This weekend we had a couples painting date night. I love creative crafty things, and having hubby tag along was an amazing bonus. Prepared Jackie, I went into the instructor’s home with a photo of my inspiration. Silly Jackie, I fully believed that I could replicate it…. (For about the first five minutes!) I walked out of that instructor’s home with only the similarity between my inspiration photo and my painting being the color. Gulp!

For our painting project, we had very large canvas that required the assistance of my husband, the instructor, and myself to physically move and manipulate. We started with the bottom half of the canvas. What I learned early on with acrylic paints is they do what they want. This type of paint moves in mass like lava.  If you move the canvas to try and cover one area, the entire paint blob moves with it. Even with this added blob complication, my bottom half looked looked absolutely stunning. I have never seen a more perfect ocean. It was very linear, orderly, and sequenced. 

Now we had the top half, the sky. Unfortunately I could not do the same technique for the sky because physically moving the canvas would make the perfect bottom paint blob move too! For the top portion of the painting, we were forced to pivot and take a different technique (or two or three or four). We ended up using double the paint, which was not intentional! We tried coerce our lava blob with heat from a blow dryer, and even a straw, all to make my sky as perfect as my ocean. But the sky was stubborn and just would not cooperate. The end result was a linear perfect bottom with a stormy haphazard top. My top and bottom were not in harmony.

As I make peace with the end result of my painting, I am surprised by how this process mirrors my own life. My favorite part of the painting is the perfect bottom, the perfect lines, the perfect ocean. I would not change a thing! That feels like the foundation of my life; my husband, my faith, my family, my friends, everything in my life orchestrated to by a perfect God. 

The top portion of our painted masterpiece is heavy, stormy and chaotic. I look at it and I want to love it as much as the bottom. But I just can’t. It’s just too messy! It doesn’t fit. The top portion, just like life, threw me a giant curve ball.

With my hubby, in this painting activity, and in life, we made a masterpiece that does not resemble our original plan. I never dreamed I would be childless and have to wait for heaven to see my babies!! But much like my own personal life, I have to make peace with my painting. I need to train my eye to accept the imperfections because they visually display the pivot points of my life. I want to see that chaotic top represents my unanswered prayers, my tears, my wishes, and my hurts. I want to see those things, and love these things because that season of life made me who I am today. I hope the longer I stare at it, the closer I will become to fully embracing my masterpiece.  The same way I had to accept God’s no to having our babies here on earth. 

What about you mamas? Is there something tangible in your home that can elicit these same ponderings? Just remember how we view life’s messy moments can greatly impact how we survive them.