Thursday, September 8, 2011

My Art and Some Stories

I have about 5 different projects going on right now.  I get all of these ideas of things I want to do - mostly things I have seen other people do and then I want to try it.  My problem is that I start all of them at once and usually don't have all the supplies to finish them or I have to wait for paint to dry or lately, the weather to cooperate.  It has been HOT and actually humid in San Diego the last couple of days - not ideal for painting something outside.

Yesterday I decided to set my sites on something that I could complete, but I didn't know what it was yet.  I was at Wal-Mart to pick up some coffee filters.  I know what you're thinking, You go all the way to Wal-Mart just for coffee filters?  On this occasion, I did.  I drop Kamryn off at school at 7:55 and there isn't much that is open at that time.  I know Target is open, but I hadn't been to Wal-Mart for awhile and thought I could get some other stuff as well.  As it turns out, Wal-Mart has an awesome craft aisle.  They also sell paint, which means they have paint chips. 

I had pinned some paint chip art a few weeks ago and since then have been chomping at the bit to get my hands on some of the paint chips.  I didn't really know what I wanted to do, but I thought once I had them, I would figure it out.  And figure it out, I did!  I made these....
The best part?  They were 100% free.  The shadow box frames are from IKEA.  They used to be in Kamryn & Rory's nurseries with Ocean Critters in them:
Lucky for me, the little critters just peeled right off.  There was a little glue residue on the mat with the turtle in it, but see those keys in the upper right corner?  The little discount membership cards that are on the ring make for an excellent, but gentle glue scraper.

After freeing up my frames, I punched the flowers out of the paint chips.  I got the punches from Target a long time ago and I think I paid $.50 for them.  I used regular old computer paper for the background.  I bet that makes true artists cringe, but that is an upgrade from what I used for the ocean critters.  For those, I just flipped over the piece of paper that came with the frame!  I then mapped out where all of the little flowers were going to go.
And glued them into place with the mother of all glues...Elmer's.  I erased all the lines, but as you can see above, I put little circles where the flower was to go.  I don't know about you, but I can guarantee that I would have put a drop of glue in a place where I shouldn't and then I would have made a mess trying to get it off. 
And thus, my finished product. 


My brother and husband were 100% unimpressed with my art to which I told them to kindly "F*%^ right off." Kamryn, on the other hand told me they were beautiful and that's all that really matters because they are hanging in her room.

I do believe I also promised a story.  Lately I have had to entice my dear little boy to do things.  If I make it sound exciting, he gets excited and then we can move along on our merry way.  Today I wanted to get the mail without incident.  Here is what went down this morning:
Me:  "Rory, let's go get the mail!  Maybe there is a surprise in there for you!"
Rory:  "Cheese?"
Me:  "Sure Buddy, maybe there'll be some cheese in there for you."
Rory:  "OK Mommy!  Let's go!"
There was no cheese today and Rory was a little disappointed, but that was soon forgotten when he saw a guy with a mustache doing the landscaping.  He's all about mustaches right now so Rory crouched down, even though the man was standing, and looked up at him - his head at a slight tilt and just stared and pointed at this guy's face.  He muttered a low "mustache" - almost like he was in awe.  I just stood there because sometimes it's more fun for me to watch instead of trying to explain what my 2 year old is doing or why.  I let it go on for a few awkward seconds and then told Rory we had to go.  Luckily the guy didn't seem to mind a toddler admiring his lip warmer even if he didn't realize that is what was going on.

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