UNORTHODOX

As it happens, I love my dining room table. I have had it for over 25 years, and while it's far from fancy, it's a piece that I love. It's made of a 7' x 4' piece of glass, atop a beige colored marble base. Both are my amongst my favorite materials. And, as it makes for a wonderful table setting for 10/12, it also makes for a fabulous work room. Just one of the reasons why people find me unorthodox at times.

Most people would NEVER do every art/paint/craft/sewing/collating/building project known to mankind, right smack in the middle of their dining room. But ME? Of course I do! Actually, I HAVE to, by virtue of my living in such a small house. But... I'd probably do it regardless, even if I lived on an estate. Never mind the cream colored upholstered chairs. Never mind the berber carpeting. All the better for making my projects a bit more challenging.

My latest art project is one I've just completed. You see a picture of it up above. It's a 3 dimensional piece and I think I kinda like it. I was watching a craft show on TV the other day that sparked me a bit, so I figured I'd give it a try. WHAT A HOLY MESS. But, of course that didn't keep me from creating my masterpiece. To make this, I had to do A LOT of papier mache -ing. (News Flash: despite sounding French, the technique is actually given to us by the Chinese) The papier part was easy. The mache-ing part (IS there such a word??) was totally outta control . Water, glue, a zillion strips of paper, more glue, runny water bowl, even more glue, foam bases, etc. You should have seen me trying to answer the ringing phone ... gooey hands dripping like a faucet should give you the idea. After the form was mache-d, I let it dry, did a base paint and then merely embellished until... Bingo. You're done. As we speak, it's hanging on one of the windowed walls in... where else??... my dining room. The top piece is hot glued to the base and the base is hanging from a nail in the wall.

Anyway, the point of all this is: Had my son, let's say, ever done such a project in the living room, I'd have gone ballistic. WHAT?? YOU'RE MAKING THIS HOLY MESS HERE IN THE DINING ROOM?? WHAT THE HELL KIND OF HOME YOU THINK I RUN HERE?? SINCE WHEN DO WE USE THIS AS AN ARTS CENTER?? I FEED PEOPLE ON THIS TABLE, FOR GOD SAKES!! And, that's just the part I can repeat. Trust me... anyone other than me, doing this... I'd have called in the Looney Police in a heart beat. But, since it's ME... well then, it's another story altogether. It suddenly becomes a perfectly FINE thing to do. A perfectly ACCEPTABLE thing to do. And, a perfectly unorthodox thing to do.