Ironing Owls…

Yesterday was chaos. Today is Tuesday.

I’m powering through grading as fast as I can. My kids won’t do work unless you tell them it’s graded. Does that mean sometimes I tell them that and then quietly don’t grade it? Yup. Absolutely. So I’m just getting through.

But I set a boundary last night, because now that I’m ironing fabric, I feel like I’m getting into this piece, so I WANT to do more each night. I just have to balance between the two so I don’t end up buried in schoolwork over break. Which I might anyway.

Around 10:30, I started ironing. I’m not going particularly fast at the moment. I did about 100 pieces in an hour and a half. Granted, part of that was a rather large owl, the one that’s here…

Came from this drawing, except he has DNA on him. And I changed the colors. He’s more brown this time. In fact, I didn’t even look at him while I was picking fabrics. Because he could have been the same color, except I couldn’t get to a lot of the gray fabrics because Midnight is still sleeping in the blue drawer. Really I should shut that drawer and then maybe she’d sleep in the one below it and I could get to the gray fabrics. Although I might get to the blues of the water soon, and then we’ll have an issue.

I don’t know what my deal is with owls. Or birds in general. They’re just cool to draw. And they’re supposed to be all mystical and wizardical and wise and shit. There should be more wise going on right now. Not just personally, but worldwide. Certainly here in the US. More wisdom (and I don’t mean age…I mean logical thought about actions and consequences and people’s lives) would not be a bad thing.

So I picked the owl fabrics and a wine bottle and I think that’s it. Kind of pitiful really, although I’m feeling good that I graded an assignment AND ironed fabric. AND cooked dinner.

Here’s the pile of fabrics used so far…

DSCN2648 small

Lots of purples popping in there…even in the owl.

It doesn’t look like much on the right…because it’s not.

It’s only 200 pieces and a bit. Maybe 250. I’m still ironing the stuff outside the bathtub…haven’t even gotten into the bathtub or the main figure. I have stuff every night this week, but think I can come home and iron most nights. I’m scared to make a goal, but let’s hope I’m fully ironed by say Saturday? I don’t even know if that’s possible…then I can cut out in the early part of next week, and then who knows? The kids come home and then it’s Christmas and Winter Break and holy shit, I am so not ready.

The girlchild has planned out her entire break already, so…hopefully we will see her at some point. Boychild will probably be here a good chunk of the time. The animals will have to adjust, which probably means me as well. Food too…no more prepping meals for the week on Sunday, because there’s only me and I don’t want to eat the same thing every night, but I don’t want to cook every night. Adjustments. I sent them both chocolate for finals. They’ve both been sending me videos of cats and other stuff as they distract themselves from writing giant-ass essays. It’s a good thing we didn’t have those distractions back in the day.

OK, another meeting this morning, hopefully less volatile than yesterday’s. Then teaching. Apparently. Yeah.

Go Make Art…

Note to self. When work starts to weigh you down, go make some art. I worked a lot this weekend. I’ve been working a whole lot this year. The last two weeks were mostly work work work. I got a little ahead (well, not ahead, but less behind) on Sunday, so I made art last night when I finished dinner. I came in the studio and deliberately put away all the fabrics I had ironed and ignored the fact that there are still a bunch in the laundry basket outside in the hallway. I hung up the drawing for the new quilt…

This room still isn’t clean. It’s better. It’s not done. Same with the boychild’s room. I sent him a new picture, and he claims he will be sleeping on the couch. Nah. I’m almost done in there. I could legitimately walk in there and pile it all up and drop it in here in about 5 minutes. It just wouldn’t be organized. I’m pretty slow on the organization part. There’s not enough storage space and I don’t want things to disappear for 10 years like before. I didn’t even show you the two quilts that are all blocks that are ready to sash or sew together. The sashing fabric is even in there and washed and sometimes cut into strips. Yeah. That organized.

Then I laid out the first 100 pieces of Wonder Under…

Very exciting. Realized there was a rug under each side of the bathtub that was a fairly large piece of fabric, so there might need to be some coordination on that. So I found all the rug parts in 4 different boxes and did those first.

I was accompanied by this helper…

Who blocked access to two drawers of blue and one drawer of gray fabrics, and pitched a tiny fit every time I opened the top gray drawer. Then when I was on the other side of the room, opening other drawers, she would come over and try to get into them. Very helpful.

This one just sat on the chair.

It’s nice to have them both in here though. Babygirl wouldn’t have allowed it. These two don’t love each other…there’s some tension…

But I think they’re working on it. Like siblings who are tired of sitting in the back seat together.

Here’s everything I used last night…

You can see the cat on the right and my gun-toting Defiance-watching on the left.

And here’s everything I managed to iron last night…

Only 100 pieces. Well, more than that, because I did all the rug pieces. It took me longer than usual, two hours, for maybe 150 pieces. But some of that was just getting my head around the colors. I have two possible backgrounds I’m looking at…they’re both dark dark blue, so it probably doesn’t matter which one I use. I’m just glad that I’m back on track, that there’s progress. I have a couple of things I have to get done over Winter Break besides this one, plus I have to get a significant start on another smaller one by the end of break. There’s only two weeks until break. So I’m hoping to get this ironed onto fabric, trimmed, and ironed down in the next two weeks. That might be a bit much, looking at the calendar, but it’s a good goal.

Saturday night was dinner with this view…

Not a bad view…good company. And I wasn’t grading anything.

Channeling My Art…

One of the biggest issues with being a teacher is that I often care more about my students’ grades than they do. I care more about their work ethic than most of them do, and sometimes way more than their parents do. I want them all to do well, and when they don’t, I go in my head and try to figure out why. Is it too hard? Do I expect too much? The thing is the only thing I’m really doing differently this year is that a lot of the instruction has gone online. That said, the huge assignment I just graded was all paper, all classwork, all things they should have been able to complete during class time. And no. They didn’t.

I could start making phone calls, but I can’t even imagine trying to find the time to make all the calls I need to, because there are that many. I’ve tried putting stuff in the weekly parent email, but it seems parents ignore that…or they care just as much as their student. I’ve never had this many kids not turn work in. I’m frustrated. My AP suggested an incentive (yes, a bribe)…those who got x% turned in got food. Nachos. So there’s two issues with that…money being the first one. So Smart and Final it is…but also, that means I also have to find the time to make sure I know what’s turned in. Whether it’s electronic or paper, someone has to log all that. So I’m trying to figure out a smaller subset I can check for the incentive. But honestly, I’m so tired and overwhelmed with the workload right now that I can’t even imagine finding the energy to try. Sad but true. I’m working way harder than they are.

So yeah. It’s with that weighing on me that I made the decision to stop trying to clean up before moving on to the next stage in this quilt. I’ve ironed a bunch, but the rest will have to wait. And I need to do another drawing for the next one. So even though I still have like 7 assignments to grade (and I might be able to kick those out this week), I’m not doing any more today. She says at 3:30 PM. Yeah. I know. I did cook a turkey this morning. Brined her last night. Pulled all the meat off, divided it in half, and got it into the fridge and freezer. That was helpful. And I’ve dealt with some holiday stuff and some bills that needed paying. So it hasn’t been a useless day…just a semi-depressing one. This job. Seriously.

Moving on. Making art.

This one. She’s stressed. She’s sad too, but she can manage it all. Presumably if I channel her a bit this week, then I will be able to as well.

An Anthropological Dig…

So I had about 45 minutes free after school yesterday, and by free, I mean I had 78 things to do and I picked one of them, notably cleaning out the boychild’s room because as of 8:30 PM tonight, he’s home in 2 weeks (holy shit, time flies). So I panicked a bit and got some stuff moved out that I had organized before but just hadn’t found a home for, and then started going through the immensely scary pile on the bed. It’s scary because I’m not quite sure what to do with it. There’s a quilt in there that I finished years ago but don’t like and think I need to paint over, although after looking at it last night, I’m not even sure it’s worth the time. I spent hours on it, but I just don’t like it. Strange for me, but it was an early quilt. I think I was still married when I made it. Divorced in 2002, by the way (well officially later than that, but 2002 in my head).

So here’s some of the fun stuff I found…this quilt…

So I am in a quilt guild that I hardly ever go to, just because it’s Monday nights and honestly, they used to have interesting speakers, because whoever was in charge had a contemporary leaning, but now it’s mostly traditional stuff, so I don’t go more than about once a year. Anyway, they would give out a pattern in the newsletter and if you brought in a block (or 10 blocks) in that pattern, you could donate them and one person would win all of them and take them home. So I thought the pattern was interesting and made a block. But then I didn’t go to the meeting. But I made more blocks. And I suck at piecing. Do not look close up at this thing. And it’s really not big enough for a lap quilt…it works for me because I have a small lap, but I think I made it to cover the back of the couch I no longer own. Anyway, I found it in the pile, and I’m like, why is this here? It looks done? There were about 15 inches of the binding that were not sewn. You know what I did last night? I sewed those inches and then put the blanket over my feet. As I turned the thermostat down again.

I do know HOW to make traditional quilts. I just don’t. Usually. Baby quilts. I don’t know how old it is…if it predates the divorce, and I think it does, it won’t be on the blog. So let’s say before 2002.

Then I found this…which I really like. And I know where it’s supposed to go.

My quilt teacher and friend Susan had this quilt she made off a drawing she did from some textile her parents gave her? She’ll tell me if I’m totally off with this. Anyway, I always liked it and so I got the pattern from her and then did it in entirely inappropriate colors (hers is all nice earth tones. Or maybe the original is. It would make sense if hers were all in purples). See, I know how to applique (I found all the blocks to two applique quilts that need to be sewn together). All this needs is a good border and to be quilted, and it’s not that big. And then I could hang it where it belongs. I also can’t date this one, although I think it’s post divorce…so it might be on the blog way back when. I started blogging in 2004, but had to migrate and not all the pictures came with the migration. Based on what I just found in my picture files, it looks like 2006. Maybe.

Then I found this…and this has been floating around the studio for years.

When I first started making art quilts, I did a lot of hand applique. Now I’m good at it and fast, but it takes FOREVER to make an art quilt with hand applique. A few of the early ones are just that and they are small and took me months. So that’s why I started taking all these classes, trying to figure out how I could do bigger faster. So this one never got done…here’s the drawing, which I was looking for…

No date on it, but I can guess early 2000s, probably pre-divorce, because I know in late 2000-2001, I finished one small hand-applique art quilt and then started fusing them. So I suspect I started it in 2000 and then didn’t finish. Honestly, it’s almost done. Sure, it’s weird. But all my quilts are kinda weird. It feels like she deserves finishing. And it’s small…ish.

I feel like going through these piles that I want to finish those two above. One just because it’s nice and brightly colored and will be easy enough to finish and then I can brighten the house with it. The other, just because she’s waited so long and it’s a bit different from what I’ve been doing. Not that I’m advocating going back to hand-appliqueing art quilts, because that’s just fucking crazy. Yeah.

So that’s where I’m at. I didn’t make art last night, but I did make a dent in the pile of stuff in here that needs to shift so I CAN make art. That’s all I can apparently handle at the moment, which is too bad, because I’ve got some major deadlines piling up here and I need to get my act together. Ha. This is not the time of year for me to apparently do that. Sigh. I will keep going through the memory pile on the boychild’s bed though…it’s like an anthropological dig through Kathy’s art existence. Plus I suspect someone will want to sleep there soon enough.

Whatever Works…

Sometimes I look at the search terms people use to find my website. I usually find that it’s a mistake. It makes me want to search through all my posts for that particular phrase, which maybe I used, but I don’t think so? Because it’s not in my vernacular? I remember once many years ago when I was teaching in a different district, a parent accused me of saying something to their child that would have been (1) incredibly inappropriate (if I had actually said it, which I didn’t) and (2) grammatically incorrect (which is why I knew I had never said it). In fact, I was fairly sure I knew which kid had said it (a second-language learner…hence the grammar issue), but all they really wanted was an apology for something I’d never said. I tried to explain why I wouldn’t have said it, but the parents weren’t having it, weren’t understanding the grammar part. Whatever. Sometimes the hardest part of my job is dealing with parental expectations…for me and for their student and for the world in general.

So after a perfectly delightful meeting at a quilt store to drop off a cat quilt and (honestly) buy some more fabric because I needed stuff for the bathtub (in the quilt…not the one the dog and cats were in), I made it to the gym and home, mostly exhausted, but with a post-it-note list of things I had to do for school. Post this, print that, and then magically come up with shit for kids to do who for some inexplicable reason can’t be in the classroom with all the other kids. Pain in my ass. Because the stuff we’re doing isn’t actually do-it-alone stuff. I still teach, people. I put a lot of stuff online, yes, but it’s only after listening to me and watching me and asking me questions that kids are doing some of the online stuff. They aren’t good readers, in general, and I act out processes and they listen (well, mostly) as part of their understanding. So if I assign two articles and tell them to read and annotate, and then do this other assignment over here based on that…a ton of kids will just make shit up to avoid doing the reading. I had to make up a week’s worth of stuff for one kid. The other kid is leaving next week and won’t be back until January, and I know where he’s going and probably why, but can’t think of any job where you can just up and disappear for over 5 weeks and expect to still have a job when you get back. Meanwhile, I have to plan curriculum day by day through January, and I’ve barely got December under my belt. It would have been done, but my coteacher has been gone (good reason) and she and I have some coordinating to do.

All that, as far as I got (because I didn’t finish the kid who’s gone for a month) took until 9 PM, which is when I finally made dinner. And sat and ate it with a dog’s nose under my armpit (the house is cold). And then I should have finished grading Per 8’s tests and started grading Per 4’s journals, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. Too Many Hours on my job. I had a plan for what I was going to work on last night, and I didn’t get to any of it because of other people’s shit.

The only way to deal with that level of frustration is to make art. But I was really tired by then and felt like I should be cleaning out boychild’s room (his return gets closer every day, I hear), so all I did was sort the Wonder Under…

Yup. That’s some exciting art stuff there. The color! The interest! Eight boxes of Wonder Under, sorted by number. If I could just get my studio straightened out, I could start picking fabrics. Maybe that will be tonight. I just don’t know. I’m not holding out much hope.

I did wash the fabric I got yesterday, but did not even have the energy last night to pull it out and fold it…

I do love my new dryer though. It’s trés efficient. Yes, lots of grays and whites and a little black. I needed bathtub fabric. I also think I need a donut. That’s stress talking. Ironically, it’s the same stress that drags me to the gym. Whatever works.

Back to It…

The week we get off at Thanksgiving has never been a relaxing vacation for me. Whether I stay home and do the whole deal here, or go to Seattle for four days, or what we used to do, which was go to Lake Arrowhead and hang out at my parents’ cabin…it was never relaxing. It was hectic, full of crazy errands and grading before, during, and after. Sometimes I’d manage to quilt or stitch down or cut out a bunch of pieces, but mostly it was tense chaos. And I’m not even the one who usually cooks. I support the cooks by cutting stuff up or whatever. This year, I barely did anything (thanks to my cousin and all HER hard work).

Last week did not break that trend. I did not shop on Black Friday or even Small-Whatever Saturday, mostly because money’s pretty tight right now. Property taxes are due next week and I need to be able to pay them and a credit card bill. Deep breaths. Then I will think about Christmas. I did hang out for a while on Saturday because I needed to do just that. Not grade more papers like I did Friday off the plane. Sunday was the inevitable catch-up day. Five stores later, I think I had got there. Although there are at least two more errands I need to do this week…I lied, three. Maybe more. And then I came home and worked until about 10:30 PM. I did make dinner in there somewhere. My SIL’s convinced I’m eating all this hidden sugar in my diet. She’s wrong. I know where all of it is. I mostly cook from scratch. Seriously, on a good day, I eat fairly healthy. I made kofta balls from scratch, put in lettuce wraps with a cucumber/yogurt sauce and a bit of brown rice. I do OK some days. And there’s leftovers.

I’m not ready to go back to school though. Then again, we never are…teachers. I’m sure the kids aren’t ready either, but they have it pretty easy. I have all the lesson plans done. I’m hammering grammar starting this week. I’m tired of reading their work with no spaces after punctuation, no first word capitalized, the word “I” never capitalized, starting every sentence with “And,” never putting in periods. The computer age may be upon us, but my students aren’t prepared. The English teacher is coming along for the ride. If I have to read all that stuff online, then they better be improving their practice. Meanest science teacher ever! Yeah whatever.

Meanwhile though, and I feel good about this, I finished cutting out the Wonder Under (finally!) for Bathtub 5, which got totally sidelined by the holiday.

It only took about 4 1/2 hours to do it, but I just didn’t have the time before I left for Seattle. I was determined to finish it last night, so I stopped grading tests (because that was kind of depressing anyway), and finished this instead. Tonight I can sort them and maybe start picking fabrics. Except I’m not sure if I have a background big enough. I’m pretty sure I do, plus I’m supposed to be at the local quilt store tomorrow after school to deliver one of the sold quilts, so I can manage that then. I’m hoping (moneywise) that there is something here big enough. I will need some blues and whites though. I think. There’s some really big white pieces in this quilt, and big is always an issue for me.

But the next part is the fun part…the fabric-choosing part. I’m going to need to clean more of this space up to manage that though. Damn. Forgot about all that. Sigh. So maybe NOT picking fabrics tonight. We’ll see.

By the way, if you’re interested in one of the smaller quilts (cats, birds, hearts), I suggest you tell me soon, because I’m going to put them all up on Etsy sometime this week, and I’ll have to raise prices to do that. Under Recent Work, Catching Cancer 2, Owl 2.0, Cats 1, 2, 5-7, and Heart in Hands 1 and 2 are all available. Also, Birds 7, 11, and 13 are also available…see below.

Bird 8: Purple Bird, 18.25“ w x 14.5“ h, $205.

Bird 11: Dove 2, 10“ w x 8“ h, $100 (no binding, no sleeve, hangs on rings).

Bird 13: Diving Bird 2, 10“ w x 8“ h, $100 (no binding, no sleeve, hangs on rings).

Just contact me on the website or in the comments. Shipping is included in the ones I did this year, unless it’s going international. The birds will need to have shipping added. I include hanging hardware. Think of the holidays…

Yet Another Unproductive Day…

in which I actually still got shit done.

I wish I could say that today was amazingly productive. It wasn’t. Well, I got stuff done, but not enough of it. It’s never enough. My bag is mostly packed. I think there’s a cat in it, but hopefully she’ll jump out before tomorrow morning. I might have enough warm clothes. I might not. I hear Seattle has stores. And my brother has extra clothes. I shipped a quilt out that needed to go to its new home. I went to the gym and the chiropractor, both good choices. I returned my library book. I transferred money to pay for college so it will be there when I get back and before the bills are due. I cut out a little Wonder Under…

Not a lot. I’m almost done with the second sheet, and I think there are 2 1/2 more sheets. I think. I could check that. Right now. One moment.

I was wrong. There are only 1 1/2 more sheets. So I’ve done a little less than half. I so wanted to be done with this step by now and picking fabrics, but no. School kicks my butt. I did laundry. I ran the dishwasher. I photographed the trees on the property line between my neighbor and I…just in case. I am that paranoid.

Here’s that “dead” tree. See all those bunches at the ends of the branches? Know what those are? New green leaves…because Southern Californian trees never really know when it’s winter, because it was in the 90s last weekend.

Poor confused beast. Does it need some trimming? Sure. It does. And this would even be the best time of year for it…although it might be a little chilly at night. That said, I still don’t have the money.

Looking back at the last few quilts, this new one should take about 80 hours total. I need to have it ready to iron together by the time Winter Break starts, so that’s about 20-25 hours of work…in basically three weeks. That’s not too bad. I think I can do that, even though it’s the holiday season. And there’s three weeks of school in the middle of that. No problem. As long as I don’t get sick and nothing else breaks, I will be fine. Plus I have to finish clearing out the boychild’s room so he can actually sleep in there. And draw the next quilt, because the timeline on it is pretty short. I’m actually hoping to draw that sometime in the next four days. It could happen. And I have to make a baby quilt…preferably before the baby comes. Although that’s always a crapshoot. My goal is to do that over break. Too. Yeah. I know. Too much.

But really, I need to go to bed right now, because I’m supposed to be up really early. Ugh. The part of travel I don’t like…the traveling part. But hopefully the rest will go fine…and I’ll have some unproductive days that are full of family stuff and food and freezing cold weather. Or reading books. And drawing. That would be OK.

Vacation Rant…

Late today. Ya know why? Cuz it’s vacation. That’s why. Hallelujah, because even though I still will have to work almost every day over break, at least I can do it in my pajamas on my couch (OK, well, not every day, because I’m going to my brother’s house and I don’t know where I will be grading there. I just know I will be grading.). I think every goddamned idiot and politician (oh wait, those might be an intersecting group) who thinks teachers are overpaid, money-grubbing child-haters should come teach in my class the week before a holiday. By themselves. On the same bathroom schedule we get. And then go home and grade all the shit we grade. Yeah. That. Fuckers. I think half my team (or more) hit borderline exhaustion by the end of day Wednesday. And we got up and taught for two more days.

I worked corporate. This does not fucking compare. At all. My job is physically, mentally, emotionally, and intellectually exhausting. I haven’t been a teacher all my life. I have many years of experience outside of education. I’ve worked in the corporate world as support staff AND as a professional, and I’ve also been self-employed. This job kicks your butt.

So I deserve this week AWAY from the classroom. Don’t kid yourself that I won’t still be working. I will. Some manage to not work all break, and I know that’s what I need, but I can’t afford it right now. I’m aiming for that for Winter Break. But that means busting my butt a little right now.

Moving on. I got up this morning when I wanted to. Well, after Kitten woke me up to inform me of the imminent rabbit invasion. I calmed her down, explaining that a single rabbit was not going to take down our kingdom. And then went back to sleep, trying to make up a few of the missing 2 hours a night from the last three months of teaching (that’s 140 hours short right now…gonna take me a while to catch up).

I finished tracing Wonder Under on Bathtub 5 this morning…

As you can see, it’s all piled up, ready to be cut out, except for the cat butt on the sheets. If you have cats, you know they must inhabit all of your projects. I eventually got her off of them, but she swiped her claws at me, so I gave up on trying to cover the light table again. Eventually she’ll go take a nap and I can clean up after her.

Both cats desperately need more attention apparently than I am giving them…

Both of them stalking me. It’s too bad they don’t really like each other. They used to be OK, but not after Babygirl. Oh well.

As you can see, it is a beautiful day in sunny Southern California. It’s supposed to hit 90 degrees. So I’m heading for Seattle and snow, and kind of panicking about clothes and shoes, but whatever. I’ll take a big sweatshirt and complain a lot to my sister-in-law, and she’ll give me shit for having thin blood. Damn straight. I live in So Cal for a reason.

So artwise, this week might be a bit of a wash. I need to go to school tomorrow to finish grading all the cell models that were turned in. I’m hoping to finish cutting out all the Wonder Under by tomorrow night. Then last night, while trying to fall asleep, I half-dreamed moving all the drawers around in my office so that the colors I use more would be more accessible. Luckily, I recently replaced all of them, so it would be pretty easy to just pull drawers and move them. But I’m not progressing quickly on the rest of the clean up. Because I’m never bloody home! Or I’m grading. Or I’m exhausted. So I didn’t leave much time around the house this week to get shit done. Oh well. I’m looking forward to hanging with my lovely family! OK, my crazy family. So I’ll probably get some drawing in up there. Although, my big sketchbook doesn’t fit in my luggage. I’m thinking of a trip to Michael’s to get a medium-sized one. I have a lot that are 9×12″ and the one I draw most of my quilts in is 14×17″. So something a little bigger. I think. And smaller than the big one. If I can find a coupon. Found one. Love the internet. Really, I do. I also ordered a small keyboard for my iPad so I can type up some stuff on the plane. Can’t use the work computer for that. I may have a bit too much tech. It’s possible. But it makes some things so much easier and faster. Unfortunately, there is no tech at the moment that can help me get the studio straightened up. It’s just gotta be me.

I have to say one thing about the refugee situation. I honestly think many Americans have lost their humanity, that they are so backwater in their NIMBY attitude, in their fear of everything government, the military, and politics have brought down on us, that they cannot even see the fear and hardship in the eyes of the adults that are coming over from Syria or wherever, but if they can look in the eyes of these refugee children and still be assholes, then I don’t want to live in the same country as they do. My America is not those people. I hate what we project to the rest of the world sometimes, and this is one of those times. These are the kids I teach. You hear their stories, you see how small some of them are from not enough good food, and you know the shit they survived, and for anyone to think these people are terrorists…hell, I live in East County San Diego…we have some big fat white terrorists brewing right here, some true crazies. We grow our own. And they call themselves Christian. Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush say they think we should only take the Christian refugees. What the fuck? I don’t care what your religion is…don’t use it as an excuse to turn away people who are starving, terrified, and scared to death. We take them in, we take care of them, we teach them, we help them. That’s what America is supposed to be about…hell, that’s what being human is supposed to be about. If you don’t believe that, then there is something seriously wrong with you. I’d like to think the students I have hear me talking about acceptance, about not hurting each other, about the biology of ALL humans, and they will grow up with that in their heads and hearts, not the hate rhetoric that I hear every day on the news. My Muslim students don’t hate like some of the Christians I’ve heard from do. They just want to be safe and warm and be able to learn without bombs falling on their schools.

That’s my rant. I’ve spent too many days listening to this shit and shaking my head at the crazy. You don’t like it? Don’t read my blog. Easy.

OK. Now I can be on vacation.

Let’s Think Good Thoughts…

Hallelujah. The righteous day has arrived. The day before a week off, not really a vacation because there are 10 tons of stuff to be graded, but at least I don’t have to get up early and go to school and manage crazy. Well. Wait a minute. I’m going to my brother’s house and he has three kids and yeah. I’m still gonna have to do all that except go to school. I did ask if I could go to school with the middle schooler. And then thought better of it. I’d just be depressed after that (private school…they probably have money for stuff).

I’m still feeling like I got run over recently, but I’m hoping a few decent nights’ sleep will help. I can’t be sick right now. That’s not fair.

I gave a test yesterday. Here’s how I know I’ve mellowed out as a teacher: I sat there and watched a girl cheat off another kid. She kept eyeing his paper and hers, and I sat there and watched instead of going over there and doing something about it, and then texted my upstairs duo, because I know there are two different versions of the test and she was sitting next to someone with the other version. Yup. I do that shit. Sure enough, she has all the same answers he does, which means every single one of hers was wrong. I’m boggled. And then I was grading these stories I had them write, and I get to this one kid and I’m reading and thinking “He didn’t even write a story; this is just telling me the process of replication.” and I realize there’s no way in hell this kid wrote anything about 5′ and 3′ in replication, because I don’t even teach that. So I pick one of the more complicated sentences in there and I Google it. Pops right up. The pros and cons of technology.

I’m just amazed by how stupid the kids must think we are. Which is why they were telling the cheating story upstairs so that my next two periods coming in already knew it. What’s funny about that is I caught two more kids doing it, same deal. One, I’m thinking, hell, why would you cheat off of HIM? He doesn’t do any work…he’s gonna fail. And the other one, hey good choice kid, she’ll probably get an A, BUT SHE HAS A DIFFERENT TEST THAN YOU, YOU DINGBAT. Were you not listening? Sigh.

At least I have a sense of humor, right?

I had quilt class (which was really just me and Susan bitching about crazy kids and parents and administrators and crap about schools) and finished this one…

Heart in Hands 2, 11” w x 14 ½” h, $215

It has more pieces than the other one (fingers and all). So that’s all the small ones done. I’ve sold a few and may just put the others on Etsy to see if that moves the rest of them.

I cut some pieces out at quilt class and then came home and moved fabric around, trying to get the boychild’s room cleared and the studio back in working order still, especially since I need to be picking out fabric for the new quilt fairly soon…although probably not before I leave for my brother’s house. That was the plan anyway. Oh well. I try. I don’t always succeed.

I didn’t cut out a lot yet…not even one full sheet (a yard or so of Wonder Under)…

I have two sheets with empty spaces where I’m still tracing smaller pieces, but I had to get a fourth one out for the aorta…

It went across the entire torso, so I didn’t have room for it on the others. I have one arm, the head, and the torso left to trace. I wanted to be done last night, but was too tired to finish up. I have about 180 pieces left to trace. Maybe tonight? Probably not tonight. Maybe tomorrow morning. Ugh. No, I need to go to the gym tomorrow morning. We’ll see.

I wish I could spend my whole vacation on art and relaxing and drawing and hanging out, but grading will be a significant part of it. My fault as always, but it is the fact of this job that grading is never done.

OK, let’s think good thoughts about the achy headachey spacey thing I’m feeling, that it’s just exhaustion and not illness. And good thoughts about finishing the tracing soon and maybe finding time to draw in the next week, just because drawing is fun and nice and I like it.

Let’s just think good thoughts because vacation is 7 hours and 42 minutes away.

I’m Not That Amazing Some Days…

Oh my goodness. Klutz morning. Spilled tea all over myself, not even sure how. Dropped a bunch of crap. Not functioning well. I did not get genes for gracefulness. I own that. Fully.

Yesterday, we had Google Expeditions in the classroom. If you’ve heard of Google Cardboard, we had 30 devices in class and our team chose to take the kids on two virtual field trips to the Galapagos Islands (because then you can talk about blue-footed booby dances and not get in trouble). Seriously though, it was very cool and significantly exhausting. As devices crashed, I walked around restarting them, all the while directing the kids as to where to look on a teacher tablet. There’s little talking points, but also you can send them around with arrows looking for stuff. Kids try to walk around with them, because the view changes as you move your head, and they don’t get that they’re not actually walking in the space itself.

At the end of the day…actually, at the end of the second-to-last period of the day, I felt like I’d run a marathon (possibly I did) and needed a stiff drink. At 2:35 in the afternoon. I bullied through the rest of the day, and then ran a bunch of errands and collapsed on the couch. But only for a while. I needed cookies for today’s luncheon…plus I find it hard to just crash at night without doing something else useful. I graded for a while in the braindead zone, and then I finally got up and traced for about an hour.

An hour is all I had in me.

I did not finish the last binding. Oh well. I got to piece 491 last night…so slowing down. It’s because the water pieces are complicated to trace, figuring out how they overlap and where they go takes some attention. It’s progress. I can’t complain about progress.

I haven’t cleared out the studio any better…in fact, since I moved in new drawers and the old drawers are still shoved in here, the dog has been complaining about the lack of space to sprawl on the floor.

I’m working on it, Calli. I’m not that amazing some days.

So today I’m still completely exhausted (a vacation must be coming up), I’m apparently filling my entire suitcase to Seattle with shoes for different occasions, and I have a huge headache like a hangover, even though I drank nothing yesterday. That doesn’t seem fair. I’m testing my students today, so it should be irritating, because many are not prepared, but at least it will be quiet. Maybe. And if not, there will be consequences. Ugh.

Parent meeting this morning. No time to chat. More later.