Paint, Sip, and Nibble

Just like Sam, my blog-partner, I also have been to a paint and sip event recently. And after painting this vase of flowers, I ventured further and went to a less-structured painting event you can see in the second half of this post.

My son and his girlfriend treated both of us moms to a fun Mother’s Day including brunch at Skillet and a paint and sip by Canvas! in Seattle (link is to our event. Robert and Rachel are the second photo!) Since I was just getting over a bad cold and don’t do alcohol anyway, I enjoyed sipping on my nice hot tea while following the instructions to create a Van-Gogh-inspired bouquet of flowers. 

Unlike Sam in our previous post, I did not snap any meaningful pics of my painting as I went so I am filling my post with close ups of my favorite parts! Haha! I really had fun layering and mixing and brushing on the backgrounds and the vase.

My son says, a few minutes in, “This is what I got an art degree for.” Ya never know, bud! Maybe one day you’ll be leading a room full of tipsy adults through a painting ;) 

It was fun to see how each of us interpreted the instructions (admirably!) and then somewhat shocking to see how some people in the rest of the room carried them out. I am Quite Happy with my painting, especially the vase! It was also a great day Ubering around the city together and talking up a storm. 

A couple weeks later, an artist friend of mine Facebook-invited me to a 6-hour painting party called “Fish and a Dish.” Curious, I went researching. A fun and encouraging artist named Brenda Boles holds a monthly painting party where you can choose from a variety of pre-sketched canvases of the month’s focus. Everyone also brings a treat of some sort to share, potluck-style. Hence, the fish and a dish title for June’s event.

 

Thank you for the invite, Sandi! I’m so very glad I had this experience :) 

I had my choice of about a dozen different fishes on different sized canvases, but this messy, highly textured angel fish really caught my attention. 

I was quite intimidated at first, but each time I got done with one step, I asked her to tell me what to do next. When I started applying the crazy, messy, green paint streaks and spatters though, I was off and running! After all … acrylics. You can easily pull off do-overs if needed heh heh. I love love love the spatters. 

The photocopy of the original painting I was using showed a blue-toned fish with no background (and a significantly less amount of the fun stuff.) So you see that I personalized it by PAINTING IT GREEN! If you’ve seen me on facebook, you know that my profile picture remains a neon sign saying “paint it green!” I love to paint things green :)  

If you get a chance to paint and sip with friends, I encourage you to give it a try! 

Happy painting (and sipping), 

Gail