Painting Class

So, a few of the gals get together every now and then and go to this painting class...it's one of those where you pick out a painting you like and schedule a slot on that day and the teacher takes you through the steps of recreating it. Not paint by number so much as "here, I'll show you what to do." Even though she's showing us exactly how to do it, every single person's painting in the class looks completely different. I love it. It is one of the most therapeutic things you can do. And you can change it up to however you like....it's your painting. We had a blast! Erin's, Brandi's, Tris', and Cara's all looked fabulous. (I don't want to hear a word about it, Cara...yours looked great!) I was pretty okay with mine...there are always things you wish you had done differently, but once you sign it...it's finished! No more changes.

This time, we did a Christmas one...because of, you know, that holiday that's coming up. Mine ended up looking like this. I'm hanging it up in the guest bathroom...so guests, I painted this for you.

When you go to these classes, you inevitably share a table with some crazy people. This time around, it was a crazy kid. His mom had brought him. I'm not super great with judging ages, so I'm gonna guess he was about 10. This was his first class. He understood himself to be Picasso...maybe a young Monet...I dunno. He started on the background pretty fired up. When we started on the tree, that's when things went bad...it was a tragic, downward spiral. He kept blaming it on the canvas moving. I was thinking, well, if you wouldn't stab at the canvas with your brush, it probably wouldn't move. He kept looking at his mom's saying, "Yours is perfect and mine is so dumb!" And his mom, as patient as she could, would say, "No, honey...yours is looking great." He'd reply with, "No, it's NOT! It looks like POO! I hate it!" His mom would sigh and ask if she could help him fix it and he'd say, "Well, sure...probably can't do much with this pile of POO! But GO AHEAD." After she attempted to fix it, quite nicely in fact, he'd grunt and say, "Ugh...whatever! It's not my painting style. It doesn't look like my style, but WHATEVER." The mom would sit and continue painting her own in silence. He'd gasp and sigh adamantly and get up to "get water" and come back...knocking his chair over in the process, all the while complaining about "his style" of painting. He finally ended the class with an exasperated, "Well, I mean, I haven't painted in THREE MONTHS, so this is just DUMB. We'll SEE if I come back again." To which the mother replied, "Yeah, I'm never bringing you back again." Surprisingly, he answered with, "But why? Oh, whatever! My painting is stupid! Mine is like a 7 and yours is like an 8 on a scale of 1 to 10. I'll probably just burn mine or something." So yeah...good times.