Just Keep Doing

The routine. Ugh. What did you do today? I got up, ate, went to school and taught all day, dealt with crazy stuff after school, came home, vegged out for a bit, cooked, then ironed and dehaired a bunch of quilts, and then traced some Wonder Under. Attempted interrupted sleep. Did it all over again. But then again…it’s probably that routine that makes all those quilts. Because it’s already in my head…what I’m supposed to do. Get up. Make dinner. Wash dishes so you have time and energy to make art. Do it earlier. Don’t start at 11 (although at some point, I have no problems doing that…not on the week school starts back up). Start early. Make it work. Blow off all that grading. You did enough work at school today. What is your life about? Being a teacher (a little) or being an artist (a lot). Yeah.

A frustrating hour with a parent issue and a bunch of kids who were dragged to detention by admin didn’t help. I’m about to give up on that. I’m about to give up on a lot of it. Usually we wait until April…but Spring Break comes early this year…and the lack of follow-through on the kids and the parents is just wearing me thin. Especially the little stupid things. There’s an answer key on a disk I have at home. I want to put the answer key on my school Google Drive, so I emailed it to myself. The school email rejected it because of the “type of file it is.” You mean a PDF from a school publisher? Because that’s what it is. And I emailed it to myself. Fuck me. So the parent that wanted me to make 14 phone calls yesterday in the very short time I have during the day that isn’t eaten up by everything else…yeah. Same deal.

This is why the art. So much of it.

I had one pile on the left of stuff that was ironed and had slats or dowels, but then it was getting too heavy. It’s supported by a large flattened cardboard box on two chairs and a computer desk. On the right is now the larger quilts, with a couch and a coffee table and a cardboard box full of books. Trying to keep cats off…

And dogs for that matter…

Is not easy. But it’s worked so far. I have about 18 done…and I’m not really sure how many I need, and I’m still culling. I pulled one yesterday, and there’s one in this pile that isn’t going as well. In the first pull, I just grabbed anything that might work.

These are the ones that are still in need of ironing and slats/dowels. I don’t know how many are in there, actually. I just aim to iron about 5 a night. Some have more cat hair on them than others…if there were safely rolled up most of the time (which probably meant they weren’t going to shows due to age or just whatever), then they were pretty clean. It’s the ones that didn’t get put away after they came home that are the biggest hairy mess.

But there’s progress. And that’s good. And I’ll feel a sense of relief when it’s done, that’s for sure.

I did trace for over an hour and a half, and was way more efficient than I have been lately.

Believe it or not, less tired last night. Not sure why. But I’m in the low 600s now with about 5 1/2 hours in. Only about 400 to go, so if I can do 200 each night, I’m on track. I haven’t scheduled out beyond that. That might be an issue. Cutting out Wonder Under doesn’t take much time…ironing will be another 10+ hours. Cutting out those takes a little longer than Wonder Under. Then ironing. Yeah. I can’t see that far out. I have a bunch of stuff going on this weekend, a baby quilt to finish, grades due…all in the next 10 days. Then I can think more clearly. Just keep doing is what I say. I can handle that part. Last night I did well.

But I Like It…

It’s amazing how exhausting teaching is. You forget about standing and walking all day. And not being able to pee when you need to. And how your voice gets used so much more than at home. Plus I’m not sleeping well. Something keeps waking me up…besides my alarm clock. The heating goes on when the house is below 54 degrees…and it has been a lot so far this winter, as my gas bill can attest. The noise from the heater wakes me up sometimes. Ugh. Yes, I know it’s colder elsewhere…girlchild got snow! Now does she send me pictures of snow? No she does not. At least she texts.

Boychild is stuck with his boring, overworked parents (well one is overworked because of soccer, and that’s not me). And the animals. It’s probably quite nice here without all the people…I should know. I had that last night. Put a fire in the fireplace because I knew I’d be tracing stuff on Wonder Under and that room is cold at night when it’s cold outside…the thermostat is on the other side of the house, the warm side.

Anyway, before I traced, I got a few more quilts ironed and slatted. It’s looking like I’m bringing way too many, but I will probably cull again before Monday. I just want them ready. Then I can choose.

I only traced for a little over an hour yesterday…about 20 minutes in the morning before school (I never do that) and then late at night. I went to bed somewhat early for me (before midnight) because I was exhausted…but then something woke me up before 5 and I couldn’t go back to sleep. So I’m feeling groggy. Better than yesterday when I was groggy AND sad that the girlchild had just left. Perimenopausal hormonal woman with not enough sleep AND sadness. Not a good combination.

So yeah. I didn’t get much done. In the morning, I had a cat butt to contend with…

And past the cat, the dog snores on.

I know, Midnight. She’s a lazy dog. She tried to leave with me yesterday morning, because she’s used to going to my ex’s house in the morning because she’s been breaking out of my yard, but the boychild was here. So I left her. And her confusion.

At night, I had both cats in there with me, but curled up on quilts (not art quilts. Couch quilts). They like the fire in the fireplace too.

This is not a fast quilt to trace. It has little pieces. It has 10 hands in it. Hands are complicated. They have wrinkles and lines and fingernails. It’s not a small number of pieces. I’m figuring about 28 pieces a hand. At least. And then there are almost 1000 pieces in this quilt, so that’s at least 10 hours of tracing no matter what. I’m on piece 363. Only 600+ pieces to go. Actually. That sounds better. That’s about 6-7 hours. Wait. Six sounds better. I could do that in three nights…couldn’t I? If I don’t do anything else.

Sigh. That’s the problem. I have other stuff to do. Add the exhaustion piece when I get home, and it’s gonna be a slog. But I can do it. I think. Sigh.

I wonder sometimes why the art drive is so strong in me. I went to school with people, knew other people who were artists in school, and now they don’t do anything. They don’t draw or paint even for relaxation. It’s just gone. I can’t do that. It’s as strong as that maternal instinct. It’s right there, whispering in my ear all the time, getting me off the couch, standing for another 2 or 3 hours after standing all day at school. Sitting down at a sewing machine for hours on vacation. It’s crazy. It never stops, never lets up, never leaves me alone.

But I like it.

Whatever Works…

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Back to It…

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Yet Another Unproductive Day…

in which I actually still got shit done.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Vacation Rant…

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

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

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

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

I finished tracing Wonder Under on Bathtub 5 this morning…

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

OK. Now I can be on vacation.

Let’s Think Good Thoughts…

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

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

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

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

At least I have a sense of humor, right?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Sleep. Apparently for the Weak…

I stay up too late. You might have noticed. Sometimes it’s because I’m trying to finish something. Or because I’m not tired. Or because I just don’t feel like going to sleep. I’m really mature that way. I was trying to finish stuff last night. I gave up on grading because the Google Classroom app was crashing with every single doc I reviewed and it was driving me bonkers. I sent them feedback (I’m sure they’re tired of me). It showed a log of all the crashes though, so I felt pretty damn justified. They’ll probably come back and tell me the iPad mini is too old and I need a new one. Sigh. Nope. Not yet.

I did finish another cat last night…Cat 7…

She’s 12″ square, just like her brother? Sister? Same price, $175.

So that’s the cats done…on to the hearts in hands. She’s the reason I stayed up so late. I thought it wouldn’t take long to do a small binding and sleeve, but it takes longer than I think most times. Oh well. Sleep…it’s for the weak, right? I don’t really believe that. I really wasn’t tired either though.

Before I did that though, I started tracing the Wonder Under for the next Bathtub quilt. This is number 5. Yes, I skipped 1, 3, and 4. Whatever.

I figured it would take about 8 hours to trace this, but I was pretty damn efficient last night.

I did 225 pieces in an hour and 45 minutes. That means hopefully it will take less time, but we’ll have to see.

The owl that I made as a small quilt is in this piece, so I had to trace him all over again. Above is what 225 pieces traced looks like. Not much, eh? Well, yes, and that’s because so many of them are bloody tiny, but that’s a whole ‘nother issue.

I have about 100 cell models and projects showing up today, if you don’t count all the crazy that went on in my school email last night. Now I know who stayed up all night because they left it to the last minute. I guess 18 days isn’t enough warning for this group. So I have to be there a bit early so I can open up the door and let all the kids with projects in. Wanna guess how many don’t put their names on them? And then how many didn’t even read instructions? Yeah. Sigh. Some days I wonder why I torture myself so.

On the Couch…

It all started on the couch…well, it’s still on the couch honestly. But Wednesday morning, after I found out my procedure would be Thursday and might knock me out of commission for a week or more, I had a goal. I didn’t REACH that goal, but I tried. I’m still on the couch today…been home since about noon yesterday. I tire easily. I’m in some pain, not a lot, but the meds are also making me tired…especially the Benadryl to counteract whatever I was allergic to in the hospital.

So Wednesday, I finished trimming all the Wonder Under, taking about ten hours total…

It doesn’t look like much, does it? Then I found a plastic bin for each 100 pieces, not an easy feat at the moment…

A lot of them were being used for other things. Kitten was after a bug in one of the bins, but the Wonder Under was also intriguing.

Then she sat right up against the first three bins, pissy that I was taking up space on her light table.

It took about an hour and 40 minutes to sort all the pieces out…

Then I headed to my office and hung up the drawing, and put away some of the fabrics that were piled up in that room (which really needs a serious deep clean…something I was supposed to do this summer)…

I started by putting the first 100 out in order and then began the ironing…

And got a whopping 35 minutes in.

Before I realized I had to be up in like 4 1/2 hours to go to the hospital. Yeah, so that’s where I didn’t meet my goal. I wanted a huge pile of stuff ironed so I could sit here, on the couch, and cut little pieces out. I guess I could do that, but it wouldn’t take very long. I think there’s only about 30 pieces ironed.

What I need now is enough energy to stand and iron fabrics to Wonder Under pieces. And that’s not happening today. In fact, I’m sitting here with my computer on my lap and my eyes are drooping again. Sigh. So I don’t know if I’m getting that burst of energy today.

I’ve been sitting on the couch and watching stuff saved on Tivo and stuff on Netflix, and then I’m sewing some wool bits to other wool bits, nothing fancy, just basic. Because I can’t deal with anything beyond that. Last night, I tried to go to bed at a reasonable hour, but then didn’t fall asleep until after 4:30 AM. At some point, I finally got up and read a book. An entire book. The Sculptor, by Scott McCloud…

I like the idea of this book, but had some issues with the story. I’m not sure it needed to be as long as it was (and it’s 400 pages long)

I think I need another nap. I don’t WANT another nap. I WANT to be making art.

Note: I put the computer down because my eyes were drooping…it’s now 2 hours later, so I guess I really needed to sleep. I’m hoping tomorrow is better. I know recovery takes time.

Damn Demanding Art Brain

Imagine my eyes wide open like this…

Yup. It’s been 24 hours or so of that. I might have slept a bit, but crazy nightmares of mud and blood and car accidents and disturbing imagery (I know, crazy, when you look at my drawings, but they have to come from SOMEWHERE, right?). And I think, what the hell were you doing last night? I went to an art opening (4th one in the same number of days?) and then I came home and ate dinner quietly by myself and watched four episodes of Elementary (um. Kathy. Sherlock is a bit creepy.) and cut out a shitload of Wonder Under.

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The container on the left has all the stuff that’s cut out. The pile on the right is all that’s left.

It was 1 AM and I wasn’t in the mood to spend another 45 minutes cutting that out. I was tired.

It’s still not cut out though and that was my plan for today: cut it out, sort it, and start ironing. But it’s 4:30 already and I haven’t even touched it. Why? Well hell. I’m having a surgical procedure tomorrow, just found out the timing today, so I’ve been running around like a crazy person labeling a quilt, driving to Home Depot for the slats for the quilt, cutting those, dehairing said quilt, boxing it up, driving it to someone who will deliver it for me, because now I can’t, and then the grocery store on the way home. I think I also made stuff for lunches for the next few days, so if I have an appetite when I get home, there’s some stuff I can eat. Because I have teenagers, and although they are both capable of cooking and cleaning and even fetching, they are also not always here or reliable or even sane. Boychild did fetch my library book for me.

It’s OK. Don’t panic. It’s not major surgery. I’m not even having stitches. It’s just the uterus and it needs some persuading to stop misbehaving, and because of that, I get to have flu symptoms for like a week. Or more. Because I have time for that shit right now. It’s OK. I do have time for it, because otherwise, I’m going to need to buy stock in a tampon company. But I don’t have time for it. I’m assuming the worst on recovery, and trying to prepare for it. So I still want to finish the Wonder Under, sort it, and start ironing tonight, even though I have to be at the hospital tomorrow at holy shit in the morning. I have 8 hours before I have to go to sleep. I can sleep ALL DAY tomorrow. Maybe I should just stay up all night. See those eyeballs up there? Yup. That would be a bad plan.

Anyway. With all that in mind, I’m a little overly stressed and a tad worried, because nobody likes to be put under and have drugs pumped into them and to lie in a hospital gown. Those damn things are freakishly uncomfortable, and just when you finally fall asleep, some loud nurse comes in and turns on all the lights and pulls the blankets off of you, scaring you half to death, just to check your incision. Yeah. Things I try to avoid.

So art…in a minute. First I want to talk about the three openings on Saturday. The first one was at Visions, a collectors’ exhibit. It’s worth seeing. I wasn’t overwhelmed, but it has some nice work in it. I’m not allowed to take pictures there. The second one was fun, but a little crazy…

The Frida Kahlo Group Art Show at the La Bodega Gallery in Barrio Logan. There were a million people there by the time we got down there, many of them dressed as Frida (somewhat disturbing). Some of the art was a bit TOO derivative, but much of it was an interesting take on people’s idea of Kahlo or her art. Artists’ names are on the tags below. Sometimes I try to link to websites for artists, but I will never get this posted this week if I try to do that.

So people kept posing this young Frida lookalike under the paintings, and she kept moving under the green one (one of my favorites), but then someone would move her back to the blue one…

And here’s the green one. Maybe we should have let her stay there.

Then a tiny room off to the side had David Van Gough in there…and I couldn’t possibly get any good pictures of his stuff, because it was hella crowded in there. But you can go see it here.

Outside? This awesome photo opportunity. Seriously cool.

After that, we went to a pop-up gallery with work by Spenser Little and Jaclyn Rose, both with amazing pieces. Then the night finished with a good burger and some wine, and you can’t argue with that. I still have a hike to post and some Wonder Under to manage. There was a side trip (while you weren’t looking) through a bunch of financial and copyright shit that I have now banished or managed or scared off. So I can get on with what I’ve wanted to do since I was awakened this morning by bad nightmares and cat breath. Damn demanding art brain.