Dream Team

On Friday night, I had the privilege and honor to paint faces at the Franklin Lakes Dream Team Baseball Program summer party.  It was probably the most amazing thing I've ever done.  The people were phenomenal and the event like nothing I've ever attended.  Everyone was wonderful.  I only hope I get to work at many more like it.

Not a Typical Start to the Week

This past Monday, I took a day off from my day job... to face paint!  It was one of the best days ever.  Three other face painters and I went to a beautiful Tudor-style house in Shrewsbury, NJ, owned by an employee of ColArt, the art supply company.  ColArt owns United States distribution of Snazaroo, a well-known face paint made in the UK.

They're looking to increase their marketing of Snazaroo, especially in social media, so they hired us to spend the whole day in the gorgeous backyard on a beautiful day, painting a bunch of very photogenic and well-mannered kids over and over in different faces for their pro photographer and videographer.  It was a blast!  At the end of the day, in addition to all the photos taken of my work, I also got to face paint a video tutorial... and get painted in one too!

ColArt has asked that we not share our work until they've got the official photos out and about, so although I took photos I cannot yet post them here.  I will in the future, though, so you'll have to keep checking!

Meanwhile, the next morning I got an email for a last minute party that same evening.  A young lady was turning four, and her mom suddenly thought it'd be fun to have a face painter.  She was right!

Lots of princesses and butterflies.

A couple of boys who loved their hulk and puppy.

And my favorite... a woman who just wanted me to do something pretty and let me do what I wanted!

She was so happy!

More Communions, More Creativity

Maybe it's something in the age of the kids that are having communions, though that doesn't explain the older and younger cousins and siblings.  These kids come up with the niftiest ideas!

When was the last time you saw an elephant playing soccer?

Or a panda playing baseball?

It kills me that the panda's so blurry, but I swear it was adorable.  At another recent communion, I got to do this.

And my first ever full-face shark!

Zoo Do 2014

Last night, some friends and I painted again at the Bergen County Zoo at Van Saun Park in Paramus.  It was a blast!  Two of the other face painters are clowns and I love hanging out with clowns.  Such big personalities, it's a blast.

It's funny, although there are four of us painting, and the way we work it is that there's only one line and each artist with an empty seat just calls for the next person in line, each of us tends to end up with our own popular faces for the event.  I heard the artist nearest me painting kitty after kitty, while I didn't have one single kitty request.  My big thing last night was dragons.  I painted a slew of dragons and had some fun with them.  I love asking kids - or adults, for that matter - "What color are dragons where you come from?"  The most common breeds of dragons seem to be green, red, and blue.

I did get one very specific request for this dragon, but with teeth, which I guess from looking at the internet now (I haven't seen the movie yet and really should), he develops as he gets older; mom called up the image on her phone.  Not sure I captured it, but it was on the fly, so I don't think I did a terrible job.

Of course, even with all the dragons, I couldn't have a gig without butterflies.  There are always butterflies.  But I decided to have some fun with them.

There are also almost always tigers, so I decided to have some fun with those too.

 Not everyone chose pretty.  There were a couple of fierce T-Rexes too.

The coolest request, though, was my last of the night - an owl.  I think I've only painted a full face owl once before, and I know for a fact this one was better.  She loved it!

I Love It When I Get to Have Some Fun

And I love it when people translate the fact that I can paint into other creative endeavors.  Most recently, a woman in my town whose daughter is being bat mitzvahed this month contacted me about doing a project for her.

At my bat mitzvah in 1983, my "sign in board" was a sheet of oaktag with a photo of me in the middle and rainbow stickers all around, since my theme was rainbows.  Hey, it was 1983.  Give me a break.  When my sister's bat mitzvah rolled around in 1990, her sign in board was Lucite with her name in Lucite letters and hearts.

Well, this mom has the nifty idea of using a mailbox!  The concept is that she'll have postcards printed with the bat mitzvah girl's logo, which she had designed for the event, and the guests can each write a message on a postcard.  Then the postcards go in the mailbox, and the whole shebang can go on the girl's dresser or shelf as a keepsake.  I love it!

This is the logo:

Cute, right?  Of course, pencil first, just in case.

And then I painted it all in.  I promise the name is in a nice purple, not blue.  With my dining room light lit, I just couldn't get the color true.

What'cha think?  I kind of love it.  And I'm open to more work like this, for sure.  Much more.

Franklin Lakes Cleanup/Beautification Day with the Environmental Commission

A while back, I became a commissioner on my town's Environmental Commission.  It's a great group, with a great mission and a bunch of great people.  They've been doing the cleanup day for a few years now, but this time we added "beautification" to the itinerary.  Our home base was the nature preserve in town.

As a brand new beekeeper, I want to encourage the planting of flowers whenever and wherever possible, so the participants also planted tulips and wildflower seeds.  Hence "beautification."  We handed out gloves, bags, and trash pickup equipment for people to use around the preserve and out on various streets around town.  Plus, we had a display teaching about xeriscape landscaping, which is the planting of flowers and plants that require very little water to flourish.

Of course, I offered my services as a face painter to draw families to the event, and had a great time painting the attendees, young and younger.

 

 

 

I was especially impressed with these three teens who showed up of their own volition without parents.  They run on the trails in the preserve and are just dedicated to keeping it nice.  Says some good things about the teen population!