Getting on a Plane…

So I’m sitting squished in the airport, waiting to board to Boston. Seriously what is it with white males and their elbows. Stay on your side of the chair, man. They say 7 minutes, but I’m in the last group, so I’ll be sitting here a while. I’m OK with that, having finished the draft of the parent email I have to send on Sunday and managed some other shit that needed to be done for school.

I did finally finish the ironing of fabrics last night for the newest piece. Despite only 991 pieces (stop laughing), it took 16 1/2 hours to pick fabrics. I blame tiredness and the need to actually match real live colors of things, instead of the crazy shit I normally do.

The crazy box full of fabrics and everything piled up behind it. It didn’t take long to finish up.

153 fabrics total…quite a lot of natural colors going on in here.

I did actually start cutting stuff out. I’m feeling some time pressure on this deadline.

And I’m taking some of them with me. I left behind the really big pieces, but figured I might get some of these done while watching the girlchild do homework. I’m OK with that.

Group B is in line now…but I’m D…so it will be a while. Looking forward to posting from Boston…

You Would Share Your Last Jelly Bean*

Another shooting. Racists in government. Here in lovely East County, we elect a racist and indicted man who luckily can serve in prison, instead of using our brains. Deep breaths. There were wins. The shooting…none of it will stop unless we change something. Something about guns. And that doesn’t look promising at the moment.

Meanwhile, I’m looking forward to visiting my girlchild this weekend. I haven’t seen much of her since last January. I basically will be following her around as she does all the shit she does, so that will be fine. I will rejoice in her presence. OK, that sounds goofy. I’ll enjoy being around her and maybe sleeping.

Unlikely to be sleeping.

Long day at work. This curriculum is painful. Sigh. Love piloting new curriculum. Not. I was the only 7th grade science teacher at my school during the last curriculum adoption, so I just picked the best book for my kids. Now it’s complicated by all the tech supports (or not, in this case). I wonder why they think middle-school kids don’t need visuals.

I came home and worked for a while. Always. Then ironed. Late. I’m close to done…but not done. This is all the plastic waste that’s in the water plumes…

It looks pretty benign there.

Puppy love. Much appreciated.

Calli is still really happy to have her toys back. She hasn’t even destroyed this one. I think it’s because she really loves it.

So the pile grows. I keep shoving them down in the box. That’s a lot.

I’m still debating taking them with me to cut out. I probably should. Traveling with this stuff is always nerve-wracking though. What if I lose part of it? I can’t put it in my checked bag…I’m totally paranoid they’ll all disappear. Can you imagine? I’ve only flown with pieces to cut out once. And I put them in my carry-on. But I know I’ll have a lot of waiting time, and yes, I could read a book and grade videos and embroider on my Sue Spargo piece. I’m going to do all those things. But it would be good to spend a few hours cutting these out too.

I think I just persuaded myself. Hopefully TSA won’t want an explanation. It’s OK…I’ll put the scissors in my checked bag. I’m not crazy.

This is all I have left to iron. Hopefully tonight?

It’s not a lot of pieces, but it’s a turtle and a squid and a sea otter and a jellyfish. Plus a boat and a net and some other fish. Not uncomplicated stuff. That’s why I quit at midnight.

Kitten was there too.

OK. To work. Another high-maintenance day. And school drama. Always. But leaving tomorrow.

*Zero 7, Somersault

‘Cause There’s Beauty in the Breakdown*

You’d think after a day off, I’d be all rested and stuff, but apparently not eating for the first 6 hours plus of the day throws my body off. It’s still complaining. It will get over it. I did manage 4 hours of ironing and a dog walk in between all the work stuff I did…I wrote sub plans for the two days I’ll be in Boston, I graded half of the videos I needed to watch, I set up at least one post for today, and I finished next week’s warmups (which I have to remember to post while I’m gone). A lot of remembering will need to happen while I’m gone. If I’m smart, I’m going to calendar that shit so I don’t forget. I can schedule things on Google Classroom, but only one class at a time, which is a pain. I might do that anyway, though, because I don’t trust the remembering part of my brain to do it on time. That would be disastrous. The sub would hate me.

So the ultrasound seemed to be a lot of Hold Your Breath and the nice radiology lady wishing my ribs were not where they actually were. I’m only a little bruised this morning. It’ll be fine. I figure they’ll try calling me at work tomorrow and we’ll play phone tag all day, and I won’t get a hold of the doctor until I’m boarding a plane. So there we are. The blood tests have ruled out some of the scarier diagnoses so far, so I’m still betting on an alien. It hurts in exactly the same place it did when I was really pregnant with the girlchild and she was using my organs as soccer balls. (No, I’m not pregnant. That’s not happening. But aliens might.). Anyway. Waiting sucks. As you all know.

So ironing…fitting the flesh pieces together. There isn’t much of this fabric left.

Then after the ultrasound and FOOD and water, we took the dogs out. It gets dark so early…

Where the sun is…that’s where Calli and the boychild are…beating me up the hill.

Calli’s tongue hanging out all over the place…

So we’re on the way back and there’s this hawk facing away from us, but I start talking to us and it turns its head all the way around to look at us. Piercingly. Thinking WTF is that woman doing.

Talking to you. That’s what I’m doing. Pretty bird. I don’t think I knew they could do that with their heads, although it makes sense.

I came back, did some work stuff, alphabetized purple and white pieces of paper so I could grade that section of the National Park Project more easily. Then made it back in here for another 2 hours of ironing. I finished all the innards (mostly) before the ultrasound…so then I started on the water plumes that are all over. Mostly I just did the water bits though. There were lots of them…

This is all the stuff that’s IN the water or ON the water (oil slick etc.) that I haven’t done. That’s tonight, I’m hoping, although it’s a lot to do in one night. Lots of fussy little details.

Plastic bottles and bags and fish nets and fishing boats and I think there’s a Humboldt squid in there as well. So that’s not a small amount of things that are left. I know I laid out all the pieces through number 991. I know I ironed down all the way through the 700s, and then a goodly chunk of the 800s and 900s were water, so they’re done. That leaves maybe 100 pieces? So maybe I can do it tonight.

Here’s the chaotic pile of stuff I worked on yesterday, plus everything that’s ready to be cut out.

Then I organized. Much better. Deep breath. I can find stuff again. More color now. You can almost see my left brain fighting with my right brain over this stuff. My left brain wants to go back and organize better by color. My right brain says there’s no point, because we’re going to pull a lot of them back out tonight and mess it up again.

Hi Kitten. You’re in my chair.

Like she cares.

Simba is with the boychild, at the ex’s house, so Satchemo was free to sleep in Simba’s bed. The crate is open…I try to remember to check for Satch before I put Simba in there at night…

Apparently it’s the best bed ever.

OK, high-maintenance school stuff today, waiting on results, tired already. Need to pack, need to finish prep for being gone, need to finish ironing.

*Frou Frou, Let Go

The Sun’s Zooming in*

Go vote. Now. Unless you’re like me and you already did…dropped the ballot envelope off at the library on Sunday. Everyone associated with my house has voted now. Good stuff. May the force be with us.

I’m at home. Grades are done, unless those two girls with non-working websites email me before I leave for the ultrasound. I did in fact get up early to eat and drink stuff before the deadline. We’ll see if it helps. I then tried to go back to sleep, but no. Dogs. Cats. Brain awake. So much for sleeping in. I suck at it.

I do still have grading to do…it never ends. I have to write sub plans for the days I’ll be in Boston. But what I really want to do, besides walk the dogs, is finish ironing.

I started late again last night, mostly because of grading. Ready to pick out flesh…I went through all 6 boxes of pink and finally found the right transition between 4 and 6 in the last bin.

I laid out all the fleshy pieces…

And I started ironing them down. It’s a weird puzzle I do…

How do I save the most fabric but fit all the pieces on there? Like that.

It was after midnight and I looked at the clock and thought, ugh. Gonna have to be up early. So I left the last two fabrics for this morning.

The box is getting fuller.

So that puts me in the 600s, but I have all the innards and hair to do. Mostly bones and cardiovascular stuff. So that’s also this morning. Or afternoon.

This was yesterday in class…

We’re piloting a new unit and it’s difficult. Mostly because I don’t have access to all the electronic stuff, and then my kids don’t either, plus I keep getting myself absent, and this curriculum is not at all friendly to guest teachers. Or to taking a rest from talking, for that matter. Lots of direct instruction.

Anyway. I’m going to shower and NOT eat or drink anything for a while and then go get this thing done so they can show me a picture of the alien in my gut. And then work and iron and all that stuff.

*The Clash, London Calling

Every Other Freckle*

That extra sleep was nice. I went to bed at midnight brain time, not Daylight Savings Time or un-Daylight Savings Time, I don’t even know which it is, so an hour early anyway, and then got woken up early by the man on his way to work, but that was OK, because it was actually later than when I usually get woken up. Tomorrow, I will have to get up early if I want to eat or drink anything before like 1:30 PM…I’m still debating that one. Fasting for 6 hours. Sigh. I’ll decide tonight, I guess.

My grades aren’t done. I did a lot. I got side-tracked by having to essentially write a script for my guest teacher for tomorrow. I have a script for the pilot, so I just structured it for them to hopefully be able to handle. We’ll see how that goes. The other two days I’m absent in the next week or so, I was able to make it kid-managed, so all the guest teacher has to do is make sure they’re on task. Tomorrow, they actually have to know how to teach on some level. Could be awful.

I think I’ll grade one more assignment tonight and then finish up in the morning. I just want to get as much done as possible before I go to Boston (and yes, I’m still hoping to go to Boston…I’m ignoring the alien in my gut as much as possible)…or I can grade stuff on the plane maybe. We’ll see. It’s hard to sit still for 6 hours, trapped, and not want to get work done, when you know if you don’t, you’re going to come back to it in huge stinky piles.

I’m in a new notebook for my weekly planner. I had to transfer a bunch of stuff over yesterday, including making a November calendar…apparently I forgot to do that the week before. November kind of snuck up on me.

Yup. There it is. A week off.

I need that. Here’s a baby lizard on the outside of the front door. Odds are it’s in the house now.

Sleepy Calli with a toy.

So yesterday was lots of grading and delivering a quilt and dinner with the parents, now that they’re back home, and then finally into the office for more of this. Ironing is taking a really long time on this piece. I’m in the beginning of the 400s and I am 8 hours in. That’s like double what it usually takes.

I’m blaming it on my trying to make some things realistic…like above is a mule deer. That’s a lot of fabric for something that’s about 4 inches square. More importantly, it’s a lot of searching for the right fabrics for something that doesn’t take up much room on the piece. I’m convinced it will be a good thing in the long run.

The plus is that I finished all the background landscape last night and I’m ready to start on the figure. Picking flesh is faster…use the same 7 or 8 fabrics for a huge swath of the piece. So the next batch of ironing should go faster. Notice there aren’t many bright colors yet…that should change in this section. There are lots of fabrics though. That’s for sure.

This is a picture of the Quilts=Art=Quilts exhibit at the Schweinfurth Art Center in Auburn, NY. There’s obviously some choral thing going on…and my quilt is on the wall, back right. It’s the first time I’ve seen it for this show.

So that’s cool. I just delivered another piece for a show that opens in December. Also cool. And Power of Women went up in the last few days at IQF Market in Houston, TX. Looking forward to seeing that in photos as well, since I won’t be going to Houston myself.

OK, so my goal for this week is to finish ironing pieces to fabric. I can take a pile with me to cut out in Boston. IDK if it makes sense to do that, but I can do it anyway. Worst case, I cut out next week and start ironing it together…see, I don’t know if I have enough time to finish it if I wait that long. We’ll see. I’m not going to stress about it yet.

But for now, I need to go to school and find all the shit I need to teach today. That’s first on the list.

*alt-J, Every Other Freckle

Yo. Universe. Listen.

I’m in between major to-do tasks at the moment, trying to decide what to do next. I have an errand to go out and do…they put me on insulin on Thursday and prescribed this pen thing, but apparently it needs needles, and those are also prescription. But they didn’t give me that prescription. And the pharmacist didn’t say anything about needing them when I told her I had never used this pen before and could she explain it (she didn’t). Sigh. Not impressed at the moment. Anyway, I have to go get needles now, but I’m waiting for the prescription to process. Meanwhile, whether my pancreas or my gall bladder or some alien who has taken over my innards is the problem, we don’t know yet. Waiting on blood tests and an ultrasound, which I will be missing school for, but it can’t be helped. It does mean I’m really scrambling this weekend, trying to finish grades and replan the week so my students can do stuff without me. Maybe. I barely understand this unit myself, having never taught it before, so this is a bit of a clusterfuck, but we’ll get through it. Hopefully the guest teacher knows something about science. Ha! They rarely do.

Interrupted by the girlchild. Her replacement phone is defective. From the last replacement phone. So I’m on the phone with AT&T, negotiating how not to pay for any of it, but get it there in time for her to do a phone interview. OK. Not on my to-do list.

So my stress levels are through the roof. I’m surviving by making lists, checking things off, and trying to get some art in at the end of the day just to keep me sane. And petting furry beasts. They’re good. Here’s one.

This is NOT one. This pumpkin was left in my classroom and I did not want it to mold over the weekend (it’s about 90 degrees here), so I brought it home. In the car. Yes, now I have beads all over the damn car. Why? Because I forgot to put the head’s seatbelt on.

I was grading things last night. I am greatly looking forward to the National Park Project from this kid.

Really. I’m thinking it will be completely riveting.

Grades are due Tuesday. I’m not getting everything done by then.

This quilt may not get done in time. But that bird is done. It’s a tern. Or a plover. I’m thinking the tern.

I also did the water and the sky. And then it was bedtime.

Mostly. I’m not even in the 200s yet. I seriously thought I would be done by the weekend, but life, school, health, and a stupid field trip got in the way.

With Katie gone, Calli can wander around with toys in her mouth again. She’s happy.

And this one was happy too.

Mommy’s foot.

OK, so I have to go get needles, finish grades, figure out how to hang a quilt that I’m delivering tomorrow, plan for the school week, write two sets of sub plans, finish the warmups for the following week, probably find a jacket for next weekend, maybe learn Swahili. Because I don’t have enough to do. Hopefully solve this gut problem before I go (that would be nice). I got the fasting blood tests this morning. They will show whether it’s the gall bladder or an alien. Much as I’d like the alien, just for the interesting interactions that might come out of the encounter, I’d really like it to be something solvable and easy, preferably non-surgical. OK? Universe? Listening? Thanks.

Magic Wand

Hello Halloween…on the one hand, I love dressing up (I’m Dr. Nefario from Despicable Me this year, while surrounded by minions)…my catch phrase is “Do you want to exPLOOOODE?”. Which seems relevant. Tomorrow, we take 260 kids to the zoo, so they can run off their sugar highs from tonight. Hopefully I survive until Friday, because I still have grading to finish. And a quilt.

Yesterday, I worked for a million hours. Got home around 6 PM and kept working…I still have kids trying to give me field trip money, even though the list is done and emailed. I’m done. No more crazy this week (ha. never say no more.)

It was after 10:30 when I made it in here. The first 100 pieces are taking me FOREVER to cut out. Mostly because there’s these tiny little animals in there. So I need to find these fussy little fabrics for them. Although this is water…

Water is fun. I’ve spent about 2 1/2 hours and I’m only in the 80s. Seriously crazy. It probably doesn’t help that I’m tired and stressed out. Here’s the fabrics piled up as I was trying to pick a bird brown that would show up against the sand brown.

Then I mostly organized them and went to bed.

Sometimes that’s all you can do. Tonight is candy for the three small children who come to our door, plus my parents are finally coming back after 7 weeks. I think Katie doesn’t believe they’re ever coming back, so she’ll be excited to see them. Much as we love her, she is a needy beast and the noisiest of the three dogs…well, maybe Simba is the noisiest, but he’s also the smallest.

OK, I have to be trained on epi-pens today. Again. Need to finish bus and chaperone lists. Need to find a magic wand and erase the noise and chaos from my head. That last one seems the most important.

Insanity Laughs Under Pressure We’re Cracking*

I’m still trying to process all the gun killings last week. I’m trying to process the idiotic things people say after gun shootings and all the arguments I’ve seen on line and did I mention stupid shit people say? Whether you’re pro or con CNN, last night they refused to show the shooter’s picture or say his name…instead they spent an hour or so talking about the victims…about the couple that had been married at the synagogue 60+ years earlier, about the two brothers who were always there. I have to admit to not being able to watch…but it was an admirable choice. And little to no mention of the two African Americans gunned down in a Krogers, one with his grandson watching. WTF America? WTF. My anti-gun quilt (let me be clear, I am anti-gun) has arrived in Chicago for the Quilt+Resist show, not that it will change the minds of anyone who believes their right to a gun is greater than the rights of others to live their lives.

I am an absolute stress monkey at the moment. I have way too much on my plate and I’m exploding all over the place. I’m trying not to. I need to meditate. Last night, my meditation was in the form of ironing fabric…and a little bit of stitching. After I finished some of the grading, of course.

I did that flower in the left corner. Sometimes people ask me why I stitch on this when it’s not my design. Because it’s relaxing. And I can finish something in 20 minutes, even if it’s just a flower.

Then I messed with the road again. This road is a pain in the ass. But I’m almost done with it…I think. Although mine won’t fit around the corner until I sew the other blocks onto it…so that will have to wait.

Then I fussed with a unit my co-teacher is piloting and I’m sort of piloting as well, but I wasn’t at the training and the book is confusing and it’s hard to know what we can do in one period, plus I have to leave stuff for a sub while I’m in Boston, and somewhere in there, my head exploded because I couldn’t figure out how to open the damn PDF in Preview so I could pull out the homework. My kids are going to freak out with this much homework.

It was past 10 PM when I made it in here, the studio, the place where art happens and sometimes I grade shit. Sorted the first 100 pieces…piles of huge and piles of tiny.

The huge are dirt and water (I didn’t iron any water last night)…the tiny are animals, mostly a snake is what I dealt with…in fact, there’s the snake laid out down there.

Hopefully she looks as cool in real life as it did in my head when I was laying out its complicated ass. Seriously. Ten fabrics for one snake that is about 3″ square.

I didn’t get far. Although I have dirt fabrics picked for the rest of the mountain, I think. I need to add some grassy bits to it though. And make sure whatever is behind the bobcat makes it pop out.

So mostly that’s sand and dirt, with a few rocks and a snake. Not even 100 pieces ironed last night.

I also did the last bit of my Halloween costume. You figure it out.

I didn’t have a chance to walk the dogs (and myself) last night. That didn’t help. I calendared it for Wednesday, when I have some chance of getting home at a reasonable hour. Not last night. Not tonight. Now the eyelid is twitching as well. Sure that’s a sign of stress and tiredness (dog had to pee at 4:33 AM…not 11:50 PM, when I tried to take her out…4:33 AM, when I didn’t want to be outside half naked with a flashlight.).

*Queen and David Bowie, Under Pressure (I don’t pick these…my Pandora is psychic)

Reasonable Requests

OK, the internet is working but who knows how long it will hang out here. We have another solution we’ve ordered and is on the way. Hopefully it will solve the problem. But I’m actually typing this on my computer instead of my iPad, my phone, or my school laptop at the moment. A blessing!

So. Saturday. I finished grading a bunch of stuff and then went in and finished ironing. You can see I have Kitten as a companion AND the internet was working. I have no idea what I’m watching…either Luther or Maniac on Netflix.

It only took another 30 minutes or so to iron it down to the background. In total, this quilt ironed together in 6 hours and 45 minutes…

The wonder of smaller quilts. Then, since I was waiting around anyway, I started stitching it down.

I guess I could have graded something else, but like I’ve said before…I don’t like giving up my entire weekend to school. Kitten was happily ensconsed in my chair. (Dear WordPress..that is TOO a word.)

More stitching down…it took just under 3 hours to stitch it all down.

So I finished on Saturday afternoon…well, evening. Then a relaxed dinner at home with a weird movie and some stitching with cat paws on the leg…

After the movie, I drew for a bit. I’m skipping one of the shows I wanted to enter because I don’t have time to make something for it…really…I could, but it would hurt. I need to relax a bit. So I’m aiming a little further out. I needed to work out some ideas in my head, and this was a good start. It’s going to need a redo, but I took a bunch of notes to myself and I have a plan in my head now.

Sunday brought dogs. Some are more social than others. Simba, we’re talking to your cranky butt. He used to play with Katie, but he’s been cranky this time.

Just wants people cuddles. We had storm clouds come in and rain on us for about 14 seconds…the remnants of a tropical storm coming up through Mexico are going to just tickle us with horrendous humidity as they go by.

This is after Sunday dinner…got the road done in that section and started work on the butterfly, the last block in July. Then the tree and house, plus the giraffe and horned thing on the bottom are August. I have September sewn down and then was messing with October in here last night, trying to figure out what to do with all the bits and pieces…

With October, then I sew the whole quilt together. I’m not sure what happens in November? I think borders. I’m not sure where that bag is. It’ll take me some time to get there though.

See, I come in here and then they lie down all over the floor again. It’s like Twister getting around them.

Here’s our newest baby gecko. It’s hiding in a little hole in the sink drain down there. Can’t get it out. We should name him. Fred.

We’ve had a lot of them this year.

So after dinner, I did some school stuff, sort of finished progress reports. I have a few things I’ll update today, and then I’m done. So I pinbasted this one…

AND this one. Because once you’ve cleaned the floor and moved stuff out of the way, you might as well do all of them.

So that’s two wool quilts ready for quilting. Ha! Well I don’t know when that will happen. I guess I finished one over the summer that had been languishing for years. I seem to like working to deadlines at the moment, so they tend to take precedent over the other stuff.

Anyway, so I can start quilting tonight, if I have the energy. I’m running on extra tired for some reason. Still. Take the vitamins, eat the foods, get the exercise. It took a long time to fall asleep last night. I’m feeling it this morning. As always. May this week be less tiring than it looks when I stare at the calendar. May there be art every night. Those seem like reasonable requests.

Almost Ironed

Computer refusing to function again. Probably going to have to manage that soon. It’s frustrating. I’m not even sure where to start. It’s interesting how much we rely on the internet for our existence…for those of us who remember having to function without it. It was on the internet I read the statements made yesterday to the Senate Judiciary Committee, since I was at work all day. Very triggering stuff. I don’t know any woman who could do what she did and be lying about it. I don’t care that he was in high school…it’s a testament to his character, as was his testimony yesterday. He’s unfit to be in the most powerful court in the country. He already was, based on his personal bias. This country I live in right now? It’s ugly. It’s always been ugly though, big parts of it…racism, sexism. I guess it’s just more obvious now. In our faces. There’s white privilege showing. If I were a POC, the ugly would have been in my face all along.

Yes, my head is in a place. Knowing what’s wrong is one thing. Knowing how to make it right is the problem.

I got home early yesterday, but the boychild and I had to deal with the flea infestation at the parentals, so we did that. And then I tried inputting grades, but the computer refused after a while…so I went back to the school computer. Got those in (oh so slowly…10-key input is so much faster).

The good news is that I finally finished all the embroidery on those 96 balls. I don’t remember when I started this…late 2013? Probably 2014…

She Spargo’s design, stitched by me at every soccer game I went to for many years. Sat around for at least a year, getting the guts to put all those stems and balls on. Supposed to be done ages ago. Now I just need to quilt it, which is funny because I still haven’t quilted the one I finished before it.

Cat and dog and new keyboard (finally…most of the letters are worn off)…

Time to iron. I was super tired. This week…

Cat and bird…

Hair and tree done…fussy skinny pieces.

All the leaves ready to go.

So everything is ready to get ironed on the background…once I finish grades. Ugh. I like it so far though. I wasn’t sure in the beginning. Hopefully the background color works. I guess we’ll see.