit.

Just Sitting…

Hoo. Boy. I spent about two hours last night yelling at my school computer and an app. My right eye was still twitching (hard) last night, but has stopped this morning. I have a canker sore starting in my mouth, which is one of my stress signs. WHY??? I am on Spring Break, dammit. I’m also fully aware of all the crap that needs to get done over break. And apparently my internet service will be down tomorrow for some period of time. Or will it be tomorrow? They keep saying there will be more info and there hasn’t been. Feel free to take my internet down while I’m gone. The boychild will not be happy, but I’ll be fine. So internet out means I need to find a way to get all the work done before that happens. Tomorrow. PLUS pack. Plus do all the other things.

Yesterday was not the most productive, or maybe it was and I just felt unproductive. I took two animals to the vet; one needed a referral to an eye doctor, and they haven’t called me back yet. The other one is fine. But that was an hour. Then I went to pick up quilts from a friend who had brought my work home from a show because I couldn’t get there in the time they allotted, which was super nice, and the conversation was good. I appreciate having time for that. Then JoAnns hell to get batting and thread (which I thought about the night before while trying to fall asleep). Then home, to the gym (yay! back on the schedule!), then dinner, then trying to grade that thing that has a giant-ass bug (not the first one). They still haven’t fixed the last bug I filed with them. So frustrated. I didn’t start stitchdown until 10:07 PM…on a vacation day. WTF.

Anyway, so I finished ironing together on Sunday night…

And then ironed it down to the background…

I’m having huge issues this morning with internet and getting photos to load, so I’m just writing words right now and hoping stuff behaves later. And here I am now, in the afternoon, hoping even harder.

Then last night, at 10:07 PM, I started the stitchdown. It won’t take long. I just have to be home and not doing something else to do it. Which seems problematic at the moment unfortunately.

This morning, I’m going to see a show at the Mingei with my mom–need to leave in about 2 minutes, by the way–so WordPress being a pain is truly unhelpful. (I already went. It really was having issues this morning.)

More about the Mingei later; it’s showing the 25 Million Stitches refugee stitched panels. Very cool. You should totally go see it. Them. Yeah.

So now it’s afternoon and I’ve seen the show, eaten lunch, planted the 8 jade plants I cut off the other main one that was falling over into the entryway path, plus watered a few things for the first time in like 5 months. Strange for us to have so much rain. Looks like we might be done, but a little more wouldn’t hurt at this point. Preferably not while I’m camping though. Please.

I need to start packing for camping, I have one more class of hellacious app assignment to grade, plus one pile of packets, plus two classes of another thing, plus homework. Plus lesson planning. Yeah, not all of that is happening before I leave. It just can’t. I need to prop up/restake my lemon tree…current stake is literally falling down on the job. Also weed the world. Literally so many weeds. Turn the sprinklers back on. Prop up the gutter downspout better, caulk the stained glass (all the while wondering how long the wood that is there will last anyway). Wishing I were more of a handyperson than I am. FINALLY after 7 weeks got the replacement faucet so we are no longer doing high-pressure dishwashing that sprays everywhere. Next time, I will just replace the whole thing. Remind me. Also, I think when I retire, I can hire out my services to bug-check educational apps. Like seriously…did no one actually make sure it worked? Sigh. Fucking giant sigh. They should at least send me a t-shirt or something. Oh yeah, also apply to that big thing that needs 47 things written for it. I have until the 14th on that one. Ha! I come back the 12th. It’s fine.

Also I feel very successful in my teaching now.

I laughed very hard. But was proud.

Amazon and its boxes…sigh.

Luna does know how to get INTO the cat tent, but she doesn’t always do it…

And getting ready to camp in mid- to high-80s? A friend rightly sent me this…

The cats have been lying around in all the sunny bits. I don’t blame them. The last two nights have been in the 30s here, but the sun is still warm during the day.

Not summer warm, but beginning of spring warm. That towel is supposed to be on the back of the fabric drawers, protecting the fabric. Kitten decided otherwise.

At bedtime, they follow us down the hallway. Luna is always first. Then these two negotiate the space.

And this morning, after my shower…

Bunch of weirdos. I have been appreciating the few hours of extra sleep, plus time to go exercise without having to worry about what I’m teaching the next day. I feel hopeful about the last 9 weeks of school. Right now. Right now, I feel hopeful. With another 11 days of break. Spring Break always goes so fast. I need to clean so many things and I am getting none of it done. Stitchdown! I need to do an hour this afternoon before pilates. Then hopefully finish tonight, pinbaste tomorrow in between last-minute camping shopping and packing. Looking forward to reading and drawing and stitching and hiking. And just SITTING without thinking about cleaning or weeding. Sounds great.

Peace and Quiet

Well. It’s Monday morning and I’m still in my pajamas (I couldn’t do that over the weekend; had places I had to be)…I need to do this at least once over break or it doesn’t feel like time off. I did grade stuff on Sunday and will do more today, just because it has to be done and I’d rather get it over with than have it looming over me at the end of break. No matter what I do, something will be left until the last minute and the Sunday before we go back will be panicky, but I can do my best now to make it better. Future self will appreciate it.

I also did a bunch of art stuff, so I’m feeling OK at the moment. The yard is scaring me with its overabundance of shit growing out of control and needing maintenance, but I feel like that’s an annual thing and this year is just a bit worse because we’ve had so much rain. The weeds, man, there are weeds for DAYS. But I have four days before we leave to go camping, so that’s time that needs to be utilized wisely. So far in the last three days, I have sent a few emails out for something I’m thinking about, the Man and I planned food and made lists for camping, I made it to one exercise class and one meeting…I’m doing amazing! Oh yeah, finished a book and started another one. I am feeling a little panicky actually because my to-do list is a bit overwhelming. But I think it’s a lot of little things that can be banged out quickly. I hope.

So the quilt pieces got sorted on Friday night (I was really tired)…

That was after going out and listening to a friend’s dad’s band and playing some meme game…

Yeah, that’s me reading the cards. So it’s no wonder I was tired when I got home…we also stopped for food on the way home…

I don’t often go out on Friday nights…too tired. This time, it was the first Friday night of Spring Break, so it felt doable. Last year, I got on a plane and flew overnight to see the girlchild…who got a new job yesterday! She’s coming back to the West Coast, so that is lovely. And hopefully this job will be better. It feels like everyone around me is getting new bosses in the next few months…including me. Change…is good sometimes.

Saturday, my quilt guild had their 3rd birthday party (yes, we started right when COVID started). The birthday cupcakes had an issue with spelling…

I worked on this while sitting there…

Wait, I have video…

I’ve been working on this since 2020, I think. It is not fast stitching, but it’s meditative.

So after that, I ironed the newest quilt together…got a chunk done before dinner…

Then came back after dinner and did more…

And on Sunday, got the main figure done…

And started working on the doctor’s lab coat…

There are a lot of pieces in this coat. Today, hopefully I’ll finish the ironing and get it ironed to the background so I can start stitchdown. My goal for the week is to finish stitchdown and get it pinbasted by the time we leave for Arizona. I think I can do that…until I start thinking about all the other things that need doing. Yeah! Woo!

New puppy Annie (Anwen) at my ex’s house…Simba is still not enamored of puppy behaviors.

That is HIS pillow. Poor puppy. She’s adorable.

OK. Boychild says I have lots of yardwork to do. My to-do list has a lot of art and house stuff on it, as well as yard stuff. I think I need to take a shower and get out of pajamas, unfortunately. Although I think I’m going to do one school thing first. I finished 2/3s of something yesterday and I’d like to get the last third done. Then start checking shit off the list. But also read and pee when I want (teacher dreams!) and eat when I’m hungry and not as fast as I can. And take deep relaxing calming breaths because I can. Thank you, Spring Break, for giving me some peace and quiet.

Solid Dream State…

I woke up from a solid dream state (better than most of the night), deeply ensconced in a dream in a country I’ve never been to, hanging out with a person I only know online (and I don’t think we’ve ever actually even had an online conversation), a quilt person, nonetheless. And I’m thinking, why isn’t my brain solving all the issues that were keeping me from sleeping? School, yard, house, money, etc. Although I guess technically, maybe that was my brain’s solution: send her on a vacation far far away.

Nicely done, brain, nicely done.

I know some people are already on Spring Break. We’re not. We’re so incredibly not. We WANT to be, but no, not yet. Five more days. After last week, it feels like five days is five too many, but the universe disagrees and wants us to forge on. We’re too tired to teach, too tired to plan or clean (that needs to happen before Spring Break too…we clean so they can clean our floors, which didn’t get done in December either). Too tired to grade, although my plan is to do as much as possible so I have as little as possible over break. Ha! It’s actually impossible. It’ll be fine. Really. My to-do list is already bigger than the number of days I have off, and since we’re going camping for some of those days, you know how that will work.

Ah well. In other gigantic news, I spent 6 hours on Saturday and managed to get my taxes from YOU OWE A LOT to WE OWE YOU SOME NOT A LOT BUT BETTER THAN NOTHING. That was a relief. Now to figure out how to pay property taxes. Minor issue. I’d like to come out of all of this with some money in savings to get through the summer. Unfortunately, I don’t see having enough to go to Quilt National in May, but I figured that was a long shot anyway.

I also finished ironing all the pieces down for the second quilt in progress…ironically, because I had entered 5 pieces in another show and the curator said they were definitely taking one of the new ones, and then they didn’t. Hmmm. So the new one, which probably would work for this other show where the curator is clueless and needs stuff from the last year, is now available. If I’d known that a month ago, I probably wouldn’t have started this one, because there is ANOTHER one I want to make for a show, and I’m running out of time. AARGH. Well. There we are. My plan is to finish this one by the end of Spring Break, if not earlier, start drawing the other one, then iron the one that was already started and get it done, so I can get the other one done before the deadline. MAGIC! Oh wait. Day job. Fuck.

Anyway, Friday night, I got within 100 pieces of done…

That was after taking a bunch of 8th graders to the Midway…let’s see, planes, military, not my thing. It was OK. I had a good group (very quiet and docile) and one very excited kid to be on planes…

I was glad to not be teaching for a while, although I had to come back and deal with 7th grade.

Who didn’t earn a movie. Actually, I gave them Bill Nye. But normally I’d do something fun, and that didn’t happen. It’s OK…11 were absent in 6th period, so this was a better choice.

Saturday was all taxes until after dinner. Oh wait, no it wasn’t. I hemmed the Man’s pants for a show…

My favorite: polyester AND zippers. Fun stuff. It was a private show, so I couldn’t go, but I needed to do taxes anyway.

Then I finished up the ironing…

A total of 8 hours and 40 minutes of that, plus 118 fabrics.

Lots of flesh colors on the right. So many people in this thing, and I made one of them blue, but there were still a lot.

I started trimming on Saturday night…

And kept going last night…

After doing school stuff for about 7 hours. Fun! I have a lot of letters to cut out, but that’s OK. It’s like a meditative puzzle at this point. I’m hoping to be done with the cutting before the weekend, then iron it together, iron it down, stitch it down, pinbaste…all before we leave to go camping. It’s a short trip this year…the Man doesn’t have a lot of days off, and we have a concert to come back for.

On my lap Saturday night…staring into the corner of the ceiling, where aliens wait to drop on my head…

Invisible aliens, except to cats.

The freesias I planted last year that were eaten by bunnies are finally up.

They got enough rain this year, apparently. We’re well over our normal rainfall. Although I’m done with rain. The universe is NOT done…more Wednesday. Ugh.

OK. So today after school, I have to watch a bunch of basketball games instead of a staff meeting (I have work to do, y’all). Then I can read my book, grade more stuff, and cut more stuff out. A day at a time is how we survive this week. Today is an activity in 7th grade that hopefully they can handle. In 8th grade, we are finishing the stuff we should have finished last week, but the app was being a butthead, so I had to give them extra time. I have a big lab on Wednesday. Then IDK what by the time we get to Friday. I’m probably not the only teacher that is IDK what by Friday this week, so I’m OK with that. I’ll figure it out by then. Meanwhile, books, exercise, and art save the day!

Might Be Damp

I’m watching the weather today because it’s supposed to start pissing down rain sometimes later today and I have duty at the stoplight after school. Might be damp. Then tomorrow, as it’s in the middle of 2″ of rain in 24 hours (which doesn’t happen here…that might be our annual rainfall some years), I will be picking up two quilts. Can’t park anywhere close to the pickup location, so that should be fun too. At least none of it is during rush hour traffic. I have multiple art pickups and dropoffs in the next few weeks, which is a good (but annoying and stressful) problem to have. One tomorrow, one, next Thursday (moved that one by a week), then another one…not sure when. I saw an email and promptly forgot about it. Problematic.

I am not at QuiltCon…which sucks, but also, I still get to see all the pictures. There’s some stuff I’d love to see up close. Ah well. The next QuiltCon on the West Coast isn’t until 2025. That said, one of my guild friends posted this…

That’s mine on the right…although the name is wrong. I emailed the lecturer and she responded right away. Frank Klein does own the other one, so it wasn’t a huge deal. It’s just that quilt has an awesome name: The Goddess of Never-Ending Chaos, which is kinda how it’s felt since I made it in 2016. Or maybe the goddess of increasing chaos at this point. Or unsustainable chaos.

It’s Friday. Hallelujah for that. If only I can get my head around the next batch of things while finishing up trimester 2 grades. It’s a lot to ask, especially with no more 3-day weekends. Tomorrow is all art pickup and socializing with friends we haven’t seen…well, I haven’t seen them before COVID I think. Pretty sure. So that’s crazy. But then I just have Sunday to catch up on everything. Yikes!

Be Efficient. Be Be Efficient.

I keep thinking I’ll be done with the ironing and then I’m not. Here’s Wednesday night…

Eyeball tree and IDK what else.

It’s a huge stash of fabrics I’ve got in this quilt…

And every night I add some more, because I don’t QUITE have the right shade of brown or gray or whatever.

Last night…I did an arm, a glove, and a basket, and some barcodes, but got stymied by the eggs the barcodes were on.

I wanted to do more, but my brain was done. I worked a lot yesterday, got a lot done, walked kids through the beginning of sound (I know more about sound than I thought I did…let’s hope the same thing happens with space, but I suspect not, because I never ever had space in school and I’ve never taught it either) and then the other grade, I got more and more frustrated with the inability to just focus for 20 whole minutes. Write me…shit, I didn’t even ask for sentences. I’m not sure what the deal was. I know that by the time I got to 6th period, I wasn’t letting them leave without finishing the assignment, so I made it their ticket out the door. You don’t leave until you’ve typed these four things in. On topic. The kids who are on top of it totally were done and ready on time. The kids who want the answers handed to them, who whine about everything, who spend the entire period trying to figure out how to throw something or clap loudly without being caught or just not DO anything at all, they were flabbergasted. What? You can’t keep me (I can). I don’t know what to do (I explained it three times). You’re gonna make me stay? (yes). The last kid was maybe 5 minutes late out of class, because you know what? With the threat of having to stay until he finished, he figured his shit out. Learned helplessness. Plus post-COVID stuff. Plus a batch of really immature kids (probably also COVID-related…no social skills learned during a pandemic, as we’ve seen nationwide). There was more after school that was halfway between laughable and WTF, and then I went to physical therapy and came home to a Zoom meeting, with about 12 minutes in between. That was enjoyable, but I can’t show you what I worked on, because it hasn’t been published yet.

Ironing started at 9:36 PM. I don’t have a lot left, but I keep saying that. Hopefully tonight. I’m frustrated by my days…which lean heavily into my nights.

Meanwhile, Hi, Kitten, but also, that mug in the background?

I painted that with a friend before she moved to Seattle, and it has a crack in it. It was working fine last night, but this morning decided it was done being a mug and wanted to be a small fountain.

It makes me sad. Yes, I can make a new one, but IDK when (not anytime soon). I don’t NEED a new one. I have plenty of mugs. I just really like all the naked people on it. Although the one I replaced it with also has a naked person on it. So yeah.

And I forgot to post this the other day…the owls are back in the nesting box!

This is exciting. But also means I can’t trim that tree for a while. Oh well, can’t afford to do it anyway. Birds are more important.

I still have Cheech photos…

This has no color, but the wires and phone/electric lines plus the background just fascinated me…

This is Roberto Gutierrez‘ piece Untitled (at least, I think that’s what it is…three labels and three pieces of art…making some assumptions here).

And this is It’s a Brown World After All by Eloy Torrez, who is quite a portrait painter.

That’s Cheech Marin himself, in case you don’t recognize him.

OK, I’ll do more later…gotta go to school again. Labs today in both grades, what am I, nuts? Didn’t plan that well. Who am I kidding…I can’t plan at that level this year. I’m in survival mode.

Damn ducks. School. Duty hopefully not in the rain. Set up classroom for next week. Come home and collapse. Um. I mean make a healthy dinner and make good choices and get some work done in preparation for not doing any tomorrow for a WHOLE day and then finish ironing and get a good night’s sleep. Ha! We’ll see.

Whack.

Didn’t sleep well last night…wind was blowing. Some weirdo winter storm out here, bringing snow (hopefully not to us) and rain and wind (obviously, from last night). I don’t sleep well through storms. Even rain wakes me up. Plus three animals in the bed who all wanted to be touching me (or on me) and then school brain, which needs to shut the fuck up when I’m not actually there or working on school stuff. Seriously, just be quiet so I can have a life. Yesterday was stressful. Lots of strange and not-so-strange things going on. I did come home and finish some stuff I’ve been trying to get done for next week, though, so that was good. Then I can plan the next unit, which will be fast and furious. Reminds me of some of my students.

Preparing for more of the crappy bits today. Hoping for some moments of clarity, where kids explain the things and I can see they’ve been thinking. That’s mostly 8th grade at the moment. A small portion of 7th grade, but mostly not. I think the crazy outweighs the thinking in there unfortunately. Wish me luck with all of that today…I’m already tired. Also, today’s self wishes yesterday’s self had gone to pick up the cat meds, because today’s self remembered she is cooking dinner and the meat needs to marinate for an hour. Uh huh. Well. Yesterday’s self just wanted to put pajamas on and read her book for an hour before starting to work again, so that’s where we’re at.

Maybe today’s self will just NOT work after school (not sure I can afford to do that at the moment). Maybe she will just iron after dinner. Because I have maybe 200 pieces left. It’s close. 26 hours in! Yikes. Crazy.

Here’s Monday night…

Here’s Tuesday night.

I actually pulled all of the pieces out of the box looking for one (which I never found) because I was trying to match something. Gave up on it. It’s not that important.

Lots of fabrics. Lots of colors. I keep adding more. I have a little left to do on her head, plus another arm, two birds, and some giant eggs. Then I’m done and can cut things out for a week or three. Hopefully not three. I’d like to finish another smaller one in there somewhere. Probably not happening. It might, though. We’ll see.

Sleepy Simba last night…

Finally stopped barking.

So on the weekend, after the Skirball and a night in Pasadena, we drove to Riverside to go to the Cheech. The exhibit was of work Cheech had collected over the years. Fascinating, lots of color, artists I didn’t know about, even though I grew up in Los Angeles and got an art degree in Orange County. We didn’t see a lot of local art (we should have) or art from people of color or even art by women…the art history book we used had no women in it at all, but my professor added some stuff. No internet back then, so it was hard to find anything out. Even my Frida Kahlo class was more about Diego Rivera than Frida herself. Truly annoying.

So let’s see how many of these I can add to this post before I have to go to work for a parent meeting.

This is a woodcut, which is pretty amazing. It’s also big. Bietenaladxi naa (Remember Me) by César García Gutiérrez.

When I can find artists’ websites, I’ll link them. Beautiful detail of the skeleton.

These pieces were actually part of a different exhibition in the front of the Cheech, but they caught my eye. This is Rebuilding by Priestly Henry.

This was a fun little piece…

This is the piece that made me want to come to the Cheech…Frank Romero’s Arrest of the Paleteros.

Huge and beautiful. You can follow him on Instagram. Here’s a detail…

It’s not just beautiful; it’s political, about arresting the street vendors in LA.

OK, that’s all I can do today. More next time. I will get through them all. I love the use of color in all of these pieces (well, even when I get to the black and white ones).

I’m not ready for today. The weather is whack. My brain is whack. School is whack. But there’s ironing at the end of it all.

Fabric of a Nation…

Hello. It’s a holiday for me. Hence my writing at a weird hour. It’s been a weird day. For one thing, we left on a short road trip Saturday morning and got back yesterday afternoon, so today I’ve been trying to do all the things I would’ve done yesterday and the day before, and I’m running out of time. Which is pretty standard for my weekends, unfortunately. I needed some significant brain power for one thing though, so I did most of that first. I’m not done, but I’m on a roll, and I think that will help in the long run.

Meanwhile, why the road trip? Two art opportunities: Fabric of a Nation is at the Skirball Cultural Center through March 12, and it’s been on my list since it opened in Boston. So that was my original plan. Then figured I might as well make a weekend of it and do a loop past the Cheech in Riverside, since I hadn’t been there since it had opened. Both incredible shows. Lots of color. Lots of amazing imagery. I’m going to try to put it on here, but there’s a lot (and there’s more photos I took, but I don’t have the time to do all of them, so I picked the best of the bunch).

So this was my first Bisa Butler piece in person, I think. I’ve seen photos and videos, but it’s never the same as closeup.

This is To God and Truth…

Her use of patterned fabric is amazing.

There’s no such thing as ‘too busy’.

This was a detail from an old applique quilt that had some racist blocks on it. This is Scenes of American Life by Mrs. Cecil White.

I always wonder if she meant to be racist, or was completely clueless about it. Or if it was commentary (unlikely; the quilt is from the 1920s). There’s so little known about some of these. Her technique is pretty fascinating for the time. Too bad parts of it are questionable in subject matter.

This crazy quilt was kind of amazing. It’s by Celestine Bacheller.

Fascinating. Most crazy quilts might have one center pictorial block, and then regular pieced crazy quilt blocks around. I’ve never seen one like this.

Carolyn Mazloomi’s graphic Strange Fruit II was even more emotional in person than in photos.

Just black and white. No way to shy away from the topic.

A detail from the Harriet Powers’ quilt…

I always think I take more (and better) pictures than I actually do. I remember seeing pictures of this one when I started quilting in the 90s. It was mind-boggling then in its simplicity. Still is.

And this one, Ruth Bader Ginsberg by Kisasi Ramsess.

Amazing use of color, again, and patterned fabrics that don’t seem to belong together and yet do.

We spent the night in Pasadena, near where I grew up. I worked on one of the Sue Spargo blocks in the car and while watching a strange movie…

And I did iron on Friday night…

Wings and a strange cat. Not this one…

Although she is pretty strange. And toothless. Or light on teeth, anyway.

There were signs at the Skirball as part of another art project by Chloë Bass called Wayfinding, up through September.

Lots of thought-provoking stuff. Do you laugh or…?

Hard to say. We walked around Pasadena a bit looking for art (all closed up), found some food and drink.

Drew something weird.

Then the next morning, drove through my old neighborhood and said hi to the house I mostly grew up in…

Cool house. Interesting what they cut down and what they leave. It was a nice place to grow up in, the house anyway. Some of the town was not so nice, but that’s another story.

OK, I have work to do, so all the Cheech photos will have to wait until later. I did iron yesterday night though…these were all the fabrics I used on one kind of weird steampunk butterfly.

I’m a little more than halfway through the 1200s now. Getting close to done.

I do need to go back to work now, though…need to grade some stuff and do some more planning, make sure I’m ready for tomorrow (don’t FEEL ready, and there’s a staff meeting in the morning, which is different). This week, I will hopefully be very efficient (unlike last week) and finish all the things, plus get done with the ironing on this thing so I can start cutting them out. Everything is taking a lot of time. I’m glad I took two days off and did some ME stuff, but I knew I’d pay for it today and the rest of the week, so there’s that. It’s nice to have the extra day, though, to catch up. Won’t see that for another 38 days. To be very specific.