Imagine my surprise when I looked at my phone to see a text from the quilt shop asking about October Kid’s Club. There wasn’t supposed to be a Kid’s Club at the quilt shop in October because both classrooms were needed for a major event scheduled for that same weekend.  Seems the event was rescheduled and they had a free Saturday.  Could I think of a project AND get the sample to them in a couple of days?

Well, yes. The class was sew much fun!

Since we have to share the library space with another club, I decided to limit fall semester club projects to weekly make & takes. Near the end of the session, we’ll pull out the sewing machines for a very basic project that can be completed in a single session.  Our spring rotation will be strictly sewing with the goal to have each student create a 16-1/2″ block for the East Cobb Quilt Guild Show.

My mission is two-fold:  (1) to divest myself of my rather oversized craft supply inventory at school and (2) make things easier for my club co-sponsor and me.  I plan to move on to other things next year, so several machines will also be “re-homed” at the end of May.

What kinds of projects to we make in clubs?

Pom-poms, Perler beads, Slime 3 ways, papercrafts (bookmarks/origami), photography (digital & instant), Felt stuffies and mail art postcards (machine project).

My total investment for this round of clubs was less than $50, including snacks.

These types of projects lend themselves very well into a library makerspace or crafternoon type of activity for elementary and middle school students.  Normally, I have all girls in my club. This time, it’s about half girls and half boys.  The girls want to make kitty ear headbands. The boys didn’t look too pleased with that idea. Hopefully, the duct tape wallet kit I found will be an acceptable substitute.

Class samples to make…

Quilts to complete….

Personal sewing projects still not finished…

Guilt for being so far behind, but not one bit of inspiration to step into the studio.

Does this sound familiar?

It’s called stress. Mine is directly attributable to the day job. Today, I got to be 3 people – librarian, teacher and parapro because they pulled my parapro to act as the receptionist. (Never mind there are four ladies in the front office.)  As an introvert, I need 10-15 minutes of quiet time after the morning class block to chill and put my game face back on for the next round of classes.  I literally did not get that until I walked out the door at 3:45 p.m.

I’m all for pitching in and helping out in an emergency. But it is getting to the point of ridiculous. The fantasy flex library schedule has collided way too many times with fixed library schedule reality since school began. The admin team is also under the assumption that we still have 3 people working in the Media Center. News Flash! There are only two of us because we lost the allotment for our part-time person. Remember?

You make a big deal to tell me I matter, then treat me like I don’t. 

So, before I say or do something I might regret (like writing a check for $1,000 to get out of my employment contract), I have elected to utilize one of my sick days tomorrow for some extreme self-care.

Oh, and one more thing. That little girl who came in with shadows under her eyes and was sent to the library because she was late for testing? She was starving. The cafeteria couldn’t get her breakfast because they were busy getting lunches for 200+ kids going on a field trip. I took the time to fix her peanut butter toast in the midst of all the craziness because I could hear her tummy rumbling.  I know I matter to my students, but do I really matter to administration?

Tomorrow is a SEW day.