My Time in Connecticut

On Monday and Tuesday of this week, I attended a two-day seminar in Connecticut, hosted by my friend Z, and taught by another friend, world-renowned body painter Pashur. It was absolutely amazing.

We spent two full days learning technique and design from Pashur, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., eating great food provided by (and some of it cooked by) Z, devouring carrot cake and fudge made by one of our classmates, and generally having a good time. In the evenings, we just painted as the mood struck, watched each other paint, tried out each others' supplies, and got some great critiques.

Every time I do something like this, my painting improves, so I can't wait until Sunday when I'm painting at Ho-Ho-Kus' tree lighting to see how this experience has affected me.

The first day's class was themed in designs inspired by insects and flowers, and this is some of my work:



I love this drop-shadow technique too! My spiders will never be the same.

During the jam that night, I tried a couple things, just to get Pashur's critiques. They were invaluable, but this is what I did:





The second day of class was all about holiday designs, and in addition to an AMAZING and scary Jack Frost design I hope to use this Sunday, and some great ornament and snowflake ideas, I picked up the CUTEST Rudolph and penguin that I absolutely KNOW I'll be using!


Plus, during the jam, I knocked this out, loosely based on a holly butterfly Pashur showed us:

I love face painters!

I'm a member of several worldwide face painting discussion groups. One is small enough, though international, and close enough, that we've become good friends. So a couple years ago, someone suggested a secret Santa exchange, and of course I wanted to participate. I love gifts - giving and receiving!

Our version extended past the holidays, into mid-January.

Yesterday, I was feeling really blech. My stomach was bothering me, and I didn't get anything done as intended. So when the doorbell rang and the dog went crazy barking, I was in even less of a good mood. When I got there, though, things got a lot better. I had a fat, padded envelope from a great face painter, Paula Southern, in the UK!

Wow, did I score! In addition to some awesome organic chocolate, a soap making book and some essential oils for our soaps and other bath products, a beautiful card to inspire my henna,

and some very cool bindis,

she sent me three bags of gorgeous shimmery cosmetic glitter.

And on top of that, my personal favorite, she sent me six jars of liquid Fardel face paint! Just look at those amazing colors! The deep blue is already my favorite.

Fardel is a Belgian face paint company, still EU and FDA compliant, but hard to get here in the States. So this is HUGE for me. I can't wait until my next party on 1/23, so I can try them out!