Creative Disasters

Had a great time painting my picture. Was able to change a few colors out from suggested picture, to match my house better. Toni is very helpful and is a great teacher.

You have perhaps heard of humans being right-​brained or left-​brained. While research has shown it to be untrue, some people are still considered to be creative (the so called «right-​brained»), and others are, well, not creative at all («left-​brained»). I am left-​brained. Very left-​brained. Even when sketching something, I often lose sight of the forest for the sake of the trees and get stuck on the minutiae (e.g. if my lines aren’t straight enough, everything thereafter is deemed a failure). Suffice it to say, you’re not likely to catch me with a paintbrush in hand. Not by choice anyway.
But it wasn’t by choice. It was more of a work-​related, team-​building exercise of sorts that we didn’t know was going to happen. I happened to be in dress clothes when we were informed of what was happening, so I ended up putting on an apron, and then taking a table cloth and wrapping myself in it to ensure my dress slacks wouldn’t get any paint on them. A good decision, because I dropped the paint brush on my lap at least four times.
The concept is similar to Pinot’s Palette. Toni is the young lady who walked us through the process of creating our works of «art.» We were all pretty skeptical that our final products would look similar to her example, but she seemed confident in our respective abilities. She supplied the canvases and necessary equipment. She had a good sense of humor and walked us (a group of 12 or so) through the process with ease.
Toni explained that her business venture started out as something for kids specifically (titled «Creative Disasters for Beautiful Minds»). I guess after a while, adults were incorporated as well? Apparently kids do really well with this sort of thing (despite everything in me assuming that paint + children = bad idea). She can come to you, or you can go to her studio. In this case, she came to us. She also told us that alcohol is welcome when you show up at her studio to do some painting.
Prices (from what the website shows) seem reasonable. I didn’t have to pay because everyone in the group was covered by the event planners, but it seems that an 11×14 canvas is $ 25.00. I would pay that; it’s comparable to Pinot’s Palette. Toni explained that if there are 10 people in the party, there’s a 10% discount, 15 will get a 15% discount, and 20 will get 20% discount. I think it stops there, but I could be wrong. It was a 2 ½ hour project for us (some took longer), and we were all intently working away with our tongues sticking out (that may have been just me). I had a lot more fun than I expected. Also, my painting doesn’t look like complete horse doo-​doo; extra points for that. Also, it’s really interesting how everyone received the same instructions, yet each of us came away with a final product that was unique to us.
Creative? Yes.
Disaster? Almost…