Birthday Adventures: Pinot's Palette

So this is going to be the second of a whole bunch of birthday posts.  I reflected on turning 32 and all of the changes through this past year here.
But now I'm ready to talk about the celebrations.
I find planning big parties pretty stressful so I'm much more inclined to having smaller mini events with different friends or groups of friends depending on who's available when.

This Saturday, I spent most of the day being a responsible adult.  I alternated between resting and cleaning from 8 in the morning till 7pm.  There was a lot to clean. Dishes, vacuuming, dusting, cleaning the stove and the microwave and the bathroom.  Normally, Baros would help me but he's had a crazy schedule lately so I decided to take care of it and give him a little reprieve (normally he cleans wayyyy more than I do). I also rested a lot!  I was so pooped from the week and lack of sleep and back pain so I just took blocks of time to rest.

However, after spending all day indoors I needed to do something.  Luckily for me, my friend Danielle was free and wanted to do something.  We decided to go to a Paint Nite event at a Pinot's Palette which was close to home.

All of the art on the walls

We met there for the 8pm class to paint a colorful Eiffel Tower scene.  It was very pop-art-esque, fun and beautiful.

Here's the painting we were trying to mimic!

Danielle brought us a bottle of white wine and we put on our smocks and grabbed some
stemless glasses (I was worried Danielle would knock them down/potentially break them).  I poured us our wine and we settled in at our canvases.

I love that Pinot's is a studio so you're surrounded by colorful art.  They even take the time to label your seat for you so you don't have to worry about getting separated from your friends (when you make your reservation online, they ask who, if anyone, you want to sit with).

Ready to paint

Quarter Way through 

Our instructor and her assistant were lovely.  They were so nice and helpful.  Our instructor took us step by step slowly through the painting. It was a great way to spend 2 hours.



















Each person worked at their own pace so even if you were slower than the person next to you it didn't matter.  And I love the fact that you can kind of manipulate your painting the way you want.  So even though you're following instructions, you don't/can't do it exactly the way the instructor does.  For example the sky in our painting was mostly dark blue and black.  I purposefully ignored instructions and made my sky more of the pink/purple color and the purple.  I wanted more of a sunset feel rather than a twilight feel.  And for our Eiffel tower, I made mine a little thinner and shorter as well.  There were people who followed instructions better and worse for a variety of reasons.   But in the end, it didn't matter how much or how little your painting looked like the original.

I wasn't loving it yet

About half way through:  this was our
instructor's painting... 

Mine!  I was finally really liking my creation at this stage!
The circle of stars really brought things together!

It's all about the process.  I know some people get upset when their paintings don't end up looking like the original or it's "worse" than the original, but it really doesn't matter.  I like that you don't have to be "artistic" to achieve one of these paintings.  You can be a complete beginner or an advanced painter and still create something lovely.  The key is not comparing yourself.  What you create is beautiful.  The process is beautiful itself.  Painting can be so relaxing, especially when you throw friends and wine into the mix.

I was a little ahead so I walked
 around taking pictures for
a bit, waiting for the paint to dry!

I had such a good time mixing my paints and applying paint to canvas even when I wasn't sure what the end result would be.  At a certain point, I gave up on thinking/worrying about it and let myself really have fun with the process.
At the end of the night, I was quite proud of what I had created.  But I also really enjoyed what everyone had painted as well.  The whole class of us (I guess around 20 people) did phenomenal jobs no matter the level.  We took a couple of group photos with cheesy grins.  It's such a fun experience and I can't wait to bring Baros with me one day.

After the group photo, Danielle and I, touched up our paintings a little more and then took some pictures of just the two of us in our colorful surroundings.

Selfie time!!

I was so grateful for her fun company and the idea to do a paint nite in the first place.  I have a feeling we'll be back at Pinot's sooner rather than later!