I have wanted to go to Paris, I think as soon as I knew about it. but my love of this romantic city has grown to almost an obsession. I have a little of Paris everywhere around my house, even on my phone case. I took French in high school, and even though the words haven't remained as well as I had hoped, the admiration for what seems a magical place has stuck with me.
When Martin and I got married, we always said we would go to Paris for our tenth Anniversary. Well, guess what is right around the corner? We will celebrate ten years in June! However, going to Paris was pretty unlikely/ We were unable to put away money like we had hoped, and the trip seemed unpractical and impossible... until...
My mom sent me a link to a contest to win a trip to Paris!
Now, I'm not saying we won or anything, I'm just really really really hoping we will.
The contest is through Michael's. To enter you must create a piece of art, any kind you want, with the theme "Springtime in Paris." You take a picture or video and send it in. It is judged on theme (40%) Originality (30%) Execution on skill (20%) and Inspired (10%).
The following are pictures of me creating my piece. I decided to make a mosaic garden table using ceramic plates, and tiles to make a spring like scene in front of the "Eiffel Tower."
First, I painted my table surface a lovely aqua. Then I used tile nippers to cut the shapes for the Eiffel Tower, and layed them out in the shape I liked.
Lots, of cutting and sorting colors went into this project. These blue pieces are for the sky.
I found these plates at the thrift store (on half off everything day)- awesome!
You can sort of see my set up all over the table, plastic bins for sorting colors, newspaper to protect the table a bit, and yes, I even wore safety goggles!
I layed everything out before gluing it down to the table with a tile glue similar to caulk.
Once I added the yellow flowers, I really felt it was brightening up!
Next I began working on the sky. This was time consuming to fit the pieces just where they should go.
I added green at the bottom to make it look like a nice springtime hill! This is what it looked like with everything glued down... but it's not done yet!
Now for the messy... grouting!
I took my time getting the grout into every little crack.
The next step was using a damp sponge to remove excess grout.
This is what it looked like after I removed the extra grout, but before I scrubbed it clean. The grout leaves a gritty film that you can see over the tiles. To get it clean, you take a stiff plastic bristled brush and scrub, followed by a cheesecloth or soft wash cloth to shine.
Here it is all spic and span on my front porch!
Doesn't it look so happy there?
Some close ups of the detail. I love the "flowers" that I made out of the flower patterned china!
The tile that I used to make the Eiffel Towers was really beautiful. I almost felt bad breaking it up. If you look closely you can see some of the design on the pieces.
Even if we don't win a trip to Paris, I have this lovely little table to remind me of many things. I love mosaics because they create such a parallel to life, here we are broken or misshapen, and it takes a creator to really make us into something beautiful and put us exactly where we need to be. We can't see the big picture most of the time. We might not even know that we are a flower, because we can't stop thinking that we are just a broken plate!
Win or lose, it was a wonderfully challenging project that I will cherish forever.
Thanks, mom for thinking I could do it!
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