Peace and Love and Art…

Funny, I thought I had started writing this already this morning, when I realized my exercise class was 30 minutes earlier than I thought and the girlchild needed to be dropped at her dad’s house. Suddenly, I was leaving. And then forgot completely about not even starting this (I resized the photos…that’s a thing). Now it’s about 20 minutes from when we have to leave for the Man’s family’s Xmas dinner, it’s already dark, and I’m unsure of what I got done today. Exercise! I did plenty of that. I managed to get sopping wet on a 3.37-mile street walk (didn’t want to venture into the wilds in the rain…damages the trail too much and the rain can be dangerous in some places with waterflow), which was exhilarating, though damp. I wasn’t the only crazy person out there. The wind had died down from this morning and it was just wet. Really wet at some point. Almost everything I wore was soaked through. It’s fine, because now my blood sugar is low enough that I can eat whatever is provided…sometimes, I have a hard time if it’s a meal I didn’t plan or I don’t know all the parts going in. It’s just easier to go for a long walk beforehand. Probably better for me too. My blood sugar has been really good since I went on Break (something to be said for reducing stress by removing the day job).

What have I been doing since Monday? Well, almost finishing the quilt…not quite. I thought I’d be done yesterday, but I was definitely concentration/focus-challenged yesterday. Still am. So Monday night, I trimmed it…

So yeah. Scribble was no help at all. In fact, I’d call her a hindrance.

Because I did not want to cut her paw off with the rotary cutter. Eventually I got it all trimmed. Then I sewed the binding on…

That lovely dark green was the first one I saw and it worked perfectly. I hadn’t even figured out what color to make the binding until I saw that green. Weird how that works. Some part of my brain had figured it out…just didn’t tell the cognizant part. I’m OK with that.

I started handsewing it down on Monday night, and then did about 3 1/2 hours yesterday. All I have left are the sleeves, and I plan to finish them tonight. This cat does not understand how this works.

ON the quilt is problematic. But then Nova tries to go under.

There’s pins everywhere y’all. Danger danger.

Sigh. She is a love. But entirely too much IN the process. HELPING. I’M HELPING.

I also made it to ceramics on Monday and worked on the bowl I’m apparently making.

It got more complicated.

But fun. I’m going to add speech bubbles I think…and then do words in it.

And the hands need more details. Fun to do anyway. There was no one there at all. I might go in tomorrow…but I think time will be short tomorrow and I really need to hike before dinner. Hopefully there will be less rain tomorrow. I think San Diego missed the worst of it.

This video was from yesterday, after the boychild stole a bunch of stuff from my kitchen for Xmas dinner (fair trade really).

I could have bought more butter, I suppose, but there it was, being handed to me.

It’s Christmas Eve, the night when many celebrate with some portion of friends or family. And this is what I’m thinking about…

Set an amount of money that beyond which, it just gets taken. It might make the world a better place because (a) it would fund a lot of things that aren’t currently being provided and (b) maybe people would stop obsessing over getting more more more being some form of ‘winning’. It’s a thought.

And this is probably what the next quilt is about.

I should figure that out since I basically have to start it tomorrow. Fun times. It’s fine. I love making art…I just was expecting to make something different next and now I need to make something completely different…than the different thing I was going to make. I’m lucky to have that be part of my Winter Break. (don’t talk about grades!) Oh, I also listened to another retirement webinar, because I was worried about one thing with the date I had chosen, and sure enough, I’m going to have to work one more year than I thought. It’s an easier pill to swallow now, this far out, but it’s frustrating that something like that is based on my birthday. If I’d just been born two months prematurely…sigh…no, that’s not fun for anyone. It’s fine. Really. It is. OK, gonna go burn another solstice intention and then go to a party. Where I can actually eat the food. Maybe. Hopefully. Hope your holidays are full of peace and love and art. In whatever order that works for you.

A Giant Experiment

There are three days of school before we go on break. There’s been some crazy shit (there always is), some crazier than usual. My blood sugar responds to stress, and yes, it is responding to stress. And cake. That was my fault. To my credit, I ate it in two shifts. On Monday, after the holiday party, which was really just a confession and food (is that the definition of a party?), I had to get on the stationary bike for an hour. It’s OK…I finished my book. Although my knees did not appreciate it the next day. They rarely do though. It’s weird…we usually have spirit week before break and dress up most of the days, at least wearing Santa hats and pajamas, and that’s not even happening. I think everyone is just trying to survive. That may be true of everyone honestly. Christmas is coming up and it’s crazy. I still don’t have a box for the stuff I need to ship. I keep forgetting. I have a to-do list but it keeps getting impacted by school. We have three days to get at least the first week of lessons done and we don’t have enough time to teach everything before the state test because the school board did a stupid thing and got sued and now we have to teach stuff that’s not on the test before the test and I can’t even tell you how frustrating that is after we spent hours this summer backwards planning from the end of the year to make sure there was enough time. And now we’re fucked. No one paid me for those summer hours and no one will pay me for the hours it will take to rearrange stuff to fit the school board’s fuckup. Summer self did that work because she knew that May/June self would really appreciate it. And now both of them are pissed off. “It’s fine,” the District says, “It’s only one year and then you can go back to whatever you normally do.” Great. You gonna pay me for the extra planning this year? Nah? I didn’t think so. Plus I have to do more training even though I helped write the damn curriculum. I guess all that is January/February/March’s problem. She’s already irritable about it though. December self just wants the first week or two planned and maybe to have a table of contents for the unit that doesn’t have to be totally rewritten halfway through. Big dreams.

Meanwhile, this is the third morning in a row I’ve had to show up early to school for something…luckily, I think it’s the last one in 2025! Maybe. Knock on wood.

I did finish all the stitchdown on Monday night…stayed up late to do it, which pairs well with getting up early.

Stitchdown is generally pretty fast…this was 4 1/2 hours. Last night, I cut the batting, washed the batting, dried the batting, washed the floor (it was gross), and cut and sewed and ironed the backing. Then it was 10:15 PM and I knew it would take an hour to pinbaste this thing, so I didn’t do it. Did I go to bed earlier? Nope. Totally not. That would make too much sense. I just didn’t want to crawl around on my kneepads for an hour…I’ll do that tonight after yet another early morning and a long day. It’ll be fine. Quilting by tomorrow. Done by? I don’t know. I need a binding fabric…I know I don’t have enough of anything for that.

Cat integration is going really well. These two play during the day (and the night).

Not touching yet, not curled up together…but I know Scribble wants that. Bowie is kind of an asshole (that phrase is said so many times in this house), but he is still kittenish and appreciates the racing around. Scribble bites gently, plays gently (with us), doesn’t hook us with claws, purrs a lot, loves a lot, squawks, and is a sweetheart.

Ceramics! I got this one out of the bisque fire yesterday…

Then glazed both with a clear glaze…hopefully the colors will hold. We’ll see. They do darken in the glaze fire, but I’m hopeful. They are both frames for the wall. I haven’t figured out construction for frames for just standing up. And I forgot to check how much they shrank. Oh well. It’s all a giant experiment anyway.

When I left the studio, Bartholomew had just showed up for dinner.

He’s definitely got more than his share of nine lives.

OK then there’s this…

This might help. Sigh. We don’t solve problems well as a species, but especially here in the US. Dumpster fire has taken over.

OK today. It’s a catchup day. The kids will hopefully get everything done, we’ll do a lab tomorrow, a quick test question Friday, turn their packets in, and go away for three weeks. I need to finish grading last week’s homework and start grading the academic assignment they just finished. Whatever I get done this week I don’t have to do during break. That would be a plus. Pilates after school, then I have to cook (normally I would have done that last night)…oh wait, I did do it last night, but just for me. Then pinbaste, kneepads on. Maybe setup or start quilting. We’ll see. Looking forward to it. Looking forward to some time off too.

The Muck

Hey. So yeah, this week has been a mess. Seriously. Adults make such a mess sometimes. And I can tell that I ME I am dysregulated. I am. Let alone students. Sigh. Like take your hood off and stop interrupting instruction. Plus the adults in charge of teachers…sigh…just do a better job. And the adults who schedule meetings, for goodness sake, 8 AM is not necessary most of the time. And if you set a meeting, show the fuck up to it. Yes, I get that there are emergencies, but as a teacher, there are so many meetings that the people who need to be there don’t show up to and then I’m sitting there, because I’m responsible and I show up. And I sometimes wish my car would break down so I could just go home.

I have to tell you, I’m incredibly cranky and beat down by the day job at the moment…not the kids. I mean, there’s some annoying kid stuff, but most of it is because another adult didn’t do what they should’ve done, so I’m having to handle it. So I’d rather not. Please do your job. I have a weekend tour of ceramics studios I’m going on this weekend with the Man and I’m totally looking forward to just doing that and telling school to fuck off, but for at least another 10 hours, I need to deal with school and all the requests that I shouldn’t need to deal with, welcome to the job.

OK. And the Man wants me to think more positively, and keeps trying to force that on me, and please, you gratitude people, please stop. Some of us think about what we appreciate all the time and there’s still a bunch of slimey smelly crap from the day that we need to get out of our system so we can function. That’s me. Every day, I am thankful to make art at the end of it. Seriously. I love that part of my life, even when it’s stressful and I miss deadlines because I have so many of them. But I still need to verbalize the muck or it fills my head. I need to go yell out into the universe regularly, it seems.

Artwise, I’m still slow. I framed another (pain in the ass) thing for the girlchild…

I think I have one more frame to cut for her, plus figure out how to hang this one and stabilize the other one. Don’t ask me how my Xmas shopping is going…it’s not.

I did iron last night, for more than an hour, to try to make up for all the not ironing the night before.

Solid start on the mucky bathtub.

I also went to ceramics last night, because I can’t go this afternoon; they’re setting up for the ceramics tour. I was hoping they would start that later, but no. So I did some finalizing work on the other one and then glazed more on this one.

It’s pretty close to done. I need to patch up some of the black and clean up the back. The other one is pretty close to dry, to being able to get fired. Hopefully Monday.

Bart(holomew) the semi-feral cat of the ceramics studio, was very helpful.

Sometimes he bites if he doesn’t like what you’re doing, so I fed him. That generally works. I also squirted orange underglaze all over everything. Fun times.

And I graded. Because I never don’t grade. Scribble was very helpful.

She’s very people-oriented. Which is nice.

OK. I have a parent meeting at 8 because someone thought that was a good plan. My co-teacher is out, so I have to print her plans and seating charts before 8, which means I need to get my ass to school soon. I need more tea. I need to finish and print a worksheet and set up lab bins for magnets on Monday and write a note to our TA to do something and probably write warmups and I think I have abdicated teaching to the students mostly because they need to do some independent work so I can think straight. I’ve been doing direct instruction all week and I’m tired. Then an emergency union meeting (on Zoom, thank goodness, I’ll be on that while I’m at Home Depot) after school. It’s cold and the Man keeps overheating at night, so I haven’t been able to put the flannel sheets on, but I think this weekend is the time where I do it anyway, because I’m freezing at night and that doesn’t help my sleep. Until I’m hot, and then the blankets get thrown off, and that never stops people, it never stops. Yes, I have all the meds and the things and this is just something the women in my family get to do: vomit all through pregnancy and overheat at night until we die.

Positive thoughts. You know what I’ll be doing tonight at SOME time? Ironing. I’ll be ironing. A bathtub with a body bag in it and a rifle underneath it and bullets and blood all around. Yup. You got that.

Mostly…

Back into the screaming fire that is school sometimes. Trying to keep the head above water. It’s three weeks. I can do that. Maybe. I mean, I don’t really have a choice…it’s just how much hair pulling and mental screaming I might do while I get there. All good. Deep breaths. My office calendar still says November. No worries.

I did get the office/studio managed enough to iron in here. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a fucking disaster area in here, but I can iron. It’s genetic, by the way…the stacking of things in a studio. I saw my mom’s on Sunday and it was just as bad, although the boychild said hers was organized better than mine. Her studio is also 4 times the size of mine, so I don’t feel bad. I do need to do something about it over Winter Break though. I can’t breathe in here at the moment. Too much chaos.

I finished sorting fabric pieces on Monday night…

I had about 30 minutes of super tiny pieces to figure out, after matting and framing a couple pieces for my daughter. I miss Aaron Brothers for mat board, y’all. Had to wait forever in Michaels for a few beatup pieces. Annoying. Their fabric selection still sucks too. We asked about one that was on the website and said it was available here, and the staff was like, I dunno? It’s over there. People put fabric back wherever. Which is true, but hey, thanks for helping…we’ll go to an independent store (which unfortunately, they all have shitty hours if you work full time). And for those of us still using Alto mat cutters, the blades are hard to find. Too bad they went out of business…the cutters don’t die. I think I’ve solved that problem though. Maybe.

Then last night, while dinner was cooking, I sorted the studio (really I just made more bigger piles out of the way of the ironing board) and started ironing after dinner.

Still a week behind on this quilt, and at some point, I have to catch up. Don’t ask what that is. It’ll be clear later. Ironing like a beast each night from here on out. Maybe. Girlchild is still here. I love it. But I suspect more framing is in my future.

I made it to ceramics last night for a lovely 80 minutes of painting sgraffito. I think I finished the other one (mostly touchups) and it’s drying. This has an hour into the painting alone.

IDK how to make simple things y’all. But I love it.

Scribble missed me my first day back to work. It was her first experience with people leaving all day. That night, she curled up by my face and purred at me all night, occasionally reaching her paw out to pet my face. I didn’t sleep much. I’m not mad though.

She’s still really unsure of the dog, but is doing fine with everyone else. Last night, she settled on my lap while I was trying to grade, and in the way of most cat owners, I let her. Graded around her.

Here’s Simba letting you know how he feels about not being invited to the dinner table.

Yeah dude, whatever.

OK. My left eyelid has been twitching for a week now. Really driving me bonkers. I’m still teaching electricity, plus vocab and independent and dependent variables (sheesh) for a few days before going into magnets. I realized it’s a lot of direct instruction, so pretty exhausting and a lot of talking. I did spend all day yesterday rubbing a balloon on my hair and using it to make a soda can move. Like you do. As one student said, by the end of the day, “Ms. Nida, your hair is CRAAZY.” Well yeah. It does that. Things you do for learning. After school, I have a lovely pilates break, then book club, I think. And ironing. It’s a lot. I do love the artmaking. I don’t mind the teaching…I mind all the minutiae and the adult crap and the school board crap and the state school board crap (which is because of the local school board crap). Anyway, I need to go write a parent email and then go to a meeting with the principal (sigh) and then do the teaching thing. All good. It’s Wednesday and I mostly have a handle on things. Mostly.

People and Carbs…

This week is just never relaxing. I’ve been to the grocery store four or five times, the pet store twice (I know, that one is my fault for adopting a new kitten), plus trying to catch up on cleaning (ha!) and yardwork (double ha!), and to finish grading? (triple ha!) …nothing is happening the way I’d planned. What’s new? Nothing. It’s always like this. I try to steal moments for reading or artmaking, but there’s other stuff that snuck in…like all the emails about stuff I needed to do that I totally ignored for the last three weeks? Yeah, those. And the four things that need renewing, but now I can’t find the renewal emails. Ugh. And then being invited to be on a cool website…awesome, but it required an hour of photos with the boychild (thank goodness he has a clue, because I don’t) and I’m sure he spent a ton of time resizing, and then I had to find art photos too and send all of them, plus fill out three pages of forms. I appreciate the opportunity, but I don’t have extra time lying around for all of that. So the bathrooms are still dirty and so are the floors. Oh well.

The kitten is adjusting. She has a name finally…Scribble. She’s like a little ADHD and very balls to the wall with the other cats. Right now, she’s sleeping, after racing around for 5 hours this morning. She’s definitely a curious little thing and won’t let her inability to jump high enough stop her.

We started out with my hanging out with her in a room with no other cats, but once we let her out…man, she didn’t want to stay in.

That said, she’s not banging on the door to be let out when I do put her in the room, which is when I leave the house, because I don’t entirely trust the other cats with her yet.

This was a very tentative moment between Scribble and Nova. Both wanted my lap.

I think we’ll all be OK in the long run…it just might take a while. Certainly last night, when Scribble was all puffed up, jumping sideways, I’m Big! I’m Big! toward Bowie and he’s just staring at her like she’s the scariest thing in the world…I think Bowie is having the hardest time adjusting. But he does appreciate an animal that will run around and parkour like he does, so he’ll come around.

One of the boychild’s photos.

OK, so artwise, I’m mostly still cutting things out.

Which is not particularly fast…

I really wanted to be ironing things together by now. Oh well. I’ve got another 2-3 hours of trimming, I think. I’m going to go do some more in a bit. I might do some yardwork first, before it gets dark.

I also spent a couple of hours at ceramics on Monday…and did most of this. It’s very relaxing.

I need to fix the cloud and a couple of other spots, but I think otherwise it’s ready to fire. I was hoping to get there today as well, but so far, that hasn’t happened? Maybe in an hour. We’ll see.

Found this in the yard.

Such a perfect mushroom.

This…I know some people are leaving for legit reasons, like being afraid of deportation…that’s a real thing and I don’t blame people for leaving. Detention or deportation to Venezuela or whatever other psychotic thing this government has come up with are legitimate fears. Go. Be well. Come back when the crazy is over (knock on wood that this ends at some point).

But if you’re a rich white American-born citizen and you’re leaving? You’re not staying and yelling with the rest of us? WTF. Seriously. I guess it’s easier than living here and being stressed about it, but those of us who don’t have tons of money and the ability to just up and go, we’re here and loud and not putting up with it, and y’all with money need to stay and be part of the fight…OR…take those fucking billionaires with you, the problematic ones, the racist misogynist ones. Take them. I mean, we can’t get rid of the ones who aren’t even here legally and have committed multiple financial crimes, but we’re trying to deport Native Americans. It’s just nuts. And if there’s no one with power and money left behind to yell louder than the rest of us, that’s on you, what happens next. You ran away? So stay away. Because you’re making it worse. You’re not helping.

Sigh. This is a frustrating world we live in. By the way, yes, we’re celebrating Thanksgiving, but there’s so many cultural things wrong with this holiday. So much that’s made up. So much violence toward the native cultures that was just shoved aside for the pilgrim story. So I’ll be thankful for a hike tomorrow, and thankful for spending time with family, and thankful for good food (although at the moment, the thought of people and lots of carbs is not really something I want…I’ll get there. But going to the store yet again today made me want to pillow fort for about a week), but remembering all along that we white people are appropriating disease-carrying xenophobes who don’t really belong here. Positive thoughts to all. It’s a rough week for a lot of people.

Hopefully Finishing

I’m two long days away from 10 days off. We’ve had enough days off this month, and I’ve just had two days when I didn’t have to grade very much and I was able to catch up in class, so it doesn’t feel horrible right now…not like a couple of weeks ago. That 4-day weekend was a nice recharge. Which is why it’s annoying that they tagged the other ‘free’ day onto an existing holiday instead of giving us another 3-day weekend. Apparently it’s all what the parents want, but since they take any days off as a reason to take MORE days off, I guess it doesn’t really matter. I’m doing a makeup test today and another tomorrow. Then I’ll have a shit ton of work to grade over break (like always) and I’ll use the extra day they gave us on Friday to hopefully do a huge chunk of it. Knock on wood. Shit always happens when I plan, so who knows if I’ll get to do what I want or need to do.

I’ve spent the last two days carving the two ceramic frames I made.

This was originally going to be a sun, but it looks more like leaves now. Might need to change my color scheme.

I put a sun on this one to make up for it.

It’s been a while since I’ve used the squeeze bottles with underglaze in them, so the yellow was completely glued in. I’m going to have to bring pliers next time and see if I can get the needle out. This is relaxing…this is also about 2 1/2 hours of work, just in the carving. So not fast. Nothing in clay is fast except those people on the wheel maybe. Even then, there are so many steps that it isn’t fast.

Ironing is progressing. It’s taking longer than I thought it would, but some of that is me, I think. Slow. Tired at night. Trying to get other stuff done before I start and then starting late. Here’s Monday night…

And last night…

All I have left is a bunch of little tiny objects on the rug, so each one needs to be considered within the whole, and then colors chosen for just that object. Then I do it again with the next object. So it takes longer than say the water, where I pick four fabrics and then find all the pieces that are those four colors and then iron them all down. Bigger space covered with less thought, although it may take a while to iron all the pieces. It’s not the same as having to consider all the colors around it and make sure it works. I ironed a snake, a plant in a pot, and a cat. That was it, I think. I really am almost done. About 100 pieces left. I don’t have to cook tonight, but I do have pilates and the trash needs to go out, so those are time suckers. But not huge ones. I’m looking forward to being done with the ironing and onto the lovely meditative process of sitting on the couch with an animal or two and cutting out a thousand pieces. It sounds delightful. Then I can go back to standing and ironing after that.

Things that are stressing me out: not having a table of contents for the unit packet after break; losing my prep period today to a parent meeting when I need to be working on said TOC; my car brakes squeaking; the leaky sprinkler; the pool vacuum not moving; whatever I haven’t done that I’ve forgotten I haven’t done. Yeah. That’s a silly one.

OK. Today I am giving a writing test. It’s not easy. Yesterday one kid said, “I watched all the videos but the answer isn’t in there.” Oh my. Yes, my dear. You will need to use your brains this time. Thinking. Hard. The worst part is having to monitor their access to the internet and AI and their older brothers and sisters. Like do your own work, please. I am also trying to get them all organized to turn in these giant packets, plus finish all their work, and that’s frustrating. But ultimately, their problem, not mine. Pilates after school. Probably some lesson planning. Then ironing. Hopefully finishing tonight. Please. It’s time.

Muttering

OK, it’s another short week. Political stuff sucks, but hey, tariffs on things I don’t buy are going down. Hope it helps someone. Maybe stop deporting people who are trying to follow the rules and deport some of those white guys who don’t follow rules back to wherever they came from. I was efficient at grading this weekend and got the academic assignment completely graded, but then spent probably 90 minutes obsessing over how to let kids make it up instead of sleeping. Good times. The shutdown is over…pro, people get paid. Con…nothing changed. Bring on the Epstein files! We’re ready!

Yeah, whatever.

I did iron a decent amount this weekend. Friday night…

I started late because I was grading, and then got all the water laid out for the second bathtub, but also needed to go to bed, because I needed to be up early. So I left part of it for Saturday.

Saturday, I finished the water and did all the fleshy bits of the figure in the second bathtub.

And last night, I did all the non-fleshy bits of the main figure: eyeball, heart, lungs, etc. I’m about halfway through the 800s, maybe a little less than that…so 200 or fewer pieces to go. Mostly her hair and everything on the last rug, plus a plant or two. Probably two more nights, maybe three, depending on how late I start. I’m mostly caught up on grading, though, so that’s a plus. I won’t be after Wednesday, but we get Friday off (really stupid if you ask me; just gives parents more of an excuse to pull them out even earlier) and I plan to grade all Friday so hopefully I won’t have a lot of school stuff to do over break.

I did make it to ceramics on Friday. Mostly I tried to underglaze this well…

It will be much darker when it fires. I’m planning on doing some sgraffito on these. We’ll see how it goes. I haven’t figured out how to make them stand up yet. Or hang. I should do that. I’ll be back there today after school, after a 2-hour staff meeting about stuff I am totally not engaged in. So there’s that.

I caught two photos of my piece The Way Out at MOCA in Westport, CT, part of the Enough Already exhibit of Sara and Michelle Vance Waddell’s work.

It’s looking good.

I appreciate it being able to show in so many places with so much other very cool work.

I took a demo class on Saturday about building figures with a local artist, Moni Bloom.

It was cool to watch; would have been cooler to do as well, but I had misunderstood the type of class it was. It’s OK; the hands-on workshop will be in 2026. I might do it; I might not. Either way, I did learn some stuff about construction that is useful. It makes me want to ditch the frames and build something new. Maybe not as big as the last one. I’m waiting on bisque fix to fix the tree, then I’ll try to make it all go together. Hoping I can get the base to detach from the head; otherwise, I might need to build a new head.

The Man has been tired at night and going to bed earlier than me, which is different. I came to bed Saturday night and saw everyone in there…

Although I put the dog up and then Nova left. Too bad. She’s a sweetheart. Often Bowie doesn’t allow others in there either. He’s kind of a dick. And we may be adding to the menagerie this weekend. I have a hold on a kitten. We’ll see. I’m ready. I think.

I do this all the time. And certainly, I spent a bunch of time this weekend muttering to myself about kids not listening and not reading instructions. It’s fine. Really.

OK, today, I have set up independent work for students to complete. Tomorrow, we start the academic assignment with some background research. Then test Wednesday. I feel like I’m going to need a filler assignment, at least for a couple classes, but I don’t have an idea for that yet. I don’t want more work, so I’m playing it by ear, but maybe a preview of the next unit. I can probably put that together today while designing a google form for redoing the other assignment so I don’t have to give up yet another lunch to makeups, but there’s kids going to away soccer games who miss my 6th period and then miss the makeup. Sigh. I can’t fix all the things. And I’m frustrated by the system that equates grades with the right to be on the stage. I think they should let each teacher pick one kid for the stage. And not have it be grade related. Because I still wouldn’t pick the kid that’s bugging me about his grades. Sigh. Anyway, hopefully it’s a chill day, but we know how that goes. It’s supposed to rain again, although not as much…enough that I should bring my raincoat again though. Just in case. Ceramics after school, some carving I hope, and then home to NOT grade? I might be able to pull that off tonight. And then ironing. Reading my book! I’d like to do that too, although this is a book club book and I’m not entirely sold on it. I don’t care yet. Maybe I will, but not yet. Not enough.

Long Shot…

OK, so struggling to make art, but I have managed to get into a new show, get rejected for the first time ever to a ceramics show (!)…also never gotten into one, but that’s OK, and mostly packed up another quilt to send to a show. Plus organized photos and sizes for a 2-person show in Virginia this spring, which needed to be done as well. Organization is hard. Art management is hard. Having to be at a school board meeting to persuade the damn people in charge of the money that we are the resource they should be supporting? Also hard. Followed by an early meeting this morning and tomorrow morning, also hard. Plus my knee was acting up yesterday; actually had to wear a knee brace all day…and we did a lab, so it was kinda necessary that I be mobile. I don’t know what’s up with my knee, but it can fuck off. I do lots of physical stuff to stabilize it, and then it just randomly decides…nope…today I’m not gonna. Ugh.

Anyway…I did do art-related stuff. Monday night, I sorted all the Wonder Under, so technically I’m ready to iron to fabrics…

Hopefully tonight? I need to finish packing this quilt up so I can get a shipping estimate, and then I need to clean up the fabrics from the previous quilt. That might take all my available time tonight, but I hope not.

I made it to ceramics after finishing grades on Monday afternoon. For once, they canceled a staff meeting so we could get actual required work done. I had spent a goodly chunk of the weekend getting grades done, so I finished what little was left and headed for the studio. My piece is waiting for the head to go in the glaze fire and my tree to go in the bisque fire. The rest of it is at home, waiting to be put together and fancified. Fabric and paint I think. So I wanted to try out some of the things I had listed as want-tos before…one of which was sgraffito frames. I may have thought myself into crazytown again though. Instead of just doing a plain square or rectangle, I got fancy. And complicated.

Twice.

We’ll see how it goes. It’s something new anyway. And smaller. By far.

And yes, I entered my first ceramics show ever and got rejected. I’m OK with that. It was a long shot. But you know, in the beginning of my quilt career, Quilt National was a long shot too…so we all get there.

This sweet weird thing, Why. Not., got into Art Quilt Elements.

I entered one of my big complicated pieces and then two smaller pieces that were not as complicated, both in construction and concept, and the big one did not get in. Which is fine. I made this piece in between two big complicated political pieces. And it is its own kind of complicated. It will be at the Wayne Art Center in Wayne, PA, opening the same weekend I’ll be in Virginia at the closing ceremonies of my 2-person show. Same coast! For once. But too far to get to, I think.

Anyway. My art travels. Sometimes I get to travel too. Just not as often.

OK. Today. Sigh. I don’t think I got into pilates this afternoon, but I’m taking my stuff just in case. I have an annoying meeting this morning, then am getting kids through ideas about force and mass and motion all day. Then hopefully pilates and then book club. I know I read the book, but I don’t remember which one it was. As always. One day at a time. Then hopefully getting this space clean enough to start the fun task of picking fabrics. I really do enjoy that part. So that’s a good thing.

I’ve Run Out of Limbs

Oh hey. Do you know what it’s like to work in a profession that is nonstop? I’m a little tired of mine right now. The nonstoppedness of it for sure. The ‘here do this because you have plenty of time’ part of it. The ‘I don’t understand why you can’t do all the things we’re asking you to do’ part of it. The ‘we need to know when the kids go to the bathroom and return and that is more important than what you’re teaching’ part of it. And I don’t know if the nutkook who will be in charge has announced his education crony yet, but if any of his other uneducated, inexperienced choices are a sign, we’re gonna get worse than Betsy WTF ‘just give them a pencil’ Voss this time. It will not be four years of sanity. Not in my district anyway. I wish y’all luck wherever you are. I’m currently juggling too many things and need to juggle more but I’ve run out of limbs.

So art is even MORE important. I kamikazed from school to ceramics yesterday and built (most of) two legs and feet. Well, one foot.

It needs work. This looks a bit like my Thanksgiving turkey at the moment.

Hopefully it’ll look better soon. The right foot (on the left) does not exist. All of it needs work. I ran out of time because I also had pilates last night (but late), so I did that too. And graded stuff. And then traced…

The lead I’m using does not write as darkly on the new Wonder Under. It also doesn’t rub off as much. I’m not sure why. Strange. It’s the same pencil I always use. There’s more resistance and yet less. Not sure how to explain that. There’s less resistance from the fusible underneath, which sometimes was bumpy enough to move my pencil lead to one side; now there’s more resistance from the paper I’m tracing on. Yes, I am thinking way too hard about this. I made it into the 500s last night, which means I’m close to a third done. My goal is to be ironing to fabric over Thanksgiving break. So I probably have another 11 days of tracing if I continue at about 100 pieces in an hour, and an hour a night…so that’s a week from Saturday. And then I have to cut them all out, which is probably 6 hours or so and then family arrives so I’m on crack. I might be ironing by Thursday, actual turkey day. Uh huh. Well. Oh well then. Maybe I’ll do some this weekend? And grade and lesson plan. Ha! Fuck me.

So yeah. Today is a lot of direct teaching, I think. Tomorrow will be less so, then Friday back on it. We’re teaching lessons we’ve never taught before, which is always stressful. I haven’t finished Friday’s worksheet yet and I don’t have any for next week. Although we found the academic thing for next week, so that’s good. I really should make a video to explain the current assignment that kids aren’t finishing. Not sure when I will do that. 2 AM? Possibly. Just after I train kids to use the new signout system that didn’t work yesterday. Yaass.

OK, also so many union meetings today. Gonna go do the first one, teach, then do the second one. Maybe go see my brother, who is visiting my parents. Then cook dinner and grade and trace. In that order. I think. I might grade WHILE cooking dinner. Not necessarily the best choice, but…