Goodbye to the Harlequin Table

I am sad today. I took a table that I painted a few years ago to the ReStore and donated it. This is a small thing, and something I do often, but today it made me cry. More than once.

I am surprised by the depth of this reaction. It's a side table I spent $9.99 on at a thrift store about 3 years ago. I did spend a ton of time working on it. I perfected a whole new technique involving layers of chalk paint glazes. And it is a vintage Henrendon (High end furniture) piece, most likely from the late 60's or early 70's. But that's not it. I have donated a ton of really high end stuff that didn't sell and things I have painted before with nary a second glance, let alone soul tears. 

And yet, this one stung, all the way to the core of me.

As I let my thoughts swirl, I heard things like: 

"But this one told me what it wanted to be." 

"I prayed about whether it was a good buy and felt strongly I should get it. 

So why didn't it sell? Why didn't it ever find a home?" 

"I am so tried of getting all excited about things that never pan out. 3 years, 4 shows 

and no one wanted it when I worked so hard and did such excellent work."

I walked over to the dishes and opened the dishwasher to make one last attempt before the weekend to finish washing what was on the counter (something I have been attempting since Wednesday). It was empty, except for the water bottles that my daughter despises filling and putting in the sink. I pulled one out, to see if they were clean or dirty and realized she had put away and entire dishwasher full of dirty dishes. I crumpled to the floor and started weeping, certain that this was so not about the dishes.

I prayed that I would be able to keep doing this mom thing, and that I would understand why God seemed to find my aspirations to succeed at something more meaningful to be unnecessary right now. I reminded Him how I had to quit running barn sales because I never made enough money to justify the enormous effort it took to conjure them into existence. I reminded Him that me doing barn sales and art was His idea, not mine. And I sat there, pleading for understanding and love.

Just then my dog, Harper, climbed up on me and feverishly started licking my tears off my cheeks.

If you have never experienced this before, it is very wet, kind of gross, insanely distracting, and incredibly funny. Needless to say, my pity party was disrupted. Now, don't think I wasn't still bawling, oh no. I was just bawling and praying and laughing and trying not to dump my dog off my lap and trying to decided if I loved or hated being licked. It was a slurpy, drippy tangle of emotions. 

Harper plopped right on my lap and kept trying to lick me while also turning around to find a comfortable place to sit or stand. And I felt this enormous wave of love from her. This sweet dog knew I was sad and was showering me with all the gifts she had to give. Her little licks, her attention, and her warm little body. So of course I started crying even harder as I saw her for the angel in my life that she is. Which made the dog lick more and me laugh more.

In the meantime, my taquitos were done. I put her on the floor and walked across the kitchen to take them out of the oven. Taquitos are a food of my soul. Straight dopamine there. I put them on top of the oven to cool and turned around to feel God say, "The barn sale was never about money for you. That was never the point. You have other things to do than paint furniture and that's what you'd still be doing if the money had followed." 

Of course.

And then my mind was filled with the image of a woman finding my table at the ReStore and it being just the shape or size or color or price she had been hoping for. I could feel her delight and relief at discovering "just the right thing." And I understood that it was about me developing my skills and then sharing my blessings with others. That my barn sale years had been about becoming more more, not making more. And even I can't deny that I succeeded there. I am so much more than I was.

I tell you this story for many reasons. 

First, it's what's happening today. 

Second, it will not be the last time God and I have this conversation. We have had it many times in the years since I quit doing shows and every time, I gain a little more faith in myself and a little more trust in where He may be taking my life. 

Third, never underestimate how much you are loved. God sent me this little dog two years ago and she has blessed me in ways I could never have imagined. Allow yourself to embrace these types of experiences for the gifts from the universe that they are. Feel the love they are bringing you. It is OK to feel loved. We are all worth all the love the Universe or God could every shower down upon us.

Fourth, it is OK to not get the answer you want. Today, God did not tell me that I will be a huge success in the blogging world. He did not tell me that my paintings and collages will sell as fast as I can make them, if and when I get to that part of my life. He simply had a little dog love on me and told me that my enormous efforts were not wasted. Then He showed me how I was doing good things for the world and my future. He gave me what I needed to get up and write today. It may not be enough tomorrow. But it is exactly right for today. 

Before you get upset that He didn't tell you what you wanted to hear, think only about what you need today. I bet He will give you what you needed to stand up again and keep walking, at least today. And if you need more tomorrow, He will give you what you need for that day. Accept that what you need is enough. That you are already enough to make up the difference and keep moving forward. And try to see the angels hiding in little dogs, or fist fulls of dandelions from small children, or a timely phone call. 

So today I will be a little sad. But that's OK, because tomorrow I will look at my emptier garage and see space to work on my barn doors. I will think about someone reading this post and it being just the right thing to keep them going through a tough spot. If that's you, know I send my love, my deepest sympathy and a full understanding of your frustration. 

That said, you'll have to find your own little doggie angel. Harper stays with me.

Talk to you soon,

CM Shaw

PS: Upon closer inspection, I realized that the dishes were clean after all and I was spared digging through all the drawers and cabinets to find the "dirty" ones to rewash them. Whew.

What Happened to Me...

So I'm sure you guys noticed that my last post was July 11...and that it is now Sept 17. I know when a blogger I read regularly just stops writing for a while, I am always curious what happened in their life. My answer to that question is simply "a whole lotta normal things."

1. I started painting Emerson's room. 

It looked like this before:

Then it looked like this:

Today it looks like this:

Notice the nicely made bed. We only spent the whole summer trying to make that a habit. Obviously it was very effective. On a brighter note, she can now clean her own room because we took so much stuff out of it. And this is a wonderful thing.

I didn't ever post about it because it's not finished yet. There are bags and boxes of things to be sorted, re-homed, or donated. And butterflies to be repaired and placed. And art to hang. But since you were wondering, this is where we are right now. I promise to I'll give you beauty shots when I have them.

2. After I finished painting Emerson's room, but before I finished putting it back together, I started painting Sarah's room.

This is before:

This is today:

Lovely, isn't it? That step stool with the drapes on it has been there for 6 weeks. She has started putting her alarm clock on it. I know. It's just that something more exciting came along about the second day I started painting Sarah's room.

3. We got a dog. Meet Harper the Minion.

This is a great thing. A fun thing. Something we had prayed for over the course of more than a year. And she is wonderful. But the timing was horrible. And you can't leave her unsupervised. So imagine me trying to paint with my kids coming in every 5 seconds asking me if someone else can be in charge of the dog and can they go to the neighbor's house and what is there to eat and can you take us to the mall? Yeah. That pretty much destroyed any kind of efficiency or continuity. Somehow, I eventually finished the painting. But stopped there, even though all of us, including DK, were home for the better part of the month of August.

4. I had to leave for Girl's Camp. I had volunteered to be a "Mom" at our church's week long camp for girls 12-18. So I cleaned my rollers, packed my duffel bag and drove to West Virginia for a week of fun, frivolity, and tubing down the Potomac.

The coming of Girl's Camp was not a surprise to me. The fact that I still hadn't finished either girl's room yet was. And it wasn't a good surprise. I knew in the pit of my stomach, that it would be months before I got the rest done. Sadly, I was right.

5. At that point, I pretty much gave up on finishing or blogging until school started. There just wasn't time somehow. And then school started, and there still wasn't time. 

Until today.

Today I started cleaning out the basement.

My office area got a substantial reduction in kid's stuff. 

You couldn't see the floor here earlier.

The rest of the room is pretty much in the "During" phase. Just like the kid's rooms. But I have been reading a bunch of posts lately about people's projects in the middle, so I'll add my "Keeping it real" photos to the pile.

Here is what the rest of the basement looks like today. Keep in mind I have already donated a carload to a local thrift shop:

While going through all this stuff, a wonderful thing happened. I got the idea to move the jungle gym outside and to replace it with a vintage table for the kids to do crafts and art on. They are currently using my dining room table, which means we never use it for meals because it takes so long to clean up all the glitter and bits of colored paper and who knows what else is stacked on top of it.

This is the table I"m thinking of:

If you are in the DC Metro area and looking at Craigslist today for a table and chairs...hands off! This one's mine...I hope.

Here it is with the leaf in:

So wish me luck that DK approves and I have time to get it before someone else does.

I have also miraculously started a few projects here and there in the last week.

This one is top secret. Can you guess where I'm going with it? I bet you can't. 

Let's just say it might represent a whole new direction for me as an artist. Very exciting!

Here's another little sneak peek:

I had a few minutes to work on the French Dresser the other day.

And here's one last project that's been burning a whole in my pocket:

They are solid wood salt and pepper mills that my dad sent me. Perhaps I'll do a tutorial on how to freehand a chevron design on a round surface. There's a trick to it. See the dots?

Anyway, it's all normal stuff, but that's pretty much what happened.

How was your summer? Is school life treating you better?

In any case, I'll talk to you soon,

CM Shaw

PS: This post was the merging of two great ideas from two other great people. Showing what I have been working on, even though it's not done was DK's suggestion when I started whining about not being able to blog one day. The basement "during" ideas was the suggestion from my sweet friend and defacto therapist, Barbaralee. Thanks for the help, guys!!!! It's so nice to be unstuck.