Painting last weekend

On Friday night, my sister and I went to Paint Nite at the Aquarium.  She got the more experienced apron -- her choice, she picked two aprons out of the bag and handed one to me. 

More Experienced Apron

Inexperienced Apron

Over the course of the evening, we painted an underwater scene with two turtles.  We sat at tables and each had an little easel, a paper plate with the required paint colours, some brushes and a red drinking cup with a bit of water.  The evening started with us making a promise to enjoy ourselves, not moan, groan and complain and to NOT drink from the red cup.  Good idea.  It looked uninviting.  The instructor took us through step by step demonstrating on her canvas.  A bit of yellow and blue on the brush to start and start filling in the canvas. 

Table setup; Don't drink from that!;  Painting started; Getting messy

Water finished; rocks added; underwater life added; turtle begun

At the end of the evening, the instructor offered to take group photos for those who wanted.  Its interesting how different each painting turned out even though we all received the same instructions.  We did a brief walk through the Aquarium before heading home.  We've previously been to the Paint Lounge which we go to by car.  Neither of us wanted to try driving into the Aquarium, so it was a different experience carrying the finished canvases home on transit.  Mine arrived home safely and since I haven't heard otherwise, I assume Karen's did too.

On Saturday, I went to the guild workshop.  Dorothy Fu was the guest speaker this month and taught the workshop.  We worked on a wholecloth painting workshop where our subject was a zebra.  The whole thing was done with magic markers.  We started with our piece of white cloth over the paper outline then traced and coloured with the markers.  When I lifted my piece off the piece of plastic, I saw why she insisted the plastic was a good idea!  Lots of bled through there! 

There was time during the workshop to quilt most of the wallhanging.  If I brought more thread with me (what colour do you want to quilt the sky) then I'd have completed the quilting there.  Since I only had black thread, the sky waited.  I was so pleased with how it was turning out, I finished quilting it when I got home then bound it using a facing.  Its the first time I've done that.  The notes I took at the rug workshop weren't sufficient now so I had some issues applying them but on the whole it worked out well.

Not only am I pleased with how it turned out, its finished and so I ended the weekend with 53 things on the project list instead of the 54 I expected. That also makes me happy.  :)