3 shades of gray...

(Three different paint colors and two coats each!)

It was an all day deal on Sunday! After weeks of delay, the tech week and opening of "Tarzan", and back to a normal work schedule we FINALLY go to paint the Bathroom!

Bright and early friend Cindy came to help us do the first coats on the ceiling and upper walls. Soon friend Jordan arrived to help us paint the upper and lower parts of the wainscot.

One aggravating set back I found about the "bead board" on the walls and ceiling is, that even a thick roller couldn't get into the grooves. Eventually we just gave up and hand brushed all of it. Our little painting party took an hour break to let the paint dry and then we were at it again!

Around 3:00pm friend Margaret arrived just in time to help with the second coat of paint and the touch ups. By 4:30 the final coats were just starting to dry and I was putting the light fixtures back up.

This picture is a little dark, but I really like how the paint colors and wainscot turned out. The ceiling is white, the top of the walls are "Comet Dust" (light gray), and the bottom wainscot is "Notre Dame" (dark gray). The ceiling will be getting a 1/4" round trim (painted dark green) and there will be a 1" runner on the top of the wainscot (that will be a maroon color.)

We finished a hard days work with washing out paint brushes and digging into a "Blue Velvet" cake!

Onward progress before the big Dance!

-Mick-

Watching Paint Dry...

One never really realizes how far gone things are, until one goes to fix them... PAINT. Everything needs paint! As I have mentioned before this is a job long over due, but WOW MICK, I really can't believe I let the lawn chairs get this bad!

The chair on the left is in its current seven years of summer sun faded state. The table and chair on the right have just been repainted. I love how a fresh coat of paint looks! With any luck I will get the other chair and matching bench sanded and painted before the week is over. I am terribly glad to see we have some warmer weather on the way, that will help speed this process along.


Only 31 more pieces to go! BLEH!

-Mick-

Cindy's Show Stopping Birthday Surprise!

Our wonderful friend (and Casablanca Council Member) Cindy just recently turned 23! Cindy is one of our very close friends in the theatre and we love her dearly. So for the celebration of her 23rd birthday no "regular gift" would do... It started as a "Joke" I just started naming off every Broadway show I could think of and adding or changing a word to "Cindy"- Cindy Side Story, The Pajama Cindy, A Cindy Line, How to succeed in Cindy without really trying, Fiddler on the Cindy...

So I narrowed down the "shows" to the final eight choices all favorites of Cindy's and found the show posters for each.
~top left to right~ Evita ("Cindy") , A Chorus Line, ("A Cindy Line"), West Side Story ("Cindy Side Story"), How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying ("How to succeed in Cindy without really trying")
~Bottom~ Sweet Charity ("Sweet Cindy"), Fiddler on the Roof ("Fiddler on the Cindy"), Thoroughly Modern Millie ("Thoroughly Modern Cindy"), and CATS ("Cindys").

It took about an hour and a half to freehand draw each poster, each measuring 3"x4"it actually took longer to color each of the drawings than it did to draw them! I was rather proud with the way it turned out, Google some of the posters if you like they are pretty close.

Finally I fixed the finished drawing on a matte and framed it before wrapping it up for the birthday girl!

All in all it took about three hours to get the finished product, and Cindy loved it!  I have to say the hardest poster to draw was "A Chorus Line",(all 19 of the tiny characters drawn in a line.) I hate the show 'A Chorus Line' in general so it was a labor of love!

Now I just hope that ALL of our friends don't want one, haha!

-Mick-

Say A Little Prayer!

For all of us working in the flower industry... today is our "Big Day"!

I hope all you wonderful Readers have Valentines!

-Mick-

Fan Mail. A Most Interesting R.SV.P.

Oh Readers, I LOVE our friends and members of the Casablanca! Being theatre people, we tend to really go "all out" for things!

As you know, our upcoming spring break formal dance is themed "Beyond the Sea" and for the Casablanca members who aren't on Facebook, we send out formal invitations. Friend Evelyn has  jumped right in with her gracious R.S.V.P.

(She writes...)

"My dear & blessed friends of the S.S. Casablanca:

I am honored for the invitation aboard your lovely vessel,an am 

planning to be there and singing "I'm Sorry" by Brenda Lee ( a distant cousin)

Ask and you shall receive what-

ever you need for the eats/drinks.

I was thinking taquitos, totilla rolls; maybe some bottled water, diet sodas, 

ice - whatever!!!
Will the cruise ship swimming pool be open? Ha Ha

Love you all-

Evy"

I cannot begin to tell you how happy her R.S.V.P. made me, I simply adore it when friends go along with my crazy plans and dreams. All Evelyn had to do was say "yes", but now I will be keeping it and putting it in the "hat box" of pictures and memories we keep at the Casablanca so we can always look back and read it!

A truly enchanting little note!

-Mick-

Bowie Flea- Episode 2

(The very place for Mermaids!)

Another wonderful trip to the Bowie flea with Patricia and friend Jennifer this past weekend dear Readers! Although it was cold, Saturday was the first "warm" day we've had in a few weeks (a staggering 54 degrees!) They're weren't many vendors out, but as always there was treasure to be found.  The cast iron mermaids on anchors in the picture above (there are eight of them) will soon be center pieces for the tables at our upcoming spring dance.

(Mermaid on a star fish)

I purchased this 9th mermaid for the "captains table" (buffet) of the dance!  The decorations are going to be GREAT!

(The "ships" treasure!)

Haha can you tell I have Spring Break on my mind?! I bought the two planters to hold silverware and napkins on the buffet table we'll be using lots of blues and greens. The large blue pearlescent planter was $2.00 and the green shell planter was $1.50.

(Hors d'oeuvre tray.)

This silver tray was a steal for $1.00 and I will keep it at the Casablanca after the party.

The tiers of the tray fold so that the whole thing stores easier, pretty neat I thought! 

(One of my FAVORITE finds this weekend!)

I stumbled over this beautiful turquoise and gold ash tray at one of the antique stores in Bowie. "The Red Barn II", I just love the gold and turquoise and I already have a spot for it on the coffee table in the living room. 

ALSO found at "The Red Barn II" two little Miller Studio chalkware mermaids for $2.00! (It was the weekend for Mermaids!) They need a little TLC to be pristine again, but that's a chore I will gladly take on. I cant believe my luck finding Miller Studio fish one month and then mermaids in a different booth the next!

Patricia found this big pink print table cloth for $3.00, she always hunts them out then talks herself out of buying them by saying "But, I don't have a table to put them on" which is her secret way of telling me she wants me to buy it.  So now she has a new pink cloth to put on our table just in time for Valentines!

 (Vintage snuff glasses)

Lastly we stopped at the Bowie church thrift shop, we call them "the church basement ladies" and we LOVE the CBL's! If you recall back in December I found a vintage toothbrush holder at the flea market, and later found the matching glass at a thrift store. I have always wanted a "reeded" rinse glass for the bathroom and I found the one above for $0.25! The "honeycomb" patterned glass on the right is actually an old container for snuff, but I liked the idea of having it for a rinse glass too, and for $0.10 how could I say no?! Especially when those snuff glasses tend to start at around $6.00 a piece!

I was quite thrilled when Patricia showed me the little Franciscan Sugar bowl (it's missing its lid) it was marked $4.00 but the sweet little church basement ladies let me have it for $1.00. The little green planter will find some job holding something in the kitchen. I love the green leafy pattern on it, its so tiny and small, but it will find a home.

You may have noticed the title of this post is "Bowie Flea- Episode 2" that is because dear Readers, we are going to try and complete the "flea market challenge" of going to Bowie every month for a year! We already have visits one and two down, now we just have 10 more months to go!

I bet we can do it!

-Mick-

Just A Little Dream!

(Kind of like a theatre set!)

Hopefully in the not so distant future of later this year.  Here's what I've always pictured in my mind, the way I know it will someday be! Here's a concept sketch of both "sides" of the bathroom.

(The south wall, the thing in the far right corner is the bathtub again.)

The dark thing with a fan on top is my metal linen closet that I hauled back from Kansas and a hamper beside it. Hopefully after Valentines day we will get the bathroom ceiling and walls painted in their entirety. I have all the pieces! Now I just have to wait patiently to put them all together.

-Mick-

The Cupid Shuffle!

"We've got a brand new dance..."

Well, "New" to the Casablanca! The song "The Cupid Shuffle" came out back in 2007 and was a hit at dances back in high school. I had totally forgotten about it until hearing at a friends party last Saturday.  I had just been talking about line dances from the 1960's like The Madison, and Locomotion and Wishing there were some more "current songs" we could play at our up coming dance without smashing the "time barrier". We found a happy compromise by finding this 2007 on an LP record!


Like blogger buddy Jim (I can say) "I actually remember hearing this song for the first time" at my Senior Prom in 2008. Even though it in no way sounds like a 1960's song, it is a lot of fun and easy to dance too! Maybe if we all learn how to Madison we can Cupid shuffle too!

Dance on!

-Mick-

36 Pieces of Lawn Furniture Was a GREAT IDEA...

NO I haven't gone out and picked up 36 MORE pieces, but back when I was collecting them one by one dear Readers It was a good idea. That venture began nearly nine years ago and while I had fun finding different types, styles, and fixing up each new piece, the time has come to start repainting them all!

(The very first glider bench I dragged home!)

All the way from Kansas! I love the basket weave pattern and I painted it turquoise years ago. The summer sun had finally chipped the paint away and now it was necessary to give it a few new coats.

I buzzed of the chippy paint using a grinder with a wire brush attachment. Then used a spray can of X-O rust spray paint (for metal) to primer the bare patches on the metal. I then used a pad of fine steel wool to smooth out all the bumps and make ready for the first coat of paint.

I used three cans of turquoise X-O Rust spray paint to give three good coats front and back. X-O rust is almost as good as auto body paint, and is reasonably priced. I'm hoping the color lasts as long as it did the first time I painted the chairs. My only worry is that the last time I used turquoise, I had it special mixed and then I used a spray gun to apply it to the chairs. I think this color is slightly lighter than my special mixed color and it might fade faster. When the above picture was taken the paint was just starting to dry, so there is the possibility it will be darker in the end. I had enough paint to thoroughly coat the bench and do two lawn chairs before I ran out of paint, which was provably for the best as over night...

(We got four inches of snow!)

So only 33 more piece to go! Haha I complain but everything will look sharp again with a fresh coat of paint, and the back yard and its contents are long overdue for some TLC! With a little elbow grease (and maybe some rain) the fleet of lawn chairs and rain will look like this again.

(Circa spring 2010)

Here's to bright colors and happy times at the Casablanca!

-Mick-