Little’s birthday has come at a perfect time to align with another Tryazon party. This year, she decided to have a paint party so I applied to host the Tryazon Plaid Learn to Paint party. I was super excited when we were one of the 100 hosts selected. Of course, if you know Little, you know cats are her thing. So to celebrate the birthday girl we chose to do a mother daughter paint party. Guests could choose which design to paint or paint together! It worked out fabulously.
This month’s Let’s Paint Live video by Plaid was “Under the Sea.” A fun sea star design that uses float medium to keep the paint wet while you work. I didn’t realize that Plaid has a library of videos on their Facebook page to teach you how to paint! I also didn’t realize that my favorite paints were all Plaid paints; Folk Art, Delta, and Apple Barrel. Plaid has a ton of online painting resources; check it out!
The Tryazon Plaid Learn to Paint Party pack came with all the paints needed, a set of brushes for each person, and 12×12″ wooden panel to paint on. While reading through my host guide I came across a short line, “… remove the protective seal from the paint bottles, remove the adhesive label from each wood canvas, and take the brushes out of the package.” I had been so focused on the paint I hadn’t even thought about the wood panels. I got to work that night removing all the packaging from the materials.
Then I tried to peel a sticker off of one of the wooden panels. Now, those of you who know me know that I peel off all the stickers. But it’s not usually off of unfinished wooden surfaces. I was stumped. After shredding a sticker and pulling up wood particles, I called Plaid customer support. I had a pile of these to tackle and didn’t have time to waste trying to experiment. The first representative I spoke with said to use a blow dryer or iron them off with foil over the sticker. Since I don’t own a blow dryer I chose the iron route. True to the representative’s word the stickers came right up after ironing them. However they left a huge swath of adhesive residue. I called again and was forwarded to a voice mail box. I left a couple messages with Tim. I was also sending FB messages to Plaid Crafts and I got another name and number from the Plaid Crafts Facebook team. I finally connected with Darlane at Plaid. She suggested using alcohol and a plastic scrubbie to get the adhesive off. I didn’t have much luck with that. My husband broke out the acetone. That finally cut through the sticky, but it still took a lot of elbow grease to get my pile of adhesive up from the board.
I was at the end of my patience. If I had purchased these for my own personal use I would have returned the product or even thrown it in the garbage. I was sick of all the fussing. In desperation to be a good Tryazon host I put a thin coat of white Apple Barrel paint over the adhesive and waited anxiously for it to dry. It worked! I was so relieved. The adhesive rectangle could still be seen, but it was no longer tacky.
My daughter had a whole plan written up for her birthday celebration. Along with calling for invitations, streamers, paint, brushes, canvases, aprons, food, pink lemon aid, and a number 8 candle, it included the design for the sweets. We had a great time making pretzel stick paint brushes to go with our M&M paints on the paint palette cupcakes.
She said we also needed a cat painting. Cats are her favorite thing. I searched the web for a cat painting tutorial and was delighted to run across Tracie Kiernan’s Step by Step painting of How to Paint a Cat and Moon. She has a great video posted that walks you through all the steps needed to create a super cute painting of a cat in a tree in front of a moon. My daughter loved it!
To help my guests get started, I drew the dividing grid on the wooden panels for them. Watching the live stream of the Under the Sea paint party on Thursday before our event helped me realize that I would also need a lot of paper towels for my guests to use. After previewing the videos I thought it would be nice for guests to have a painting steps at a glance. I created handouts for guests to help them see what was coming next. It also helped them choose which painting they would like to create at the party; sea star or cat.
My husband stepped up in the tech support department. I told him my ideas about having tablets out for guests to watch while painting or using laptops so we could hook up speakers or guests could use their phones and work at their own pace. While I was out hunting down a number 8 candle he really pulled out all the stops. We were painting outside and he informed me that non of our techie screens would show up well in the bright daylight. He moved our TV out under the patio and set it up for the guests to watch the Plaid Let’s Paint Live video! Wow. It was perfect! Everyone could really see and hear the video. Of course that left me talking the other half of the guests through the Cat painting; but it worked well.
Most of the moms and girls painted their own. Some painted the same design and some different. It was great to see all these mothers and daughters getting crafty together. I was amazed at the attention and detail the girls were putting into their paintings. This was one party that seemed like it was over too quickly. We were having a great time.
#LetsPaint
#PlaidCrafts
#tryazon
So much fun! Now we get to decide where to hang the paintings.
Great ideas and products (other than the boards…)