A Nuclear Error, but I Have No Fear*

OK, well I managed to finish the current quilt last night, fully two nights earlier than I thought. Basically everything took less time at the end than I thought it would, which is interesting, because the earlier stages seemed slower than similar quilts of that size. It’s all a crapshoot…all the time I keep track of helps me estimate, but it’s never reality. That’s sort of the lesson I get out of life…you can guess what might happen, but life does its thing no matter what.

But first, we walked the dogs…they always need the exercise. So do I. These flowers are out again…they like it damp.

Someone left this by the trail…

After dinner, I sewed bindings and sleeves on for about 2 1/2 hours to finish.

There was a lot of sleeping going on around me.

Only three of the four come out here to sit. And that little gray one wanted to be ON the quilt. I said no. Pins in your butt, cat.

Eventually the two smaller ones left, but the big old lady was tired. And I finished the handwork.

I knew this one needed some ink…so I added that. Although now, looking at the picture, there’s more to do on that.

More cat butt. Cats are funny about whatever you’re working on…need to be right on it or in front of it.

Anyway, it’s done…and now I have to realistically see (or not so realistically, honestly) if I can finish the next one in time. I sort of mapped out time…and then laughed hysterically. Anyway, my plan is to get all the Wonder Under traced this week…and maybe start cutting it out. We’ll see. I’m also supposed to be grading stuff…but we had a major issue realized Sunday night about the websites the kids did. Hopefully we can fix that today quickly (ugh) so I can grade those. Not Panicking. Not Panicking.

I have work showing in Sweden, opening this weekend, part of the Feminism Now show that’s been here in San Diego and up in Los Angeles…mine is the top left…

So if you’re in Stockholm, check it out. I’m not in Stockholm, but a few of the artists are…

One of the things we taught yesterday as part of puberty was in response to the Santa Fe, Texas, shooting. If someone says no, then you’re not entitled to keep harassing them. I also taught about incels…and talked a little about what to do if you are feeling the way that kid must have felt to shoot people because a girl wouldn’t go out with him. Or what to do if your friend is really angry like that. TELL TELL TELL. Or snitch, as my kids call it. I didn’t gender the anger, but saw this quote later…

This world is really difficult sometimes. Especially when you’re trying to get a bunch of 12-year-olds out of vengeance mode…it’s something I’ve heard from them for the last week. If someone does something to them, like bullying, their response is to get back at them. I realize they’re still kids, but y’all need to get out of the video game and into human reality sometimes. And yeah, it’s mostly boys…a couple of girls, but mostly boys. Large disturbed sigh.

Today? Today is long. Teaching menstruation and ejaculation (oh my!) and then a science meeting and then at some point, I’ll be tracing Wonder Under. That’s a long way away though.

*The Clash, London Calling

Take a Walk on the Wild Side*

Yup. I skipped writing all weekend. It’s not because I was out doing totally amazeballs things away from technology, so I couldn’t check in and clear my brain (cuz that’s REALLY why I write, to do the brain dump thing…AND to keep me on task with the artmaking stuff). Nope. It was just because I was trying to get this quilt done…and I was pretty close to successful.

Friday night, I graded…and yes, that woman in the background was me. Totally.

But I only graded until it was time to head out for the musical event of the evening. This was in the parking lot where I left my car…

Everyone likes old signs.

Then to the Music Box for that band I follow…

It was a good show…might be because we got a VIP table this time. Much nicer experience…but not particularly cheap.

Came home and then hey…I was the one who fed all you bastards and threw balls and petted snotty-nosed cats. But I do not get all the love (actually, I’m OK with that)…

Saturday, I got up (eventually…it was a long, exhausting week)…and started quilting…outlining first.

And I outlined pretty much all day Saturday, on and off.

While on FaceTime with the girlchild, do you see the mouse? On the agave leaf? He was trying to get seeds off my weeds (see, having weeds is good for the ecosystem. Please tell my neighbors.).

Fascinating stuff. Back to the outlining. This usually takes the longest part of quilting, because I have to be (semi) careful and go (semi) slowly.

It helps that the machine behaved…always. This section will need inking too.

Then a late afternoon walk to clear the brain and allow my eyes to see in the far distance, instead of cross-eyed close up.

No coyotes out there this time. Well, that we could see.

Sometimes you just need to get out into nature. I need more of that.

I remembered to take a picture of the two backing fabrics. Told you they were obnoxious together. The fish one is at least 22 years old.

I bought three different fish fabrics to make baby bedding before my son was born. This was one that didn’t get chosen…and he’s 22 years old plus. Graduating this weekend. So it makes sense to use it now. Probably not gonna make a baby quilt out of it now.

More outlining…this is still Saturday…

I finished outlining around 8 PM…

Then out to dinner and this cat. Well, he was really close to my face. He didn’t want me to finish my book (I did anyway).

I was too tired at that point to keep quilting. So I read and then went to bed.

Sunday morning (still hard to wake up)…the background quilting was pretty basic. I just followed the board lines in the floor.

And did a big stipple thing on the wall. It took almost no time at all to be finished.

I trimmed it easily…

Went to the quilt store, bought binding, a fabric I think I’ve used somewhere else in a binding, but can’t remember where (it was the right shade of dark brown)…sewed the binding on after dinner, and then started the hand-sewing.

It’s going to the photographer on Thursday. So I need to finish sewing and do the ink stuff in the next night or two. And then get going on the next deadline. No problem! Seriously, I’m feeling kind of amazing at the moment. As long as I don’t think about school.

I did grade some on Sunday as well, but noticed a huge issue with what I need to grade…not sure how to solve it. Only panicking slightly. OK, a little more than slightly. Sleep was not my friend last night. This week will be a challenge…I think I’ve been saying that since February. No but this time I mean it! Laughing hysterically (maybe a little TOO hysterically) over here.

I think the quilting took about 5 1/2 hours and I’ve got 2 hours into the binding so far. So things didn’t take as long as I thought they would. I tried to pick a similarly sized/complicated piece to figure the time…but this one was apparently simpler and faster. That’s a good thing. I’m deliberately trying not to think about the other quilt in terms of time. Because grades will be due in the middle of all that. Plus 4 days lost to travel. It’s OK…I’m looking forward to seeing the boychild graduate from college. Seems like a fair trade-off. The other quilt will either get done in time or it won’t. Like all things in life.

*Lou Reed, Take a Walk on the Wild Side

Acting Steady Always Ready to Defend Your Fears*

Ugh. Braindead. Twitching eyelid. Mornings. Things I like: more sleep. Really, I think that’s not true. I want more hours in the day. But sleep sounds nice. It’s probably really nice to be asleep. Damn. It’s only Wednesday. Gotta get through relationship abuse (not personally…teaching about it), yes means yes, anatomy, and puberty before the weekend. We used to start on the first day with anatomy and totally freaked them out…but now we start a little easier and talk about liking vs loving. Already had to bring up repeatedly that it’s OK to love someone and NOT want to have sex with them. Sigh.

It was a long day…I have duty this week and I had tutoring yesterday too. I get home and I’m completely burnt out. I did sit down and calculate the hours it would take me to finish this quilt (approximately 31) and how many days I had (approximately 9…well…now 8). And I did some math and stared at the calendar. Then I calculated hours on the next one (100) and days I had (22? I think?). Um. Yeah. I then proceeded to work on this quilt, because I still think I can pull it off. I might be crazy.

Well, you already know the answer to that. I think I need to average 3.3 hours a night to finish. OK. Wait. I’m laughing hysterically. Last night, I did 2 hours and 50 minutes. I could have done more, but I was tired. So I took a break. Tonight I have more time.

I finished ironing the stuff on the mantel. That was easy.

Then I pieced the background and ironed everything down. That was also easy, although somewhat time-consuming. This quilt isn’t huge (it’s also not small), so it wasn’t too hard. I’m just realizing I’m totally gonna need thread for the background. I don’t think I have anything that will work.

Total iron down was 14 1/2 hours. When did I start? Thursday. Last night was Tuesday. That was fast.

And then I started stitching down. I got everything down on the floor done and started on the standing figure.

So that’s on my list for tonight…I don’t know if I need batting though. Damn. I should figure that out now. Because it’s closer to school than home. Ugh. OK. Thread and batting.

Calli on her daily ride back to my house, where she likes to escape the fence and run away to this house. Even though no one is there either. Weird dog.

OK, I’ve eaten and drunk most of my tea and I’m still exhausted. This job kicks my ass some weeks.

Is it realistic to think I will get this quilt sandwiched and pinbasted after school tomorrow, so I can quilt at class? Probably not. Sigh.

*Aimee Mann, That’s Just What You Are

Happiness Hit Her Like a Bullet in the Back*

Well today is the big day…the day we start teaching human reproduction and all the resulting crap to our kids. Are we ready? Well we never really are, although as far as attention span, this usually means we don’t have a problem for most of the rest of the year. That’s a plus. It’s a high-maintenance unit though, with not a lot of down time for the teacher. You can’t really set them free on the internet to explore a topic. So direct instruction for most of 5 weeks. Talking every day all day…let’s hope my voice holds up.

I’m so very tired, even with going to bed earlier…I think I can blame school. I’m really looking forward to a break. I guess that’s always true.

Anyway, I came home, walked the dogs, cooked dinner, and then ironed. I wanted to be done. It’s always like that…you wanted to be done or you were done. Or you knew you were nowhere near done.

We ate late so I started late. We ate late because I walked the dogs. So it’s like a cascade of late things. I started by ironing the fireplace…I needed it to be dark so the figures would stand out.

The female figure even mostly fit…I had to add two pieces of fire to make it work. It happens…stuff shifts around and doesn’t fit perfectly. I’m not particularly anal about perfect ironing. I make it work. You can make the pieces stretch or add stuff behind so it fills in.

At midnight, this is all I had left…a spider web, a key, and a candlestick in a holder. But I wanted to get to bed at a reasonable time…so I quit. I knew I’d have to piece the background before I could iron it all down anyway…so I guess that’ll be tonight.

He fit pretty well…I had one piece that needed shifting, but I just pulled it until they would stick together.

Looking good. Tonight I’ll finish the last little bits and get it all onto the background…and hopefully start the stitch down. I’ve spent almost 13 hours ironing it together so far. Like I said before, I’m not sure I can hit the deadline on this one. It’s going to be tight if it happens at all. Oh well. That’s the way it goes. I don’t think I’ll be able to finish the next one either, honestly. Sigh. I’m debating quitting on this one for a while and trying to get the next one done. I’ll think about that. I’m really on a day-to-day basis at the moment. Probably not the best plan if I have deadlines. Tonight I’ll analyze my remaining time and make a decision.

There was sun yesterday morning. Satchemo found it. The chair is holding his head up.

There’s no sun this morning. Poor kitty. I wanna be a kitty some mornings.

*Florence and the Machine, Dog Days Are Over

Until I Have to…

So over the weekend, I managed about 7 hours of ironing this quilt together…but until I went and added all the time up, it felt like I hadn’t accomplished anything because I wasn’t DONE. Need to work on that mindset. I did OK. No, I’m not done…it’s true…and it’s possible I’m not going to get this done by the deadline. The world will not end. It’s still going to be a great quilt. It’ll show somewhere.

So where am I? I’m still ironing. Yup. Not done.

But first, a sleepy puppy.

Because he’s cute.

So I left off with the body done…but she’s holding this heart and sewing up a gash in it. So I ironed the heart together…

And then shoved it in the hole where it belonged…ironed some fingers together to go on top of it.

Strangely everything fit together fairly well. Then I ironed the hair in there and the face parts separately. They’re too hard to see with all the hair around, and I always iron eyes separately so I can place them correctly on the face. It’s less of an issue with just one eye. With two, I don’t want them crooked.

Face in place…all good. That hand is HUUUGE. I like it.

Then I laid out all the 700s…moving into the fireplace area…

And I ironed most of them down into the hearth. Seriously…that’s about all of the 700s right there.

I laid out the 800s, which is the stonework and the rest of the fireplace…and then I looked at the clock. Midnight. Damn. Can’t start out the week on too little sleep. It just snowballs by the end, and I’ve got stuff to do Friday night. Can’t be exhausted. So I went to bed.

All that’s left are the 800s and 900s…the fireplace and the stuff on it. Then iron the whole mess together and onto a background. I might be able to get all that done tonight. It’s more likely I’ll get most of it done, but not onto a background. Stitch down tomorrow night or Wednesday? One of those. It’s going to be tight, this quilt. I have to work hard at grading stuff at school, so I don’t have to bring it home. I’m not even going to think about next week. Until I have to.

Not Today

I have been looking forward to this weekend. No real events…just something tonight. No things I really HAVE to do, except work on these two quilts…which I should probably get going on. I slept in (but went to bed really late too). I need a swathe of unplanned time to just sit around in my pajamas and drink tea and maybe do what I want. Think what I want. Not really though. That’s what weekends SHOULD be…but I’m stressing out about school and getting stuff done and whether or not to give kids more time to finish something when I can’t really afford to give them that time. Because I need to grade it. Aargh.

Anyway. I don’t know who let all that shit in, because I was trying to keep it out. Deep breaths. Sip the tea.

I worked on both projects last night. I also wasted chunks of time doing hell I dunno what. Seriously. I really don’t know.

A student gave me a rose for teacher appreciation week (his mom made him)…I don’t pick yellow usually, but it’s pretty.

I traced Wonder Under for about an hour while my show was finishing up…I’m in the 300s? I think? All the way up both legs and now starting to do the stuff around that.

Then I moved into the studio and worked on ironing the second figure. He’s got legs…

And I did his hands (one hand is literally just the tips of his fingers)…

That hand was complicated. I like it though…and the arm attached to it.

I numbered the fleshy bits before the box he’s holding, so I guess I’ll iron all the body parts and then the box and then insert the box? Not sure. That was midnight last night and I was tired, so I quit…and then stayed up too late anyway. It happens.

Today I am braindead. So I’m going to eat, shower, drink more tea, and then start ironing I think. I have an event tonight, but I should be able to get a chunk done this afternoon. Kinda looking forward to it. Then tomorrow I can make a decision about whether to extend kids’ time or grade stuff or whatever. Not today.

It Could Happen

I really need to work on this thing where I sleep through the night. It’s like having a baby around…except it’s my brain or the dog or who knows what. Exercise seems to help, but I don’t always have the time or energy for it…like if I walk in the door at almost 6 PM and I’ve been working that whole time, except for a nice leisurely lunch with my coworkers because it’s teacher appreciation week and the only kids who appreciate me are last-year’s kids (I’m OK with that…we’re probably pretty annoying right now…by this time last year, they won’t still be annoyed by us)…well then I THOUGHT about the gym, but a wave of exhaustion hit me as I walked up the stairs to the front door. So I didn’t. I will later this week. I’ll just do it on a day when I get home before dinnertime.

I think mostly the sleep thing is stress. I have other signs: the twitching eyelid, the canker sore I always get, the tight jaw…yup. That’s stress. I’m trying. I really am. So last night, after getting some stuff done like rejecting one proofreading job because the timeline was too tight for someone who works during the day, dealing with beneficiaries on my life insurance (yo kids! It’s you! plus how did they spell my brother’s name wrong? It’s the same as mine!), and some other email stuff…I decided to start tracing the next quilt. Yup. I don’t hardly ever, as far back as I can remember, work on two at a time…except when I’m working on one and the deadline on the other is more important. Then I might set the less-important one aside to work on the more priority piece. But I’m doing these pretty much simultaneously. Mostly because I had a Netflix video that I knew my video-watching partner wasn’t going to like, and he was gone, so I could watch it while tracing, but not while ironing (two different rooms, only one has a DVD player. I wrote VCR. I mean, it has that too, but we don’t use it any more).

I traced for almost 3 hours. Meditative.

IMG_4249 small

I didn’t get super far…all the stuff in the bottom, ready to start on her feet. Maybe 150 pieces or so. Not sure why it took so long, but it did. My brain fighting the process. I’m still working on not bringing any work home…on getting stuff done at school and at meetings, so I don’t have to bring it home. Not sure that will last, but I’m trying.

I got a phone call this morning at 6:30 AM from a duct-cleaning place. Every other day or so there’s another message from one of them. That and the phone researchers…one called last night at 8:45 PM. Annoying…not sure how to get off those lists.

Early meeting today…hopefully I’ll wake up and find my brain by the time I get to school. It could happen.

I Am Superman and I Know What’s Happening*

Well girlchild is home. In Boston, anyway. Strangely, now I miss her more. Because she’s in the US but not here? Mom brain is a strange beast. I’ll see her in 2 1/2 weeks. Plus even better, we now can revive the mom-kids group text! I bet the boychild is thrilled about that.

I’m so tired lately…I know I don’t sleep enough, but usually that’s not a huge problem. Right now I’m not sleeping well AND it’s not long enough. I even went to bed early last night, but I still feel like a truck hit me this morning. End of year exhaustion? Starting in early? There’s 26 days left. It sounds like a lot. Six weeks sounds worse. And then I think about trying to finish these two quilts in that time and I panic.

All right then. Let’s not think about that. Back to a day at a time. Today is the first day of state testing. Never fun. One kid said yesterday that this must be the teachers’ favorite time of year because we love torturing kids. Oh for fuck’s sake. I hate testing. Arbitrary contrived bullshit stressing the kids AND us out…to what end? Accountability? Yeah right. Whatever. There should be a better way.

Yeah. I’m cranky. I’m going to be artmaking tonight (after school and a union meeting).

Last night, I managed to finish cutting out the last little bit of pieces (it was an extra 38 minutes, so if I’d done it the night before, I wouldn’t have gone to bed until after 1 AM, so it’s probably best I didn’t listen to art brain.).

Here’s all the pieces ready for the next step. It took 11 hours and 12 minutes to cut them all out. Much longer than I thought it would.

Ready to sort them all…I really hate this step, but it’s mostly necessary…otherwise I’ll never find the pieces I need in a pile of a thousand.

An hour later, I’m sorted…with a cat butt to assist.

I wish I could say I then got up and ironed or did anything, but you remember that part about being tired? Sigh. Not a particularly productive night. I always figure my brain (or body) needs the break, but it frustrates me. So hopefully I will frustrate myself less tonight.

Simba likes it when I sit down somewhere that he can cuddle next to me though. So there’s that. Abstract with dog.

I made the dog happy.

*REM, Superman

She’s Like a Chemical*

Two boxes winging their way to the girlchild in Boston (even though she’s not there yet)…check. College graduation announcements heading off to foreign parts…check. A chunk of the weekend schoolwork done…check. A huge blogpost for one of my art groups completely written, just missing one photo…check. Grocery list made and ready for shopping…check. Calendar created for the week and mostly populated with daily to-do lists…check. Not bad. Could always be better.

I finally got the video of the snake swallowing the lizard processed. Some day I will remember to hold my phone sideways. I swear.

Meanwhile, a baby possum is wandering around my front yard…not sure where momma is. Pretty sure he should be nocturnal, or at least hiding. Not sure if I should go out there and catch him…and do what with him? Yeah. Wildlife.

I cut stuff out for a chunk of time yesterday too…trash on top, to-be cut on the left, already cut on the right…

Mostly that was at night. I need to do more, obviously. Lots more.

Someone was impressed with my organization of all the fabrics used by color. Really that’s just so I can put them away easily (and because it looks cool). Right now, the office is kind of a mess…almost every drawer is open and rummaged in…when I’m ready to iron the next quilt down, I’ll put everything away again.

But for now, it’s a disaster. Semi-disaster. It’s been worse.

Sunday. I would love it to be a day of rest, but really, I’m going to do some work now. And then some artwork. And shit, I gotta make lunches for the week. Damn. OK. Well, at least I have some focus now.

*Elvis Costello, Pump It Up

Tomorrow Might Be Good for Something*

I have my Star Wars shirt on for school. Wait. No I don’t. I have somebody else’s Star Wars shirt on for school (mine is not necessarily appropriate for school, so I borrowed). May the Fourth be with you. I’m prepared for being a hella bitch today in class to keep kids on task. I’m going to engage my inner General Leia. I will only have to do that in two periods…the other three have figured out that they need to work and are doing so. Then we have a talent show at the end of the day. I have no stage talent at all, so I will be in charge of standing over kids and using sign language and my piercing glare to get them to behave (strangely, it works). I’m already cranky and tired, like almost every teacher at my school…it makes you wonder how we survive the last 29 days. I’m never really sure how we do it. With spit and alcohol and an occasional donut. But we do it. State testing starts next week, so the world gets a little wonky for a few days. I think there’s only two kids in my homeroom that might drive me bonkers for 3 1/2 hours of testing. Wait. No. There’s three. Maybe four. Fuuuck. It’s OK. I’ll feed them and use that piercing glare again and more sign language. It’s doable.

I had my monthly stitching meeting last night, but I am feeling a need to get this quilt done ASAP, so I cut things out instead of stitching…

I got a good chunk of the pieces done…and then I came home and ironed more…although I was tired, and that doesn’t ever help. I finished ironing down the heart-shaped box and started on the hearth.

Picking the fabrics for that was harder than I expected. The grays of the fireplace are going to be a pain in the butt. I guess the plus is that once I figure out what four fabrics I’m using (stones, shaded stones, grout, shaded grout), I will just have to pile the pieces up and get them ironed. That first part though, picking them? That sounds really exhausting to me at the moment. I bought one gray I thought would work, but now I’m looking at it and I’m not so sure. I guess at some point I will just make a decision about it. It never seems to be as crucial once I get the quilt ironed together…it’s more like, why did I worry so much about that one piece? I guess that is in my nature.

When I was done with decisionmaking, I hung out for a while. There was a cat for a while in there too…

But the other cat is nervous about hanging out…so she was still in my office. With an ancient art quilt.

Girlchild was traveling around. She sent me a lemur…

I still have most of the last 300 pieces to iron down. I have 9 1/2 hours into the ironing, so I underestimated how much time I would spend staring at bins of grays…because mostly that’s what I’ve been doing. I keep thinking there must be another drawer of them somewhere. I have a fabric I want to use and I can’t find it. I’m not sure if it’s in the grays or the blacks…it runs right in between…but I just can’t find it and it’s one of my favorites. Yup. I have favorites.

Anyway, I’m not busy this weekend (yay!). I have gaming tonight, so I’m not expecting much out of myself after that and school…but maybe? And then tomorrow, after taking limpy dog to the vet, I’m hoping to iron. Like until I’m done maybe. And then I do need to grade stuff, but that’s always a thing. Ugh. Maybe that can wait until Sunday. It’s nice to have an unplanned weekend, because the next three are kind of a mess. What’s new? Yeah. At least I can still make art around all that.

*Matchbox 20, Unwell