Real Time

[Alison]

I was going to post this in our discussion about painting 'Beautiful Jewel-toned Wolfe Green' (Thank You Elle), but there was so much more going on.  I thought you might like to see how practicing really fits into my busy life.

Here is was - 10pm, and I just got home exhausted.  My husband, already sleeping, had left a bag on (ugh) onions on the counter.  Well, gotta put up with the onions, and I even gotta put it away myself - I wouldn't want to take the chance of the onions getting even ughier by rotting all over the important papers that I leave out of the counter.

So I had to put the onions away, even though I was so tired.  And, look - these onions are in a mesh bag.  Similar to the one that I use for snake-skin texture.  I always wondered if these finer mesh bags would word - maybe give me a different look.

So I put away the onions and went upstairs with the mesh bag.  So tired, but I'll make a snake on my arm.  Hey!  I remember our recent discussion about putting Snazaroo yellow under the Wolfe green to make it wash off easier.  I don't have Snazaroo, and I really wanted to check this out with Mehron turquoise, so I sponged on Mehron Yellow before painting a Mehron turquoise snake. 

Then I tried the mesh bag from the onions.  Ick - ugly.  I'm not going to use That.

And I wanted to leave the paint on for a while
to see how it would really wash off after a whole day.
So I went to sleep with the snake still on my arm.
Washing the next morning, it did come off 'easily',
but it did take more effort than my paintings usually do.
I had to resaop and wash/wash/wash at least three times.

BTW, tired as I was, I didn't bother taking out my face-painting brushes. 
I just grabbed an old brush that I had been using with Acrylic-paints for years.
(See post called 'Brushes')  See?  Not the finest painting, but it would go over
okay in a pinch.

[Alison]

Huh?  Why didn't my image show up?
I'm going to try to post it again.

[Alison]

Oh yeah!  Now that I see my picture, I just remembered that this post also has to do with our posts about 'Dots'.  Do you see the excellent row of dots of different sizes that I painted with that old brush?  That just popped into my mind that night, too.  And I was so pleased that I've been better at dots for my gigs since then (although there still are some designs that seem to do better with my old clunky way of making dots).

So much in this post:
mesh-pattern
staining colors
brushes
dots

and Me!  Hi fellow face-painters!

[Sherry]

I love it Alison!    Now I need to try out the mesh bag thing works!

[Alison]

Hi Sherry ~  I hope you'll let us know the details of application if the
small mesh (from onions) works.  

I already know that the thicker plastic mesh works fine.  And I'm on the
look out for one with circles that are about 3/8" diameter.

[MandiIlene]

I love the way you write Alison, I think its great. I was really with you there in the kitchen looking at the onions disappointed, then seeing the light bulb go off, then going upstairs as tired as you were and painting a snake with your old acrylic brush you had lying around. I loved it, and I have been there many times.

~*~Mandi~*~

[Sherry]

I'm fresh out of onions and mesh bags.  I'll have to put that on my grocery list.   

I agree with Mandi, you could do some creative writing.   

[Alison]

Thank you ~  That's not the first time I've been complimented on my writing.  I enjoy doing it, even writing longer stories.  But making a career out of it was the pits - talk about people-pleasing.  So I happily left that dream behind - I say happily because I don't think it's so healthy to spend all your time in words, which are abstractions and connections.  Still, I'm glad to get in to it sometimes.

I like this group.  I like that I really get a feel for some of the personalities here- not just business.  Even though that's what we talk about - business.  People who do this work professionally (more than a job) - it's part of who we are.  If we speak fully, we can't separate one from the other.

Have you bought onions yet, Sherry? 

[Sherry]

I was over at my mom's last night and she was fixing spaghetti dinner, so I asked her if I could have her onion bag.  Voila, I've got one, but instead of practicing snakes, I got in the mood to practice butterflies on myself last night.  I just can't get butterflies right for some reason.  I thought I'd try it with the metallix colors, but still, I wasn't liking the results.

I really wish I had the mesh bag for the gig I did yesterday.  One boy requested a dragon face and I was thinking, if I only had the mesh bag, I could make better scales.  He was extra wiggly, so the hand painted ones were fat, sloppy and incomplete... oh well!   

[Alison]

Whenever we have someone else involved
in Anything that we do,
things get more complicated - eh?

Even just painting on a stranger's face, there is Relationship involved.

[MandiIlene]

"Even just painting on a stranger's face, there is Relationship involved."



I have to say I love that part, my favorite is painting a pregnant belly and knowing that the mom is never going to forget that, and neither am I. The baby starts moving, and then when you get to show them it in the mirror, its the same reaction a kid has when they see their face, I love it!!

~*~Mandi~*~