What Exactly Do I Do For a Living?

Tonight I participated in a ladies night event here in Belle Plaine, The Autumn Gathering of the Goddesses.  It was put on by Keystone Women's Circle, a group of female businesses owners, of which I am a founding member.  We are all dedicated to doing business in a way that supports our communities, expresses our authentic gifts, and respects the planet.  We have joined together to help each other promote and grow our businesses, like a mini-Chamber of Commerce for cool chicks.

Tonight's event was a huge success, and went amazingly smooth, especially considering it's our first one of this kind.  The hardest thing for me, aside from fitting my six presentations into their 25 minute time slots, and getting each group out my front door and headed around the corner to the next location on time, was explaining to people exactly what it is that I do.  Take this past week, for example, and tell me how to describe it in a sentence...

Along with having two art students on Monday,  making programs and presenters name tags and hand-painted personalized wine glasses for every participant in tonight's event, I tricked out one pick-up in girly swirls:

I think Sherry is pretty happy with it, judging by the look on her face!

Photographed a cabinet job I did a few years back:

"McKenzie finish" is a blend of cream with ochre and umber streaks.  It is named for a certain collectors china that it coordinates with.

This end cabinet was stock, until I added the crown (salvaged from an old dresser mirror frame - dresser and mirror both long lost), and the wood appliques at the hinges.  The idea was to make it look like this kitchen was made up of custom cabinets built in around an old posh hotel ice box, instead of '80s builder oak.  As you might imagine from the acid green wall color, this client has a bold sense of personal style, which makes her great fun to work with.   The close-up below shows the black-rub over peacock blue finish. 

and did a chip-china/mixed media mosaic for the same client on a fireplace:

The client, Jodi, worked with me on this, which really contributed to the final look, and the fact that it only took four days, and not six or seven.  Most china mosaic is very sweet, but this, with all sorts of interesting bits of iron, glass and mirror, and cocoa brown grout is a little more edgy, which perfectly suits the quirky, dark romantic style of this home and it's owner.

I guess what I do for a living is help clients express their creative imaginings in whatever way best suits them.  Perhaps I'll have to change my business card to read "artistic translator". 

For tonight, I'm going to sign off of here, go put my feet up, enjoy my sparkly clean house and the contented exhaustion of having successfully pulled off tonight's event.  I'm fairly certain that after four straight hours of presenting,  I will have no voice when I awake in the morning, but hey, I don't meet with my newest client until noon, so no worry!