This Ain’t Gonna Work*

Well. So. I ironed for about 7 hours yesterday until I realized I’d made a major mistake two steps back. I’m not even sure how I pulled it off. It’s funny, though…I can go back through the blog and see when I made the mistake…it was the day after the election. For some unknown reason, I flipped the drawing over and kept on tracing, but now everything was backwards from before. I have a light table because you have to trace the Wonder Under upside down so when you iron it to the back of the fabric, everything will be facing forwards again. So I did it right until I got to the head. And then I flipped it. For no apparent reason. Wednesday the 9th. Wow. OK.

Anyway, I didn’t figure that out until last night around 9 PM. When I was so close to done. Sigh. Giant ass sigh.

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Uterus in purple and red…legs going into the water…

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Kitten in one of her sleeping spots…

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Prosthetic arm balancing the ever-present cup of tea…and trying to catch that lost eyeball.

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There’s some weird stuff in this quilt…

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The other arm has a giant cell on it…

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And around 9 PM, I started the hair and went. Wait. Fuck. That’s backwards.

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Dammit. I’ve done it before. In fact, I have one entire quilt that is backwards. A full-size one. But to do it midway? Shit. So I was sitting there, head in hands, trying to process. Because it was the last 300 pieces. I hate to waste fabric. And time. So I ironed the sun/cloud combo…

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And I ironed the bird. So the sun would still work on the left side of the body…it was a little different, but I would be the only one who knew. Well, except I just told y’all.

The bird though…not gonna work. Orientation is all wrong. So that’s another 150 pieces or so…I mean, the head had to be retraced because the shoulders and hair wouldn’t work going the other direction. Same with the cat. So that was already 100 pieces.

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I didn’t want to retrace the bird. So at the moment, this is the plan. Flip the bird and cloud locations. I don’t think that will be an issue.

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But I had to retrace about 100 pieces…

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And I did that. And cut them out. Last night. Today, I’ll iron them down to fabric…and cut them out and iron them together. Dammit. Because I was going to be done with the ironing yesterday. Shit. I guess it makes sense that a quilt about time would fuck with MY time. And now you know how much the election affected me. Yeah. Well.

You know what sucks? Colleges deciding midyear to change housing/food costs, so you need to come up with an additional $700 right after the holidays. With no warning. Dudes. This is why I do that payment plan thing…so I can PLAN for it. Fuckers.

Speaking of a plan. I need to do that. For my quilts. It’s in my head. I just wrote it on the whiteboard on my studio door. I’m crazy. You might as well know that now. I’m hoping for four new quilts for the show…which would be fine, if they didn’t need titles, sizes, and photos by April 28. Yeah. I’m working on it. That’s about one a month.

Still trying to get the dogs to be cozy together. Previous to this, Calli was smelling Simba’s privates. Which dogs do. And he lets her, because she’s big and scary. To him. She’s a Golden…she’s really not that scary to most living beings. She’s scared of the cats.

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Yesterday morning, we worked on these trees. Which are on my neighbor’s property, but up on his slope. We’ve trimmed them before, with his permission. But they’re putting the house on the market, so that’s fun (both houses on either side of me selling in one year’s time after 18 years of the same neighbors). The trees block my view of the mountains…so we try to trim them to deck railing height every 5 years or so. I think it’s been longer this time.

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Now when I say we, I should really admit that my job is to stand on the deck and say “cut that. No, there.” while throwing balls or sticks for the dogs. My ex climbs into the trees and I ask where his health insurance card is and make sure the phone is ready to call 911. Because that shit scares the crap out of me. Yes. He has a chainsaw up there. He’s fucking nuts.

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And then we hauled it all back to my property…but here’s my view! The trees will bush out again…and that one roof is ugly as shit…but there’s the mountains! Yay.

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So that was productive. We also took out a volunteer tree that will never be a real tree. It’s a tree weed. But now I can hope the new neighbors are not loud noisy assholes. The guy above me and his cigars. Sigh. I hate that people don’t realize their bad habits affect their neighbors. Then again, I sew in the middle of the night.

Trying to make up for the stupid head stuff that messed up the quilt. Well. I will deal with that. And then start drawing. Well, there’s that school shit I need to do too. Ugh. And Christmas gifts. I started early, which is good, but it’s never early enough.

I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t put all the fabrics away that I used in this quilt, because I’m going to need them again. I hope I have enough of all of them. Eek. One of the flesh fabrics was pretty devastated…hopefully not the face fabric. I think all the grays are OK.

And yes, I will probably iron the wrong-facing face together and do something with it. Like I said, I hate to waste fabric. Those Depression-era sentiments passed down from Grandma through Mom…although I don’t save my tin foil. I do save rubber bands and twist ties though. OK Kathryn…focus. Yup. That app…read the quote. Sometimes I think it knows me.

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Because the mistake isn’t the end of the world, now is it? It was just hard to take last night. And now that I know where my head was when I made it, I just want to give myself a hug.

*Glass Animals, Gooey

Did You Know You Brought Me Around*

I think when I finally get to the chiropractor tomorrow, he’s not gonna let me leave. I’ll just have to stay there until my neck and back are fixed. And that might be days. In awesome-sauce news, I finished grading the giant science unit, so now I can breathe a little easier. I still have grading to do, of course, because it’s not the end of June (seriously, that’s the only time it stops), but the big ugly thing is gone. Whoo! I really wanted to celebrate with someone at 10:30 last night, but everyone I knew who would care was asleep. So I did a little dance, scared the crap out of the animals, took some deep meditative breaths, and tried to stop grinding my teeth…that’s been going on for over a month now. Not a good sign. Think I either need a vacation where I sleep and sit in a hot tub and nothing else, or about 17 massages.

But in other good news, I did manage to finish cutting out the rest of the Wonder Under…only 6 hours and a few minutes to do that. And then I sorted it…

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That’s the easy part. Next is the fabric choosing part, which is fun. But hard to do at the end of a school day, because of all the standing. I’ll do it, though. I need to be ironing by Monday. And that means about 10 hours of ironing and another 6-8 of cutting shit out before then. Plus everything else that’s happening this week.

Luckily, the animals just lie around and sleep all night…

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Or look cute.

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That makes some of it easier to think about. Progress. I wanted to draw last night. These two drawings are wearing on me. I need them out of my head.

*Zero 7, Somersault

If I Just Lay Here*

It’s amazing how two full nights of sleep help. Although things are still looming, I think I can handle them. For now. Ask me how I feel about that on December 1, though. Or in January, when the politics get worse than they already are. Friends are worried about their posts becoming an issue with the change in political climate. Artist friends are ramping up their political pressure. I know where I stand on that, I guess. I’ve been apparently making controversial art for a long time…I suspect that’s going to continue, based on the drawings currently in my head.

I was grading yesterday at school…there’s A/C there (it was in the 90s yesterday here in sunny Southern California), plus the construction noise here was driving me bonkers. I’m going back tomorrow. But I’m sitting there grading as both my kids are going back and forth about political stuff they’re involved in at school…and you worry, because you’re the mom, but I’m really proud of them. Good kids. Go out and change the world. Because this sucks. Big time. I feel a disconnect between their marching in protests and the like and my sitting here and grading papers about atoms.

Meanwhile, I got about halfway through the piles. That’s it. I’m going back today.

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It was about 3 1/2 hours yesterday. Probably will be the same today, if I can find 3 1/2 hours. I still need to finish a worksheet for Tuesday, write next week’s warmups, write and send next week’s parent email (these are the things I do on Sundays), and who knows what else. But my goal is to have all those graded before break so I don’t have to worry about them then. I can work on the quilt that has to be done in early December and the copyediting, when it comes. And maybe clean the house and clean up the downed branch that’s been in the back yard for about 6 weeks now.

I walked the dogs too…and myself. A nice 3-mile hike to clear the mind. Those are harder to do with the time change…it gets dark too damn early.

I went to an opening, shopping for pens (there’s only one place I’ve found to get them locally, and it’s in Hillcrest, which is a pain in the butt for parking), made dinner, and then settled down to the long boring task of cutting out Wonder Under pieces…with Midnight supervising.

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It’s actually sort of meditative, and I kind of get surrounded by animals…it’s hot during the day, but chilly at night, so they gather around.

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Simba isn’t sure about being next to Calli…but she really doesn’t care…unless he’s biting her.

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Of the 5 yards, this is 4 of them cut out on the bottom, a box of trash on the top. Just one more to go. Not sure if that will happen today, but I did give myself Sunday as well…because sorting them will probably take an hour as well.

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Then later this week, I can start ironing them down. Although one other thing I’ll need to do today or tomorrow is find or buy a background fabric. Which means staring at the drawing for a while to figure out what color that might be. I don’t have a clear image of this in my head at the moment, in color at least, so that might take some rumination. I’d really rather be ready to go today…so that’s grading, drawing, and fabric today. Plus an opening. Plus some version of socializing. Well. Maybe with just one other person. Not sure I can handle more than that at the moment. Says the woman going to another opening tonight. Sigh. OK. Whatever. Still crying at the drop of a hat. I am so worried about the future of my students…about the future of my own children. There is too much crazy in the world.

*Snow Patrol, Chasing Cars

I Don’t Know Why Sometimes I Get Frightened*

Yes. I have the day off. Thank you, veterans of the world. I’ve been reading too much (as many of us over-educated people apparently do) lately, and am disturbed by references to how major conflicts and wars began in the past and what we are seeing with Brexit and TrumpWorld. Though I am not pro military in many ways and I wish we could coexist in this world without always trying to force each other to behave, I also realize the Hitlers and Putins and Mugabes of the world probably need a military force in order to make them behave. A worldwide force. So for stopping concentration camps and dropping atom bombs, I will say thank you to our veterans. And for anything that we need to do in the future…protecting human rights for all…not just whoever seems to be in charge.

That said, holiday or not, I am going to work as soon as I finish this. I have a pile of work that is taller than I am, I think. I can’t go into this weekend with that hanging over me. I want to get a good chunk of it done. Especially since I know I have a quilt that needs to get done over Thanksgiving week…because I’m starting a copyediting job right after that. So time is tight.

But my brain is in this place. We met last night for the next show my women’s art group is planning and we revised it in light of the election. And on the way home, the drawing for it popped into my head. I need time to sit out on the deck and draw that. Although the mosquitoes are back. So maybe not on the deck. Sigh. But the world does not feel safe at the moment, not for women, not for LGBTQ, not for my refugee and immigrant students, not for anyone who does not want to feel attacked all the time. There is a call for people like me to better understand those who voted for Trump, and I have a hard time getting past the reality that a lot of it was probably a sexist choice or a choice based on fear of change. But I will listen. And I will act…if that act is making more art, or if it is marching in solidarity somewhere, or if it is speaking up against racism and sexism and xenophobia everywhere (I already do this in my classroom), then so be it.

I came home and finished tracing the Wonder Under on the new piece…just over 10 hours…

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It’s 5 yards…about…of Wonder Under. I almost met my revised schedule on this. I think I wanted to be done tracing on Wednesday and cutting on Thursday.

Midnight. You are such a dork.

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But I did start cutting…got two yards cut out. And watched all of Colony…dystopian societies with revolutionary groups fighting for freedom and rights. Huh.

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This morning, there’s the remaining three yards waiting for me. Tonight?

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If I get enough work done, yes. Finish cutting them out this weekend and sort them. Start picking fabrics by Sunday night? Maybe. Ouch. Way too much to do. Grading. Finishing that worksheet for Tuesday’s class (waited a bit too long on that one). Planning for after break…just getting the normal school stuff done on top of this grading pile. And the holidays coming…

Yesterday, I had this one group of kids fighting over the lab equipment, and then the two boys were denigrating the one girl who was trying to do her part, and I finally went off on them. Quietly. Which I think scared them. And I asked them what we were learning in homeroom about how to listen to other people respectfully, and I asked them why they were trying to make the two girls feel bad for “not doing it right.” They froze. And their faces dropped. And they heard me for once. Hey, that age…when they DO hear you, that’s a big one. I’m keeping that moment in my heart and head at the moment. That was a success. They worked together after that. Mostly. Because one of the boys has some major shit in his head. But those moments give me hope.

Yeah. I need a hike today too. I bet the dogs do too…so despite temperatures in the 90s and early sunset, I’m going to push that into the schedule. Because I have to take care of this stressful, panicked feeling. One of my art friends said, “Make Art Loudly.” Yeah. That.

*Split Enz, I Got You

When the Evening’s Thin*

So many conversations going on. So many worries. So many stories of hate out there. My students who wouldn’t stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Hell, I’m with them on many days, but I told them, this is YOUR country. Not Trump’s. Be angry. Be scared. But remember this is your country. Hard for some of them to hear, as refugees. As immigrants. I remind them my own family immigrated here. We didn’t start here. We left oppression, starvation, and came here.

I had a long meeting after school, then a longish phone conversation. The plus is I got the copyediting job, but it will start later than I thought. In some ways, that’s good…it gives me a chance to finish the grading I’m trying to do on the last HUGE unit, plus the quilt that needs to be done by December (ouch. scary.). And then December will be a bit of a bitch. But I’ll have some money by the end of it for college. And I need that right now.

I did grade some stuff last night. And then I went back to tracing…

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At one point, I thought I could finish last night…but then I realized I had another 150 pieces to go, which is at least an hour and probably closer to two. And it was midnight. Hmmn. And I had to be up early for a meeting. Ugh. Yesterday, I lit about 45 candles. For science…although I did briefly say some good thoughts to the goddess while doing it. And I don’t do that often. I didn’t set off any fire alarms. I feel pretty good about that. Today I think I will have to tie knots in 45 balloons. We’ll see.

Tomorrow I walk these guys…except it’s in the 90s today and supposed to be tomorrow as well (is it November? Really?).

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Someone left my yard gate open and both of them got out yesterday evening. In the dark. The little one doesn’t come when he’s called, but he follows when the big one and I run away from him. I’m a little creeped out by the gate…who was here? Pool guy doesn’t come on Wednesday. Plus the pool was full of leaves, so I know he wasn’t here. This living alone thing is scary sometimes. I reminded a friend who called last night that she was lucky to have someone to cuddle with in bed tonight…so she should go do that and enjoy it.

Tonight? Another meeting. But maybe I’ll finish tracing and move on to the next step. And maybe I’ll find time to draw. Because I think that would be a plus over the next few days. I need some space for my head to get out on paper. As many of us do.

*Sarah McLachlan, Building a Mystery

It’s a Very, Very Mad World, Mad World*

Reeling. More worried about how to walk into my classroom today and let my almost 100% immigrant kids know that they are safe here in TrumpWorld.

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Because I’m not sure they are.

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Reeling for women’s reproductive rights…hell, women’s rights in general. LGBTQ rights. Human rights. The Supreme Court. My taxes. My kids in college, paying college fees and loans. My health insurance. But mostly knowing that I am currently under a government that doesn’t care about those things. Or me. Or my students. And people around me voted for them…not just Trump, because he is just one man, but a conservative, racist, misogynist man who takes the slightest offense and turns it into a Tweet war, and a government that might be on his side.

I started having a panic attack around 7 or so, so I turned off the news and started tracing. I traced for over 3 hours. My kids were texting me all throughout. It’s possible the girlchild is rioting right now, while the anarchist boychild plots some sort of political overthrow. I’m OK with both of those right now. (And if they’re not, maybe they should be.)

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I guess that was my meditative solution to the stress levels.

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I’m about 540 pieces in. Another night like that and I’ll be done.

Simba tried to help. Petting animals is supposed to help.

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Yesterday’s new unit cover page.

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It’s pretty cool, but I’m more horrified by my country right now than pleased with my cover page.

Peace on people. Stand up. Get educated. Yell loud. Don’t stop yelling. Don’t give up.

*Gary Jules, Mad World

Everything’s in Order in a Black Hole*

I don’t talk about politics much on here. I mean, I talk about political things, but the election crap this year has been more than I wanted to handle. Too much crazy. I voted weeks ago, basically as soon as I got my ballot and found 3 hours to read everything (San Diego ballot this year was hefty hefty hefty). I suspect most of you might guess my politics just based on my regular rants, but just in case, I got this…

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which might be dangerous in my part of town. But whatever. I stand by it. And I raised my kids to stand by it. Luckily, I will be distracted by teaching all day, so I won’t have to hear about voter turnouts etc., and I can choose not to watch the chaos tonight. I’d really just rather wake up tomorrow to a new world. Except no matter what happens, tomorrow will be filled with chaos. Ah well. At least I now have the right to vote, despite my uterus and its apparently harmful effect on my brain.

Whatever your thing, go vote. Then hold them to their promises. Or fight their crazy. Whichever seems appropriate.

This text from the girlchild from yesterday morning is still cracking me up.

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(she was writing an essay.)

So yesterday, I finished grades. At least mostly. Which is good, because they’re due at 2 today. I dumped a couple of assignments. They just weren’t in the cards. That happens. And then I bid on a copyediting job. Which seems crazy, when I look at my deadlines, but it’s a pretty compact job, though not small, and would give me a good chunk of money towards paying the next college bill. I can’t ignore the multiple thousands I need to come up with in the next 6 months. I can’t just scrimp and save to get them. I need to do more work…work that’s paid. So if I get that job, the next few weeks will be a bit crazy. Oh well.

Then I finally made it to the artmaking space…both in my head and on the light table. There’s no motivation like the potential start of a new time-sucker to get you going…

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It’s not going particularly quickly, unfortunately. I didn’t start until after 10 PM and I’m only in the mid 200s…with 800 pieces total in the drawing. And the next big assignment to be graded gets turned in today. I’m not ready. I need a break from hours staring at a computer. That’s the thing…it’s never-ending.

So I trace for three more nights? Get done (might be wishful thinking…there’s meetings galore this week). I have Friday off. It all depends on whether I get this other job. If not, it’s a piece of cake. I start ironing over the weekend and cutting stuff out next week, ready to iron together over Thanksgiving, then quilt etc. (while finishing grading…and possibly copyediting for hours). Yeah. So I’m kind of in flux at the moment. But much much MUCH happier and more relaxed today after tracing last night. Interesting how that works. Make time for art. Shee-it. You’d think I would always be able to do that, but apparently not.

*Arctic Monkeys, Fluorescent Adolescent

Looking at the Mutating Skyline*

I’ll be so glad when the internet issues get fixed. I literally sit here and watch it come and go. Right now it’s here. But it might not be by the time I get to the end of the sentence.

We’re doing a field trip this week, so a ton of my time has been spent dealing with that. And energy. By the time I got home last night, I was already exhausted. But I dealt with food and then graded for a while and then prepped food for an opening tonight that I don’t really want to go to. Oh well. Actually, there are two. I’m not in the mood for either. I could skip one. Mentally I could skip both, but really not an option.

So it wasn’t until late until I started tracing again…

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It’s going slowly. Not sure if it’s because in the bottom part of the quilt, the pieces are all pretty big, so they take longer to trace, or it’s because I’m tired. I’m about 160 pieces in, but it’s taken me about 2 1/2 hours. That’s too long. Anyway. It will get done. It’s obviously not getting done quickly though. I guess my job gets in the way of that sometimes. Or a lot. Regularly. For instance, I had to get up early today and will have to be at school 30 minutes early for a staff photo. Let me tell you how I feel about that. No really. Because (1) I love having my photo taken and (2) I love getting up earlier than I have to. And I already had massive issues falling asleep last night (too much shit in my head). So I’m tired. Ugh.

I’m really really looking forward to next week (only a 4-day week) and Thanksgiving break (ah, so many days to sleep in. Potentially. If I didn’t have the puppy.). Then I can stay up as late as my brain needs to in order to fall asleep quickly, and I won’t have to get up early to go have my photo taken.

So looking at the rest of the week, I’ll be lucky to finish tracing this by Monday night. Which is scary, because I know when the deadline is and this is another tight one. Shee it. So hopefully fabric choosing by the 3-day weekend. That’s my goal. We’ll see if I can pull it off.

*M83, Midnight City

No Discrimination Here, Squirrel*

Huh. Yeah. OK. This week. I started a blog post. Internet (or lack thereof) just ate it.

Some weeks…some days…I get up and I eat my breakfast and take my meds and get showered and dressed and shuffle through. And it’s already a trial, so I do that thing in my head where I try to talk myself through it or persuade myself there’s some light at the end of some shortish tunnel. But some days. Weeks. Are just hard. October was a bitch. November can only be better.

It has to be. There’s no other way to go but up. Cooler weather (90 on Saturday. Shit.). Days off from school (piles to grade). Shut up brain. A chance to hike. Maybe go to the movies. Just be instead of having to be it all.

So eventually last night I got up off the couch (I was trying to grade…until I just plain gave up) and started tracing the new deadline. I’m really tired of deadlines. I need to stop thinking of them as a deadline and think of them as a way to make another quilt. But themes kick my ass at the moment. I’m tired of themes. I just wanna make stuff.

So maybe I will figure that shit out.

I didn’t get far, somewhere into the high 50s. But that’s OK.

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There’s only 800 pieces in this one…so about 8-9 hours of tracing. Probably not getting that done before the weekend, especially not with Trimester 1 ending and a field trip. Really I should just go back to bed and take a few days off. Ha!

Calli’s got it. She understands.

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Here’s the one I couldn’t post yesterday. I decided it was a laser for radiation therapy. They probably don’t really look like that at all, but tough shit. I’m OK if I’m the only one who understands my art. Today at least.

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Ugh. This mood. Sucks. Operation take care of Kathy. Going to the gym and reading my book tonight. That’s a start.

*Outkast, The Way You Move

Find Out What We’re Made of*

OK. Better. A little. I made art. It’s amazing what that daily dose does for me. Well and a counseling session. Mindset needs to flip about some stuff. Trying to do that without feeling more stress about it. That might be the hardest part.

So first of all, I delivered this commission, Owl 3.0, last night…

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To its rightful owner, Julie…who has been around me and my art for a long time and is one of my two Number 1 Fans.

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We stitch every month together at a Barnes & Noble…this was my name on the cup last night…

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Creative spelling. Or just hieroglyphics.

I worked on one of the Sue Spargo blocks. These are very relaxing to do…and more appropriate in the space than trying to cut Wonder Under out.

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Although with 105 bullion knots just in the flower, I think each block might take 8 months to do…

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I really do like to hand embroider. I just don’t do much of it any more on my own pieces…no time. Maybe that’s something that should be in the solo show. Somehow. Because I still have no time.

I’m followed everywhere by this pod of mismatched dogs…

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They mill about and occasionally settle…I don’t know if you can see the Golden on the floor under my feet.

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She put her bone on the coffee table for safekeeping. Seriously. From the puppy. Who is on my lap.

I finally settled them all enough that I could start cutting out the Wonder Under for the piece that was supposed to be done last week. And I was getting emails about it yesterday…for photos of the piece in progress. Well. Um. Here they are.

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Lots of doggy interaction going on…

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But I cut them all out in less than an hour…

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I even sorted them into two bins (there’s only 200 pieces). So if I have any energy or brainpower tonight, I can pick the fabrics. Certainly I should have them done over the weekend. Cutting pieces and ironing down next week…which means figuring out the construction issue…by next weekend. I’m quilting this, but not trimming and binding it. Not for this show. I might decide differently later on…but for this show, it shouldn’t be.

So that will make it easier to get it done. A little. I also need to make a slide show of my work for a presentation tomorrow night. Which is a little nerve-wracking. But I guess I know about 5 people in the group…so it won’t be totally like standing up in front of 40 people you’ve met. Just about 35 people I’ve never met. It’ll be fine.

OK. Progress. My brain is in a much better place this morning. Those alpha waves save my ass…

*Bruno Mars, Count on Me