And we paint....again

We're addicted.  Can't deny it, can't hide it, and we might need a 12-step program.

One of the wine and painting companies in Portland is called Wine and Canvas.  They schedule paining classes at different restaurants and you can sip on the beverage of your choice, eat some dinner, and paint a masterpiece.

After our first paining expedition, we decided to do it again.  This time, we went to the Old Spaghetti Factory to paint something called The Bench.  Julie and I met our good friends Summer and Daphne there, and were excited to slap some paint on a canvas!

We started the evening with some food and Carnival Martinis.  If you don't know what those are, I suggest you try one.  Like the headpiece of a Vegas showgirl, two large martini glasses filled with plumes of bright pink cotton candy and cherries were delivered to our table with smaller glasses of martini mix, which we were then instructed to pour over the top of the cotton candy.  It melted into the sweetest martini ever invented.

Then it was time to paint.  The teacher and assistant were fun enough people, and the painting actually

looked like it might be more simple than the one we did before, and we were right.....until the bench.

I'm not sure if it was the martini, slight delirium, or us just not understanding the words coming out of our instructor's mouth, but bench has become a curse word between the four of us who were there that night.  Even the zombies showed up to oogle at our terrible benches.  Songs were made up about them, we grumbled at them, and no matter what we did, none of us were happy with our benches.

Then it came time for the trees.  We all love trees, and it alleviated some of the pressure we felt about making our benches look like benches.  Grumbling turned back into laughter, whining subsided, and jokes about dancing trees took over the dialogue.

Something about painting a tree just seems to make everyone happy and inspired.

Enter the flowers.  How much fun do you think it was to cover our paintings with flowers?  So much fun.  So much that I got so carried away that my painting was almost nothing but a gigantic pile of flowers.  I did think about burring the bench in them, not gonna lie.  There was no shortage of whiny benches jokes.

When all was said and done, I was happy with the entire experience.  Good drinks, good friends, a hilarious group of people, and another masterpiece to hang somewhere in my house.  Even if I do hate the bench, I will always remember that evening every time I look at that cray bench.

All in all, it was a really fun night, and I can't wait to do it again.  Wine and Canvas staff are very professional yet very laid back and realistic at the same time.  They were happy to give help suggestions as well as praised our paintings even if they looked like a third grader painted them.


For more information about Wine and Canvas, you can find them on the web at wineandcanvas.com

Trust me, you're gonna love it.