Monthly Archives: July 2014

reclaimed

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Hand painted, then messed up re-sanded, and hand painted again. So it is essentially doubly reclaimed. If that is possible. Go figure.

Why is it that everything I see on Pinterest makes me think “pshhhhh, I can do that!” I must have an inflated sense of artistic ability. Plus my manic obsessiveness totally messes with me. I decided a few weeks ago I was going to repurpose furniture bought off Craigslist, then resell it and get loaded. Well, I have shined. I am a professional at purchasing from Craigslist and getting loaded, just not the right kind of loaded. I originally thought I was going to get rich, not drunk on wine and paint fumes.

But today is a milestone. I have finally completed my first piece and listed it on Craigslist and Ebay and, well that’s it. I couldn’t think of anywhere else to list it. But I have faith! It will sell! Hopefully. Here it is in all it’s original glory, or lack thereof… I didn’t even take a pic of it’s partner in crime. Here they are. Coffee and End table, let’s call them Bella and Edward. (I just watched Twilight)

coffe table orig

Oh, wait – look who it is back there, so shy.

photo (10)

These little buggers gave me a fit. I sanded, stripped, stained and then painted a couple times. Then I distressed, stained some more, ooops stained too much. Had to sand back down, repaint and re distress, uggghhhh. But now they do look great, if I say so myself.

table 4 (1024x755)

Table 1

So now onto the next ones, I have quite the lineup of furniture too. Many of these I plan to keep. At least until something else sparks my interest.

Until next time.

Ensemble Theatre

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I hate theatre, harsh I know. I thought it was cheesy and who in the duck can memorize an entire script anyway? But this is my year of trying new things and getting out of my comfort zone so I signed up for an adult acting class at the community theatre.

Class one was cool. There was about 7 people in the first class and I warmed up pretty fast. We did some emotional exercises and some warm ups but all together it set up a good feel for what was to come.

Class two on the other hand was a bit more surprising, about 12 people showed up. All races, ages and mixes. A real melting pot, which is cool. Class started like normal –a warm up to get our creative and emotional juices flowing, we had to circle around passing the emotion. Then came the weird stuff…

We were given a monologue directory at the end of the first class and were told to at least memorize the first sentence of a choice monologue. We then performed the first sentence of our monologue whilst thrusting different emotions from our hips. Imagine dry humping the air with your hips and hands, palms up. (I know my mom will eventually be reading this and probably seriously reconsider sending my kid brother there for any form of drama camp but it isn’t as bad as it sounds.) It actually, surprisingly made a lot of sense. We did a 10 count of thrusting – counting, then we made some weird noise while doing it, then we said our line. We did, happy, sad and angry. It made you try the line in different emotions and stop thinking about what you were saying and just go with it. It did make for an awkward conversation when I got home and C asked me what I did in class…

Just go with it. If I can dry hump my way through my monologue in front of a live audience, what else am I capable of?

improv 101

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Improv 101 is over. What an amazing opportunity. I’m so glad that I bit the bullet and got out of my comfort zone and did something like that. While I find myself personally hilarious I would never suggest that I am by any means skillfully funny. Although from what I learned in class, and read on improv-haters blogs, improv is not supposed to be funny. Huh, who knew?! Anyway it’s totally helped me with off the cuff and public speaking work-wise so brownie points.

Leading up to my last class, or the “showcase’ was weird. The “what if’s” were in full force, “what if I say something disturbing”, “what if I go-up”, “what if I pee my pants”, “what if everyone thinks I suck balls”. Then all would be cool and I wouldn’t stress a bit. Then I would get back all in my own head and have all these crazy thoughts swirling around and little voices taunting me. I know, so freaking nuts. It’s an artistic brain or something, I read about artists being sensitive and weird all the time. But then our teacher sent us this guy Jimmy Carrane’s Blog called Improv Nerd.

It. Was. Life changing.

Not because he’s this great improver or hilarious, which he may very well be – but it was how he articulated pre show nerves and the range of emotions he would feel before and after a performance. He claims to have all kinds of emotional anxiety and maybe that’s why I related so much but it gave me the courage to get out of my own head and pretend to feel confident. And I did. And the show was awesome. And apparently I was always the mad, angry or yelling character, which maybe leads me to think maybe improv is my outlet for repressed emotional anger. That’s deep.

I love summer

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It’s been so long since I’ve blogged. I often think about doing it but just haven’t had the time. It’ mostly because I love summer. The days are longer and there is so many more options to do stuff other than sit in front of a computer. And I have been doing so much recently. Here is a mini update on my kind of exciting life;

I finished my improv class. What a success!

I signed up for an acting on camera class. This has been a rollercoaster class, it’s on Saturdays and I’m alllllways late, arriving disheveled and stressed. But it’s great to practice on camera and I do get to see myself on the silver screen!

I also signed up for an acting class. Guess if I am going to continue to go on these auditions I should, oh I don’t know, learn the basics? I have taken a hiatus from submitting for auditions to work on this script analysis class. The first class was also a success! Woo-hoo me.

I have a recent and almost disturbing obsession with thinking about refurbishing furniture purchased from off craigslist. I have made 3 large furniture purchases from craigslist in the past two weeks and cannot stop myself from stalking the site every day for more.

I have moved on from the days spent on frivolous Target purchases to become a compulsive Amazon Prime shopper. They lured me in with the 30 day free trial and I am smitten. I love when I run out of something these days because I just hop on amazon and wham, bam, than you ma’am it’s delivered to my door step within 3 days. It’s so exciting seeing boxes on my door step awaiting my arrival home. What is it, what is it?! Oh, it’s the vacuum bags I ordered. Fun!