arts extravaganza

A few years ago, I bought a bunch of enameling supplies at a tag sale. Enamel is powdered glass, so it can be used on glass beads. I love the look of this, so I jumped on it when I saw the listing for the tag sale. Scott has used a little bit here and there, but we still have lots of supplies, so I've gotten some books from the library in an attempt to learn how to do enameling, with no success. As a matter of fact, Jesse and I kind of melted some things we didn't mean to melt the last time we tried. ;-)

All enameling classes I've seen are 8-10 weekly classes 1-2 hrs away from us and I haven't been enthusiastic enough to make that kind of commitment, so the stuff has been stashed, just waiting. Finally, I saw a listing for a 1-day enameling demonstration by Lilyan Bachrach at Worcester Craft Center . Perfect! I figured that's a low budget, low commitment way for me to get an idea of how it's done, so I'd know whether I wanted to pursue it further, on my own or with one of those longer class offerings. What I didn't realize is that Lilyan is an absolutely delightful 91-year-old enamelist who is very respected in the field and has written an excellent reference book on the art of enameling. If you read her bio (linked to her name above), you'll get an idea of the irreverent style and entertaining anecdotes that made time fly for the 3-1/2 hour demo.

I only have the most rudimentary understanding of how enameling works, but I think that's enough to get me started. We'll have to pull out the tag sale stash and give it a try one of these days. Still, even if I never touch the enamels again in my life, I am happy to have had the opportunity to spend an afternoon with Lilyan.

The enameling workshop was actually on the tail end of a big weekend of events for us all. We volunteered with the Hartford Symphony Orchestra on Saturday and then enjoyed their live performance of the music of the Wizard of Oz, shown on the big screen at the Bushnell Theater. We were aiming for a performance of dances from around the world after that, but the time and price were incorrectly listed on the info I had, so that didn't work out.

While I was at the enameling workshop on Sunday, Scott, Jesse, and Leah were back at the Bushnell for The Lord of the Dance performance, our birthday gift to Leah, who has wanted to see one of these shows f-o-r-e-v-e-r and could barely contain her excitement. They had excellent seats for the show and thoroughly enjoyed the intermission conversation with folks around them.

By the time we all met back up on Sunday evening, we had so much to talk about! We caught up over dinner and spent the rest of the evening relaxing at one of our favorite places, the perfect place to wind down after such an exciting weekend.