It’s Some Day…

Oh hey. It’s some day. In the week. During summer break. Most summer breaks, I take on extra paid work, mostly copyediting, but nothing came up this summer (thank goodness) except the house stuff, which is like another whiny job that never goes away. I stared at the closet for a long time before finally deciding I really should just paint it. And then I stared at it even longer before starting the process. NO, I haven’t painted yet. But it’s cleaned out and washed, and yesterday, I finally made it to Home Depot (procrastinated for a week, y’all) to get what I needed. Today is prime the unprimed/bad paint sections. Maybe paint. Maybe. I hate painting. Really. I do. But I want the closet done so I can put stuff away in it. The house is still a freaking disaster. I put 5 pillows away yesterday. Why are there 5 more pillows? I really don’t know.

I didn’t make it to ceramics on Monday because we puppysat, so I ironed a big chunk instead and managed to finish.

There were a bunch of pieces that were loose on this piece, couldn’t be ironed down until I got to the background.

Then Monday night, I ironed everything down…

There were 5 pieces I never found, so I made new ones.

Usually with a piece this big, I’ll iron it down on the entryway floor so I can see and place the whole thing. There were two major pieces and then a lot of smaller things. But the entryway floor is a fucking disaster (see closet discussion above), so it wasn’t an option. So the pro is I did it on the ironing board. The con is that it’s not straight on the bottom, but I’ll fix that when I sandwich and pinbaste it. Here’s the whole thing, late at night, in the dark…

And then yesterday, I started stitching it down. I looked at how long it took to do the Supreme Court stitchdown (8 1/2 hours about). This is a similar size…it’s about 54″ wide and 80″ high.

My goal is to be finished with stitchdown before I go to San Francisco Friday, so I figured I needed to do at least 3 hours of stitchdown a day. I managed more than that yesterday and got the entire base and I think two whole figures done? I think I’m more than halfway, but I could be wrong. I think the Supremes had more pieces by quite a bit, and that’s kind of what decides how long stitchdown and outline quilting will take.

If I finish today, I’ll try to sandwich and pinbaste tomorrow, although that means clearing space on that damn entryway floor. Ugh.

I also finally finished the handstitching on this one…

So that’s two ready to go to the photographer. There’s Bowie too. He likes quilts. All cats do.

Not going to ceramics on Monday meant my phone told me I needed to go on Tuesday. OK. I’ll go with that.

I finished the glaze on this and put it on the shelf to dry.

It’s all underglaze. And then I went to unwrap the top part of the figure I’ve been working on. I hadn’t been in for a long time, due to my schedule and the classes in over the weekend, and it had dried too fast. Two parts cracked, so I wrapped them while I was finishing up the other piece and then reattached. I’ll go in today and/or tomorrow to check on it and start underglazing it to match the base. There were a ton of people in the last two times I’ve been there. I prefer quiet. Honestly.

This one is kind of refusing to come out to eat. Poor kitty.

There’s her half-toothless face. I try to bribe her with treats. She must be eating something, though, because she’s not super skinny at the moment. It’s warm and she doesn’t like that. I worry about her lots. Leaving her for 5 days…ugh. She won’t take her meds if I’m not here. But she’s fighting taking them now. So there’s that.

In other quilt news, I’m on this poster, as my quilt is in this exhibition, opening this weekend.

Nice to be invited.

Ah yes…

Sharknado? I’m good with it…although I don’t think he can run that fast.

Anyway. Today. I need to think about packing for the trip. I already found a few books and downloaded them, and decided what stitching I’m taking with me. The piece I’ve been traveling with is not in a good stage for that at the moment. And I’m unlikely to have the time to get it into a good stage. However, I had a series of 9 small blocks that are appliqued but not embellished (another Sue Spargo, shockingly), so I grabbed a few of those. It’s unfortunate that the place I’m staying does not have a comfy chair in the room (this type of Airbnb never does…annoyingly), but I’m not really expecting to spend much time in the room. If there’s down time, I’ll go to a coffee shop or something. There’s only about 20 within a short walking distance. Tea, snack, stitching, while watching some videos. Need to remember my headphones. Girlchild is working some of the time I’m there, so I do have some options for down time. Maybe some fabric, maybe some art, maybe a boat ride. Who knows? We might go visit the boychild if he gets stationed far enough south. Right now, he’s about 3 hours north of San Francisco, and that’s without traffic. That would be a long day. ANYWAY. Also today, at least 3 hours of stitchdown. Priming a closet (ooh exciting. not.). Plus maybe ceramics. If not today, tomorrow definitely. Yardwork! I’ve filled 1.5 trashcans and need to fill 1.5 more. Fun times. Bush from hell around the pool. It just takes forever to trim this bush. I would totally pay someone to take this bush down to 6 feet all the way across. OK, IDK how much I would pay them, because yeah, this summer has not been cheap. OK. Eat breakfast, more tea, change into painting clothes and do the first step of getting this closet put back together. That’s a plan.

Chaos and All.

Ah chaos. There’s nothing like it. When things seem like they are finally chilling out a bit, add some chaos to it. I can never remember whether chaos always moves to order or not, because my experience is that order always returns to chaos.

So pro: the carpet is in and I’ve managed to move a chunk of boxes and furniture back to where they belong. Con: boychild is still at the fire and probably will be until next week, and he wants to go through his stuff, so he doesn’t want it all moved back in. Hmmm. So I meant to go to ceramics the last two days and it didn’t happen, because when I’m at home, I feel like I either need to paint (I primed the drywall patches yesterday) or move shit (I did a lot of that yesterday). I now have about 7 boxes of books that need to go back in bookshelves, a box and three bags of clothes that need to go back in their shelves, and about 3000 other things that need to go back where they were. I did finally clear enough of the living room to be able to swing the other couch back out, so I can get in to the couch without climbing over the Man. Plus the oppressive height of bookshelves in the middle of the room is gone. What’s not gone is my inability to focus on any one task for a given period of time. It’s summer, it’s chaos, I’m tired, I’m overwhelmed in a very different way than during school. It’s OK, because I get to read every day and I’m not at school (oh wait, I was yesterday) and I’m getting this house back into shape (that is the overwhelming part). There’s so much painting, and I hate that, and it takes forever, and I’ll never finish. So there’s that.

Artmaking has been slim for the last few days. I need to change that. Monday night, I cut binding and sleeves for the two quilts from my stash (score!). I don’t need to buy more fabric right now. I’m going to PIQF in two weeks…I can buy it there (ha ha). I did not sew them on yet…that’s a goal for today. There are many goals for today.

This one has matching binding and sleeves…I had a lot of this fabric. It was a background for another quilt.

This one, the sleeves match the backing, which I’ve had for about a million years. Seriously. So I’m glad to start using it. And the binding is from my stash.

I don’t usually buy more than a half a yard of fabric unless I’m using it for a background. And then I use the leftovers on the back when I can. Or the rejects sometimes. I get a background home and it’s way too busy to BE a background. And one of my friends who gifted me a bunch of fabric when she moved, she had larger pieces (yardage) of fabric, so I’ve been using those on the backs, and I just found some remnants from my niece’s old curtains and bedding (I think?) that will be great for backings too…when I was cleaning out under the bed. You forget what you put away…it’s hidden from sight and mind.

Then I started tracing the bugs for the OMA Street Level event next Friday. Why did I agree to this? Because now I’m doing a TV news thing too. That sounds terrifying. ANYWAY. At some point, I’m going to retire from teaching and I need alternate sources of income. That’s how I see it. I have weak moments…if you ask me to do things at certain times, Imma think I have to. Lame but true.

So I traced two of each. I am demoing at the event, so I need to have some in process pieces. I haven’t figured out what/how I’m doing it entirely, but I’m going to turn at least 5 of these into stepouts of some sort. I can’t decide how many I’ll need to demo at each stage…hopefully I’ll have that figured out next week. Ha! Today, I’ll cut some of these out and iron them to fabric, I think. I also need to start ironing the big quilt together. Like today. AND go to ceramics, but that might need to be tomorrow. Today is a little chaotic. A lot chaotic.

Oh, here’s the carpet…no more 1980s dirty beige. And it’s delightfully squishy.

How long until that cat has an accident on it? Probably not long.

That is the boychild’s half-destroyed chair blocking my office during the carpet install.

He needs a new chair. Not my problem though.

And here’s a sunset view of the Lake Fire area.

Pretty if you don’t think about where the particulates that made it came from. It’s at almost 30,000 acres and 16% containment. He’s been there since Sunday night late aka Monday morning hella early. They usually do 24 hours on and 24 hours off…but since they left San Diego at midnight on Sunday, IDK how they’re counting hours. I do know we heard from him this morning and he was headed back in. This is Day 12 of his being gone. I should go water his plants again. The last bout was 12 days. I think this will be closer to 17 or more. Tough on them. This fire season has started out worse than last year’s, for sure.

I did a drawing a week ago at dinner. It was weird. Post hike.

There were lemons at the bar. What can I say? Sometimes I just roll weird.

I have two tomatoes growing and a few bell peppers…this one is growing quite fast.

But I can’t seem to get the zucchini to do anything but make flowers. I collected some pollen and read about male/female flowers, but I’m not seeing any female flowers. Plus something keeps trying to eat them. I don’t know. I got zucchini because I hear all these stories of 100s of zukes being produced by one plant. I don’t NEED 100s…just a few would be nice.

These little spiders (and their webs) are EVERYWHERE in my yard right now.

At least they are tiny. The big orbweavers freak me out. That’s fall.

Simba misses his boy too.

OK, so more chaos yesterday…

Um. Yeah. We have a new kitten.

He has no name yet. Don’t even ask how or why. Unless you’re buying me a drink. Then I might explain the convolution. He’s very sweet, hyper, and friendly.

Although I think lots of hissing has gone on. And we are puppysitting today (set up before the kitten showed up). So there are four cats and two dogs in a space that still has all the furniture willy nilly. Yeah. Chaos. So I’m going to stick around here today, I think, a bit more than I was originally planning to, just because I think the Man’s patience might be worn a bit thin. Although the cat is his. Or Simba’s. Hard to say.

I have plenty of stuff to do around here. I can go to ceramics tomorrow if I don’t get there today. I do need to be more focused today than I was yesterday. I guess I was focused on moving shit yesterday. The Man’s back injury doesn’t allow him to lift much, but he is a Logistics guy, so he was useful for how to do things, but sometimes a little too tell-me-how-to-do-it. Sigh. There’s a fine line, I know. I also have some school stuff to work on, after meeting with my co-teacher yesterday to evaluate the mess in each others’ rooms and for me to find my packets…why I didn’t take them with me in June? Oh I know. Because I needed to lock it all up and walk the fuck away. I’m not necessarily WORKING on stuff now. But at least I have it. It’s a beautiful day. I have art to make. I need a shower and more tea (Simba barking at 5:22 AM y’all). I need some food. It’s all good. Chaos and all. Maybe that’s the kitten’s name.

Getting Through…

Oh my. So today is carpet installation day 1. It is also the Man’s birthday (unfortunate that he had to get up early and the next two days are pretty stressful for the animals). Also we were hoping the boychild would be home from work to take the dog away for two days to his dad’s house. Nope. Haven’t seen him since the 28th of June, and now he’s at the Lake Fire in Santa Barbara County, so we probably won’t see him for a week. It’s OK. I’m in the office with the dog, who is stressed but has finally stopped barking. He got pets from the owner of the installation company, so that seemed to calm him down. He’s now listening to them pull up all the carpet stripping nail things, which I’m sure have an official name, but I don’t have the brain power right now to figure that out. I got up early to strip beds and pull servers (of course) and I have only half a cup of tea in me and my head hurts. Also we saw one cat take off down the hallway and we’re not sure where she is (she might be in the office with me for all I know). ANYWAY. And after all this, when I have new carpet FINALLY, it will be lovely. This carpet was put in by the previous owners and needed replacing when we moved in, but we figured waiting until the kids were older made sense (ha ha ha!!!), so it’s probably 30 years old? Maybe more? I’m guessing 1980s. It’s gross…but the work involved to move all the furniture and crap out of three bedrooms and three closets was why I never did it. That and not being able to afford it, although I think my parents were willing to pay for it. I just couldn’t visualize how to do it. And honestly, I’m not sure how I’m going to move all this shit back by myself…although the Man can lift up to 10 pounds, so drawers :-). And bedding. Sigh. As long as there’s a bed at the end of the day today, we’ll be fine. We do have air mattresses galore. And a tent. So we really will be fine. Probably not the nicest way to spend your birthday though. Although he could be teaching in a middle-school classroom…that’s how I usually spend mine.

So there’s been a lot of moving shit going on and prepping. A lot of doors to sand. I didn’t finish all of them. Didn’t even get close. Oh well. There were a lot of things I wanted done before the carpet went in, but I prioritized art over 8 hours a day of sanding and painting. As always.

After writing on Saturday, I made it to my quilt guild meeting. I was pretty out of it, but I did manage to stitch some hair.

I’m not sleeping well…it’s warm, I have a million itchy mosquito bites, and the puppy is fussy at night…mostly animal sounds and stuff. Raccoons, skunks, coyotes. The Man comes to bed late (he’s stressed about his back and lack of work)…so then I wake up and can’t go back to sleep. It’s fun. Really. Saturday was mostly a lost day…there were things I was going to do that just didn’t happen. I was really efficient Friday and then Sunday, I got more done in the morning before pilates than I did all day Saturday. Ah well. It is summer break, so I can get away with that. I read my book! That’s progress.

I did finish quilting the second piece on Saturday…and trimmed it for binding.

I had to clean the floor first, because…sanding. Dust everywhere. I trimmed the other one as well.

One of the plans for today involves getting the binding sewn on these two so I can handsew at night. I also packed up an older quilt that my SIL (and brother, whether he likes it or not) is going to hang in her dining room and hopefully sell…or if not, she can just stare at it until she’s sick of it and picks another one. So hopefully I’ll make it to UPS today. I needed to get that quilt and these other two out of the way so I could have room to start ironing the big one together. Hopefully tomorrow? We’ll see. I sense furniture moving in my future.

Claywise, I’ve been trying to go into the studio every couple of days. I tried fitting top to bottom…had to do some carving to get it to sit down.

The hands work OK though…that was the other worry. The upper hand is touching the torso, but helps it balance.

Then I got the heart attached…

I also built a hollow thing for a totem-type pole/garden stake series they’re doing at the studio…

I’m not sure the holes are big enough, but I can carve them larger if need be. I formed it over two bowls and filled it with newspaper…it was leather hard by the time I left. It’s been so hot. I underglazed one side for sgraffito. I figured that was the easiest/fastest thing I could make. I can carve fast if I need to…especially during the summer.

The dog is finally just lying on the floor, even though there’s banging going on outside the office door. Good boy.

I’ve also been working on the central panel for Homegrown…getting all those bits sewn down for embroidery.

I’m not looking forward to appliqueing all the velvet bits. Pain in the ass, velvet. Looks lovely afterwards though. But there’s like 25 circles in velvet. Ugh.

So we don’t know where Nova is hiding right now…but last night, she was in my drawers…luckily I thought to cover them with a towel. These drawers are at my head height. The cats sort of love our current hoarder household.

I can’t stand it. This is partly why I keep leaving for the studio! The Man lived in a tiny house for a while and his place was kind of like this…drove me crazy, but he tolerated it. I need more open space apparently. I did realize I need my work bag and keys tomorrow, and they’re on the fireplace hearth…about two feet into this chaos. So that’ll be fun to figure out tonight. I think I can reach it if I move about 8 bins and an old sewing machine. Hopefully. Should have thought of that before now, but oh well.

A friend posted this…

I kind of want to draw this. Somehow. My sketchbook is buried somewhere too. I need more tea but there is a guy banging stuff right outside this door…suspect the metal strip that is between the old carpet and the tile of the kitchen is challenging them. NEED TEA Y’ALL.

OK, today’s plan…binding on two quilts, finish packing the other quilt and ship it, take the Man out to his birthday dinner, write that other blogpost for the art group I’m in. Hopefully move some stuff back into the master bedroom. READ MY BOOK. If I’m ever allowed out of this room. Dog is chill…trying to keep him that way. Some days are just about getting through them to the quiet, organized, newly carpeted future.

Legit Bugs

Hey oh. I suspect everyone thought yesterday was some day besides Friday…I heard ‘Saturday’ and ‘Monday’. I knew it was Friday but somehow forgot to actually WRITE on Friday. I was busy. I got up and showered and went to the ceramics studio, came back for a stitching Zoom, then a trip to the local farmers market, and then a ton of sanding…more of that in my future. All good. I just forgot to write anything. Ah well.

I’ve been trying to finish the two smaller quilts, or at least get them to handsewing stage, before I start ironing the big one together. I got the first one quilted a few days ago…

And then started the other one yesterday…

This is what happens if you walk away from the machine and don’t fold everything up so Kitten can’t get to it…

I sorted the big quilt’s pieces…

That took a couple of hours. In clay, I did some final glazing on the winged woman…

I suspect she went in a glaze fire yesterday, but we’ll see. She has fabric in her future.

And then I started underglazing on the current piece. The base is ready for it…

I didn’t finish.

More clay tomorrow…I’m trying to go in every other day during the summer. Between the quilt stuff and the clay stuff, this summer is delightful. This is my solution to burnout.

I did…well, I didn’t volunteer, but when I was asked, I said yes…agree to do some demos at the Oceanside Museum of Art’s Street Level Volume 2 event in a couple of weeks. I never understand my brain when it says yes to this stuff. Although it gets my work and name out there, I guess. I don’t know. Anyway, I’ll be demoing bugs.

I ended up enlarging that little one on the bottom. Some are legit bugs. Not sure about the bottom one. I’ll have them in different stages and then demo some of the stages. We’ll see how that goes.

I bought this for the prep room at school for the next school year.

It’ll make 50 cups of tea…between me and my co-teacher, hopefully we won’t need all of those cups in one year, but who knows.

Butterflies everywhere…

I’m still watching that cocoon.

No hatching…hatching? Is that the right word? I don’t know.

It’s been warm. Not the heat wave you keep seeing on the news.

I mean, they keep giving us warnings, but I think we’re still pretty bearable. Cats may disagree.

My phone thinks my volume is too high.

Intriguing. I’ve been listening to a book while quilting and doing yardwork and housework. I have one earpod in. Apparently now it will decrease my volume whether I like it or not (I need to be able to hear over the sewing machine. Fascist phone. What if people are hard of hearing? Anyway, I’m sure if I Google it I can figure out how to turn it off. Technology. Took me 30 minutes yesterday on chat with a Zoom person to figure out how to send feedback about their new cost increases. Y’all, I am not a professional Zoom user. I do not use it for my business (well, sometimes I do, but my business is one person. Me.). Why don’t they have a level between the free Basic and Pro that does not cost so much? For what I use it for, I don’t need all the AI and phone stuff…I just wanna hang out with my faraway friends on Zoom a couple times a month. Sheesh. Stupid.

OK, quilt guild meeting today. Need to sand doors (ugh). Lots of doors. Need to finish quilting this small one and pack up one to ship to my SIL for her wall. Her job is to sell it off her wall. Or just enjoy it. Also fine. The yardwork needs to start, as we go into a warm week. Carpet starts Monday…so I moved a bunch of drawers, but still have some stuff to move at the last minute…that’ll be tomorrow. Hoping to hike today? But will need to wait until 6 PM I think for it to cool down enough. That interferes with the Man’s dinner plans, although he’s going out to lunch, so he’ll probably need a nap. Might be hiking alone. Plan.