Cats & Wet Paint .... Grumble!

How to turn Agitation into Innovation. 

Where was that "For Dummies" book on Saturday??!?

I decided to paint a fun CanadianRAISED"EXPRESSIONS" shirt for a friends birthday this past weekend. All was going well, or so I thought.

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I had penciled on my Braille Dots, all was aligned and centered. So then I clipped my shirt to my favorite painting table in prep for Painting.

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I then Painted the Braille on.

 
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Looks good Right? That is what I thought too. So I set the Wet Paint shirt aside (and within view) to dry. This drying process normally takes no more than an hour in front of a fan, allowing me to flip the shirt to work on the other side of the garment.

The shirt had been laying flat to dry for no more than 25 minutes, when my youngest son (6) whom was riding his bike out back, came into the yard to talk.
Assuming (this is typically where things go wrong) that the Cats had paid no attention to the garment while I was sitting in the room, would manage to stay away and off of it while I was outside. 

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Not 10 minutes later, this is what I came in to...

 Not quite how it looked 10 minutes before hand :(

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So even though I knew that finding the "culprit" wasn't going to fix the shirt, I decided to chase down all 3 cats and flip them to find out which one was guilty.  I did find the Paint-on-Paw evidence needed to bring this kitty in front of the Courts .... but really, what would that accomplish? They would get off on their cute looks anyhow. :)

So as stated, I knew this Adventure of chasing would not result in a neatly completed shirt on it's own. (Although in the end it was beneficial.) Read on .....

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Aside from the exercise that I accomplished chasing up and down stairs, I was able to brainstorm a way to not have the shirt be destined for the Garbage pail.

Step #1: Fix Braille
I had to go over the Braille I had originally started which in turn made the Dots so much larger than I would normally have. (Very hesitant)

They don't look like I would like them to, but this is part of "problem solving". Right?
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Step#2: Cover Paint trail/splotches

So the Cats wanted to paint on the shirt ... and conveniently my friend does like cats.
This is where the "Innovation" part comes in...

That's right! Cover the splotches with Tactile Cat Paws :)

It did take a lot of Fan-dangling but the Shirt was then finally complete. What should have taken 3 hours to complete, turned into 5 hours (incl. Cat chasing activity).

1.5 hours in I was so worried that it was not as nice of a gift as I had initially intended it to be, but by hour 4 I began to believe in myself and the integrity of the gift again :)

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Here is the finished product. 

              TWITCH





                
                  


                HELLO 
           MY NAME IS
               TWITCH

When the gift was given to my friend, her reaction made me (almost) totally forget about the effort that went into the creating. She was so happy, Loved the cat paws, and posted pics of her wearing the Shirt on Facebook by that evening :)

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We all need to overcome "hurdles" in life. These obstacles, whether expected or not, give us Goals to overcome. When the "hurdle" is leapt over (even if you grazed your tush on the wood), it gives such a satisfied sense of Achievement and Accomplishment!

Fool me Once ..... shame on you,
Fool me Twice ..... shame on me :(
Step #3: Build a Work Space away from Cats! .... With a closing door!  :)

Cheers, and Thanks for Reading ♥
- L