Art: The Act of Making Things Pretty

At least that is my definition  of art for today.

Yesterday I told you about our exciting Saturday at the Garlic Festival, but I left something out.  I hate to leave anything out, especially the good stuff and there’s plenty of that.

My mom looked at me late Saturday afternoon and said, “Visiting you is never dull.”

Nope.  Sorry mom, but dull is way overrated.

However, every now and again, we (especially us women) tend to feel dull.  So we go and dye our brown hair blond, or our blond hair red, or our red hair black.  Sometimes we just skip the dye and cut off all the hair.  Maybe we go on a shopping spree and buy lots of ugly clothes we’ll never wear.  My point is, when we get all dull feeling (translate hormonal), we sometimes make rash choices in an effort to be un-dull.

You’re all looking at me like I have two heads.  I am not alone in this.  I am certain!  You do this too.  Don’t you?

Well, I have been dull lately.  I think it’s the four inches of gray roots on my head.  I decided to own the IreallyNeedtoGetmyHairdone look and started telling people it is this year’s hottest fashion trend (at least according to all the cool and uber-fashionable pinners on Pinterest).  Can we say “Ombre?”

Ya, no one else is buying it either.

So I have been carrying around my dull ombre head that is also in desperate need of a haircut and mulling over my options.  Shaving it all off is looking better every day.

On Saturday, I forgot dull.  I let Christina, the super-fun and extremely talented woman who painted my Fresh Cupcakes sign, paint my hand.

My Henna Hand Art

Yes.  I got a Henna tattoo.

Now it will wash away in about two week, but I am going to tell you something.  I. Love. It.

Every now and again, I catch a glimpse of something dark and think I have dirt on my hand, but that’s just because it’s new.  I am not used to vines growing up my fingers.  I am accustomed to them growing out of my head, but not on my hands, not until Saturday.

My kids were the first to find Christina.  She said she recognized them from my blog.  I hope she also forgives them for driving her absolutely wonky.  FringeBoy can be passionate about art and he’s a perfectionist like no other.  He will not hesitate to say when he doesn’t like something.  To Christina’s great credit, she let him sketch a design and then did a beautiful job copying it on his hand.

Thank you Christina for your patience and kindness.  I know there had to be a time when you wanted to smack FringeBoy in the back of the head.  Believe me, I get those urges quite often.

The only one the Henna didn’t work so well on is my mom.  She had it done on her arm and it didn’t really show up.  That’s probably because she has thirty-two thousand freckles on her arm.  Looking at her arm is like sitting in a planetarium and looking at the sky.  There’s a constellation every quarter inch.

FringeBoy begged for a kit of his own, and because I am a good mom who happened to have a bag of freshly earned cash, I let him get his own Henna Tattoo Kit.

Do you realize what repercussions this decision will have?

Obviously I was thinking with my mama’s heart instead of my brain when I gave him twenty bucks.  My son has been drawing sketches for days.  He loves the idea of a face paint that will not wash away for a few weeks.  He’ll set up shop on my porch and be inking every kid that gets off the school bus.

Heaven help me.

It will be like yard time in prison, only with shorter people.

Old Indian women will clutch their chests and gasp over their lovely wedding traditions gone so wrong.  They should have expected it from us Americans.  We take a good idea and run wild with it.

And that my friends is why a visit to my house is never dull.