Color Us Ours

Charlotte: I'm thinking about quitting my job. Sometimes I walk by one of those Color Me Mine pottery places and I'll see a woman having a lovely afternoon glazing a bowl. That would be a nice change.

Carrie: Sweetie, if I was walking by and saw you in there, I'd just keep on walking.

Flashback Carrie and Charlotte.
Charlotte wears Lilly Pulitzer's
Not So Crabby skirt.

Sometimes my sister and I like to plan out our mid-life crises. "When I have my nervous breakdown," I'll tell her, "I'm going on a road trip to Sedona." Or sometimes, "When I have my nervous breakdown, I'm staying at the Ashram in Malibu for a week and eating nothing but goji berries and sprouts."

My sister's imaginary meltdown typically involves the Ojai Valley Inn & Spa. There in the shadow of the Topa Topa mountains, she will retreat to the resort's Artist Cottage and Apothecary, where she will blend her own perfume and learn the lost art of mobile-making.

Usually, daydreams about forced downtime and hippie arts & crafts are good indicators that we need to schedule a few days off from work. That's not happening anytime soon for me, so I was thrilled to get an email from a fellow Junior Leaguer that she was organizing an event at Paint 'n Pour in Redondo Beach. At this art instruction studio/ wine bar, you can sip chardonnay while you replicate a "Painting of the Month" - in our case, one of the Manhattan Beach Pier. No artistic ability? No problem - a friendly instructor will guide you through it step-by-step. 

Here's what our paintings were supposed to look like.

Here's how my little disaster looked half-way through the class.

Uh oh.

And here's how it turned out.

The Merry Husband has suggested that we give it a place of honor where no one will ever see it in the master bathroom. It's that good.