Painting fun

Ready Steady,

B-A-K-E

I have dabbled with acrylic painting 

for a few years now.

I find it a very therapeutic way to unwind.

The only problem I have is 

finding the time to escape from family life 

for a few hours to visit one of my most 

favourite places in the whole wide world,

The Crafts House .

It's fair to say,

this is my little bit of serendipity

that I came across quite by chance

and that I love to indulge in, 

in an otherwise

very busy life.

However, 

Little B is at a VERY clingy 

stage at the moment,

which is lovely in the sense that 

I feel so needed and loved,

but on the other hand,

I can't even go to the bathroom 

without company.

So the prospect of leaving him with Daddy 

for an afternoon,

whilst I disappear is just about impossible.

It's such a shame because Miss B has 

come with me on a couple occasions 

to paint,

and she really loves 

her time 'up on the hill' too.

I shall just have to be patient 

and wait a little while longer,

and the time will come 

when we can 'escape'.

The Crafts House is run by a wonderfully 

talented lady called Sandra

 and her lovely husband, David.

Sandra is front of house,

looking after all things crafty,

and David is in charge of 

creating and cutting all the amazing 

MDF shapes

that adorn the shelves of the shop.

These blanks all sit waiting for you 

to unleash your artistic ideas on.

Sandra helps and guides 

you through the process of

conquering the initial fear 

of picking up a paint brush,

and realising that painting 

is so much fun,

as well as medicine of the soul.

David made some letters 

for me quite a while ago,

and in between having children 

and juggling work

they got put into the UFO

(unfinished objects) box.

I started working on them about a year ago,

and I am ashamed to say,

it's taken me this long to make the

time to complete them.

An opportunity to get all my paints

out onto the kitchen table 

and indulge in some very precious

'me time'

happened this weekend,

and I loved it.

The kids were 'helping' Daddy clean the car,

a.k.a. the mobile skip,

so I was able to revel in the pleasure of

forty five minutes of peace and quiet.

I had already done all of the 

base colour work with Sandra,

so there was only the 

decoration to finish off.

I wanted to keep this simple 

so as not to look too fussy

when they were mounted on the wall.

The hearts and polka dots 

on the 'b' and 'e' were 

so easy and quick to do,

but very effective.

The 'k' was just a stitched line 

effect created with a white uni-ball Signo pen.

These pens are great for writing 

on most surfaces,

but especially black so those 

chalkboard labels that are 

very popular at the moment

are a doddle with this.

The 'a' was a little more 

time consuming with the rose pattern.

I was slightly apprehensive 

about this one because I had 

never attempted

to paint roses before.

In actual fact,

they were really simple 

but didn't 'come together'

until I added the white accent an dots.

I fixed them to the wall using 

command picture hanging strips.

These are amazing little strips of 

self adhesive Velcro that attach to 

the wall and to the thing you want to hang.

It eliminates fiddling about with 

picture hooks and such like.

There are no holes in the walls 

and no need for bashing the 

end of your thumb with a hammer.

 The great thing about these 

for my wooden letters was

that I could literally stick them 

to the wall anywhere in the kitchen.

So after a bit of playing around 

with position,

and height, etc. 

and advice from Mr. B,

I decided above the ovens 

was the perfect spot. 

Voila.

I love them and feel really

 pleased with the patterns and colours I chose.

Until next time,

enjoy your day.