If You Stay Ready…
The busy-ness of the Holiday Season is upon us!
During the holiday season, there are usually more gigs being offered than you could ever take! It’s exciting, maddening, and fun. But it’s also a time when the heightened activity can stretch your creative muscles more than they have been all year.
It’s probably obvious that I love holiday events…It may be because my first experience with them last year left me with nothing but positive vibes.
It also doesn’t hurt that they are much more low maintenance than lesson planning. 😏
But the best thing about them may be because they cause me to get in more practice time. As the saying goes:
”If you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready.”
~Lots of people
There’s much truth to that.
When you get a lead to perform at a live event, if you’re ready, you can accept the job with no problem. But, in order to stay ready, you still have to keep making yourself ready.
I love time to practice…maybe even more than the events.
For me, practice time feels like a form of therapy. I don’t have to be so judgy about the work I do and I’m free to take more risks and learn from them before I play on someone else’s items.
Case in point, this cluster of florals around one of my first engravings were a little experiment that I played with recently.
Yes, I have combined bottle painting and engraving before. But, I had never tried to make the two forms of customization play off each other so deliberately compositionally. So far, that has only happened in practice. ☝🏾
I think they’re pretty cute! And it’s good to know that I can make something that looks credible if I need to.
The lovely Annabella wine bottle with the roses and gold flourishes was a risk…and a great reminder of why we engrave first and paint last. 🤦🏾♀️
Instead of following best practices (😬), I painted it first and decided to engrave it later.
I wrapped up the entire bottom with some practice calligraphy paper, carefully secured it with washi tape, frustratedly unwrapped it, made a mental note of where the center of the bottle was, and re-wrapped it all over again. Then, I drafted and engraved the top portion of the bottle finishing it off with Rub ‘n Buff.
Needless to say, I was relieved the paper I used and the wrapping and unwrapping didn’t scratch any of the paint off since I also hadn’t used a sealant (it’s just practice, okay?). If I ever get in a bind where a client wants me to add engraving to a painted bottle after the fact, I have a game plan…more or less. 👍🏾
I rotate and practice each type of customization I offer throughout the year because…well, it’s fun! Also, I’m convinced it will pay off later down the road.
Last week, I tried engraving a new-to-me ‘Y’ and played with my flourishing a little…
I still make time to practice straightforward calligraphy on paper too. The muscle memory helps for ornaments on slippery surfaces like the ones below.
These were the few photos I got to take from an event for Balsam Hill at a private party at Nordstrom a little bit ago. It was the kind of event where I didn’t have time to second-guess myself and needed to get it right the first time. In those cases, there’s no drafting or anything. Your hand just needs to know what to do. That’s possible with some prep.
I did ornaments similarly last year with white markers, so it wasn’t entirely unfamiliar territory.
But, I wouldn’t dare have tried it again based on the success of last year.
Have I gotten better with practice over the past year? I think so. Difficult to tell since, I still practice the same style for the most part. But, even if my calligraphy has only changed by a smidge from then to now, building up the discipline to practice is what matters most.
Operating at your personal best at the busiest time of year certainly requires it. 😌
I write this with the understanding that my issues are first world issues. Unfortunately, in another part of the world, there are oppressed people currently fighting for the right to live and to be free. Their children are suffering. Their homeland is further demolished day by day. As a mother, a wife and a teacher, my heart goes out to these people and their families. Please take a moment to pray for them and then act. Contact your representatives in government to put an end to the bombing in Gaza. No child should live in that kind of trauma.
