Paint Nite!

Our daughter and I did the coolest thing this past weekend.  For Christmas, we spent a weekend in Orlando and took a painting class. She took art classes in college; I took pottery classes in college.  She can actually draw and sketch beautifully; I can make lumpy bowls that are too heavy to actually use.

Before we got started.  Don't we look artistic?

The event we attended was called "Paint Night."  At the online "Paint Night" site, we chose a picture we wanted to learn to paint.  At the event on Saturday night, that picture was on display in a beautiful room adjacent a trendy bar.  We sat down at a long table (with other attendees) in front of our own canvases and easels and paper plates filled with five different colors of paint blobs the size of a slider hamburgers.  We were given aprons, which were clearly reusable.

We each had a plastic cup 1/4 full of water and three different types of brushes. Some people ordered drinks from the bar before we started; my girl and I had iced tea and soda.  I've never painted before in my life (other than interior walls and paint-by-number kits when I was ten), and I was pretty sure alcohol was not going to enhance my lack of skill.

Step by step, the instructor directed us to first draw a sky, and then a horizon, a pathway, and some trees.  That's all there was to the picture.  It was a very basic, primary colors, kind of painting.

It took us two hours.  Oh my gosh, I concentrated so hard. I felt like I was five, learning to write in cursive.  My brain was really cranking.  Sitting this close to my project, I couldn't tell how the completed thing would look.  Painting is done in small pieces (who knew?) and while I was doing the parts, it didn't look like anything.  My daughter was great, so encouraging and unafraid.  I found myself following her instruction as much as listening to the teacher.

We laughed and made mistakes and covered them up with white (which really does hide pretty much anything.)  We tried not to confuse our paint water cup with our drinking cups, and I tried not to splatter her canvas (when I tapped off my brush) more than twice. The whole thing was so much fun, and we came away with not half-bad masterpieces.

I'm so glad I don't have a copy of the original picture, because then you'll never know how close we got (or failed to get.)  We didn't understand why there was red and yellow on the pathway, but that's what the sample picture had, so we added it.  My daughter originally thought the pathway was a river.  I understood it was a path, but thought maybe it had bloodstains on it from a recent crime. One student added two snowmen on this pathway.  Art is so subjective, isn't it?

My girl and I are giving our own picture to each other for Christmas.   I might have her fix mine before I wrap it.