Why I didn’t marry an artist.

For the last few weekends I’ve been painting the house.  On the inside.  Once we paint our bedroom – the last on the list – I will have painted the entire house, inside and out.  This weekend was my daughter’s room, by her special request, since I painted my son’s room last weekend and she wanted hers done as well.

In our old house, she had a brown room.  A mocha color with brown velvet curtains.  In this house, her house was an aqua blue color. Until yesterday.  My husband took the kids to his mother’s house and I spent the morning painting her room “Shabby Chic” and watching episodes of The Blacklist.

All the painting, with the exception of the really high places on the back of the outside of our house, I have done without my husband’s help.  And that is fine with me. This is, in part, because he’s the messiest painter I have ever seen.  I think he’s who drop cloths and tape were invented for.  But in part it is because I really enjoy the process – everything from picking out the paint, to putting it on the walls, to seeing the transformed room. 

I realized yesterday that if my husband were an artist as well, this is something I’d have to compromise on. We’d pick out colors together, and we might paint together, and where I’d never cut him out if he wanted to be involved, there is a part of me that really appreciates that this is something that I get to do myself, without compromise or too much discussion.  When painting and decorating is your hobby, how you relax and enjoy your free time, having it negotiation-free is a awesome.

Before I met my husband I dated artists, and I think this is why I am so thankful that I married someone who is not one.  My husband has always supported my artistic ventures, whether they are as simple as painting our daughter’s room or as complicated as running my own leather business, and in a partner that is exactly what I need. Having his support behind allows me to continue to take chances, both in our home décor and in my artwork, and because he’s not an artist I have complete freedom to make my own mistakes, and to learn from them. 

Having his unwavering, unrestricting, support has been a wonderful gift for me personally and also for my career.  I’m glad I didn’t marry an artist, because I have found that sometimes feedback, input, opinions on the work that I am doing can be stifling to my own creativity.  And I am glad that I married a supportive non-artist, because it is his support is what gave me the solid foundation on which to grow.

xo

c

 

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Dragon!

This is going to be a quickie, but it was promised, so here goes.

My daughter Aife had her first real Halloween this year and after years and years of making my own costumes, I was so excited to make one for her.  She has a collection of my old stuffed dragons that she adores, so I thought I’d make her a dragon costume.

I bought a dragon costume pattern from Simplicity not thinking really too much of it, bought the fabric, then cut it all out (painstakingly – that takes forever!!) and realized that this dragon is not a dragon at all!

It has no ears. It has no wings.  It has two sets of fins that are full of interfacing, and no fins on the back of the costume, because (I think due to CPSIA regulations) it has velcro up the back rather than a zip front like they all had when I was a kid.

So I get to work altering the pattern.  I cut an extra set of fins from the contrast fabric, used the ears from another of the costumes in this pattern, cut them down a little smaller and folded them to stitch them on to the hood, and then cut a pattern for a pair of wings. I moved the zipper to the front, which meant altering the tummy piece. 

All in all, I think my little sage and berry cotton velvet dragon costume was adorable!  Sorry for the vague pictures – Kevin is still not keen on photos of Aife on the internet.  But here’s one of me in a rainbow wig to make up for it.

xo

c