Far From Perfect, But Perfectly Me!

I have been a great many things over a great many years, writer, artist, designer the list goes on and on, but over the past 3 decades while the words and forms may shift with the passage of time, the passion never fades. A few years ago, our family moved to a larger home that afforded me my own studio/office space. While I had to make the space work for both functions, the fact that I even had that was amazing. I went from having my sewing machines set up at the dining room table, computer by the sofa, and printer sharing space on the tv stand to an entire room to myself. I was elated to finally have a proper sewing table, cutting table, and a computer desk. There was space for my ironing board and shelves to hold my fabric mini bolts beautifully. This had me tickled pink for the last several years. But as time passed, I began to feel it was missing something. It was missing me. While it was beautiful and functional and wonderful all around, it had truly little personality. The walls were practically bare aside from the formality of my degree, and short of the fabrics and threads there was not much in the way of color.

I sat there in my room silently for a bit. Slowly turning about in my chair as my husband happened to walk down the hall and catch my thoughtful glare. “Oh, lord….” He knew. Well, he didn’t know the details, but he knew it was going to be something elaborate. He just stood there leaning in the doorway staring, waiting for me to turn and let him in on the big plans I was undoubtedly making. Mind you, at this point, I had no real idea what I wanted. I just knew I wanted it and I wanted it now. Color, whimsy, personality overload. It had to be flashy, and unique. Artwork! Not just any artwork. Something with real pop. I set to google image search as I often do when I have an idea of what I want but need to come up with some inspiration and I keyed in “Custom Fashion Art” and scrolled forever. Beautiful piece after beautiful piece appeared before my eyes. All pristine and perfect. But not really anything that screamed out to me. Nothing that was really ME. Until I saw this one tiny image of a barely even brush strokes body with flower petal skirt and I could feel my eyes light up! I fell in love! I searched out more like it and could not have been more in love. I showed my daughter and she lit up like a Christmas tree. This was it for sure - but I couldn’t find anyone who made them on commission. This was a huge dilemma for me as I am no painter and my drawing talents … let’s just say I have never won a game of Pictionary in my life. I was heartbroken not to be able to find anywhere to purchase them, but my sweet girl just kept telling me she knew I could do it. I swear that girl genuinely believes I can do anything. And for her, I would absolutely try my hardest!

So, I set myself up for success as best I could. After all, an artist is only as good as the tools they use. I put in a pick-up order for the next morning with some blank canvases, a fresh new pair of Fiskars scissors (because I am NOT putting my coveted fabric scissors anywhere near floral wire!), a HUGE assortment of floral stems to play with in every color and style you could imagine, Turbo Tacky Glue (which yes, I own at least a dozen bottles of but I can never find when I need it), and a set of Prismacolor watercolor pencils and watercolor brushes to make the painting portion of this as easy and beautiful as possible, along with my already impressive collection of metallic paint pens, and an assortment of Swarovski Crystals for highlighting along the way. After picking up my supplies I headed home and began the process of sketching out my first girl. Inspired by my daughter and her love of ballet I started simple. The first draft sketch was utterly laughable. I was nearly in tears laughing so hard. But I kept at it. The brand-new pencil eraser I started with was completely worn down before I was done, but in the end, I came to a final sketch I loved. My daughter loved it so much she asked if she could give it to her pointe teacher for an end-of-year gift. I was more than happy to let her give it with pride and made a new one for myself with a few changes to ensure each would be one of a kind. I have made a number of new sketches since and put a few more to canvas watching each new girl take on a personality all her own. I am having so much fun with them especially letting Emily help me decide which direction to go with each new design. What I thought was going to be a disastrous waste of time and supplies ended up being exactly the project I needed to bring new life to my studio and creative spirit.

As much as I have loved sharing my gifts with the world over the years, no joy has ever come close to that of watching the love spread to my own daughter and seeing it grow in her as well. Being able to show her that even when we don’t think we can do it, sometimes we can surprise ourselves when we have the support of those we love. As I continue down my path, I feel her footsteps following behind faster by the day. And as they are starting to veer off on their own way I know she will be my most beautiful creation ever. So far only 2 of these mixed media art pieces have made it up on my walls, one inspired by her and another by me, but I foresee many more in the coming months. They are far from perfect, but perfectly me!