Practice Makes Perfect
Plus my 3 Favourite Big Batch Cocktail for Spring
I treated myself to a 36-pack of Faber-Castell pencil crayons recently. Not the super-premium Albrecht Dürer product line, which are bum-clenchingly expensive, but the next highest, the Goldfaber line, which are pricey enough at $64 for 36.
These German-made artistic instruments are the Ferrari of pencil crayons – or, being German, should I say Porsche? My niece introduced me to them a few Christmases ago when she generously bought me a pack of 12 Albrecht Dürer’s (a $40 investment!!) They really are good, though. But of course they are. Germans made them, after all. My forefathers do not except mediocrity.
I’ve been working on my art for the last few years. (My gawd. What an utterly insufferable sentence.) Not for any real purpose, just s's and g's, as people of my vintage have been known to say.
When I started drawing with a certain amount of dedication, I realized it might be a passing fancy, so I limited my supplies to Crayola knock off’s from the Dollarama. But as the years turned, and I kept at it, taking an art class here, working my way through an exercise book there, I have started to see some satisfying improvements, and with that I now feel the limitations to sub-par tools. I suppose one could argue that a true artist can make anything work, but as I’ve already stated, I don’t consider myself a “true artist” and I need to lean on good equipment to make up for my lack.
Sometimes – well, a lot of the time, actually – I’ll try a little sketch that’s a bit beyond my scope of… let’s just call it talent. It’s happened so frequently I now just assume the first draft will be the warm up: figuring out how to blend the colours, learning about the lines, discovering the technique. The first picture comes out somewhere between God awful and not terrible, and the second attempt usually comes out somewhere between not embarrassing and OK.
Don’t get me wrong: there are (many) times when my ego leads me down the road of frustration and despair when the page looks no where close to the image in my mind (see above, right), but, c’est la vie. I remind myself it’s the journey and not the destination… no matter what my temper-tantrum suggests. There’s more paper and a lot more pencil. We can begin again.
(Also, those paintings are watercolour not pencil crayon, but you take my point, I hope.)
And so it goes for hosting. I know a few people who falsely believe they can’t pull off a get-together with grace, and a couple who then don’t even try, preferring the safety of the image of not caring, rather than risk looking like they attempted but failed.
And that’s very sad for me. I mean, I love my friends regardless, and if I’m visiting, then I’m there to see them. I don’t care if we’re munching directly from the chip bag and drinking from the can – as long as the bathroom is clean.
You don’t need me to tell you that a tub of store bought dip, a few veggies, a wedge of good cheese, some olives, and a nice baguette is more than enough to entertain the troops with laissez-faire whimsy. Add in a carefully created cocktail (this does not mean fussy) and you’ve got yourself a fantastic cocktail hour.
These are my drinks of spring. All recipes make 8 drinks, about 4oz each.
The time draws near, my friends (I’ve been listening to The Hound of the Baskervilles on audio book, can you tell?)
I hope you’ve enjoyed thus far, but now we go behind the velvet curtain.
If you would like to upgrade, it’s as little as $6 Cdn per month. But if not, I understand completely, and will see you on Friday for the Weekender, which is free for everyone. I am grateful for your support, no matter how you subscribe.