October 11, 2011

Not A Perfectionist

I am not a perfectionist.  I don't have the patience to be one!  My lack of perfectionism was clear to me when I went to the Dancing Brush with a friend.  What is the Dancing Brush you ask?  It's one of those fun studios where you can paint your own pottery.  We had been wanting to go for months and since her hubby is under the ocean and mine had duty, it worked out perfectly.

We started the evening with dinner at The Loft.  If you live in Kitsap County and you've never eaten there, you are missing out.  They have delicious food and a deck over looking Liberty Bay.  It's a great place to eat dinner.  Anywho, after dinner we headed to the studio.  By the time we got there, we only had an hour and half.  After perusing the options, I decided on this plate that I will use as a platter:
I'm really not that crafty.  I can sew just fine but when it comes to painting....I am lacking in skills.  Art was not a favorite class of mine.  My painting ability is as bad as my singing ability...if you've ever heard me sing, then you know it's bad.

Thankfully they have stencils.  I love Asian influences (10 points if you know why!) so I picked a Chinese character.  I traced it onto my plate/platter and I was ready to go.  I decided to paint the character in red (my favorite color) and do the background in blue (The Man's favorite color)
 So far so good.  Until I decided that I should do a rim of red around the bottom.  Since I'm not a perfectionist the line around the plate isn't the same all the way around.  Oops!  The next hard part was painting in between the parts of the Chinese Character.  Hopefully it will look ok!  Painting it once would have been ok, but the more coats you put on the darker it comes out so...I needed to do at least two coats.
Then I started on the outside.  I got two coats on no problem.  Time was running out and I was going to put our last name along the top and Est. 2009 along the bottom cause I'm sentimental like that.  Well, I tried writing in on in pencil first, messed up and decided against it.  Even though the pencil burns off while it's in the kiln I decided to paint over it so the outside got a third layer.  I didn't have time to give the inside another layer of paint so it's going to be a little lighter than the outside.
 I'm hoping it will look ok.  I figure:

It's my first time

No one ever has to see it

It's a unique piece.

It took me about two months to get the finished piece.  My friend picked them up and then I never got it from her and then I was in MA for a month and it was the last thing on my mind.  I just got it this past Sunday from her.  Here's how it came out:
I don't love the inside and the fact that you can see all the brush strokes.  I wish I had had time for 1 more layer on the inside. Oh well..now I know!

Have you ever painted your own pottery?
How did your creation turn out?


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2 comments:

  1. Even though Dancing Brush is an hour and a half away from me, I really want to go :) Maybe I can talk husband into keeping the kids one day and let me have a day to myself out and about. I haven't painted my own pottery since I was in elementary school. :)

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  2. Of all my years in Kitsap I've never gone to the Loft. I swear... I need to make a trip home just to do tourist stuff!

    And the plate turned out fine. I agree a second coat in the center would have been good if you had time, but who cares... it is your special memory. :)

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