4th of July and art repairs

I've never known what to do with the 4th of July, it wasn't a day we celebrated in Canada, on the reservation, or on Molokai. Oahu has a bigger military population, and people generally like beer, bbq & beach holidays, so the neighborhood clears out. I decided to make an apple pie, and if the oven is on I might as well make bread. I decided on Kings Hawaiian Rolls, because they are expensive - so why not make my own? 

The recipe calls for pineapple juice. I had a container of fresh pineapple in the fridge. Some part of my brain dinged up a warning - didn't I read something about the enzymes in fresh pineapple killing the gluten or yeast or something? Shouldn't I go get a can of pineapple that's been pasteurized? Shut up, brain, fresh is best, the stores are going to be packed with people getting beer and meat, and I'm not going out in that mess. 

Well, I killed my bread, and made an enormous bowl of gluey slime. I was not prepared to add another 8 cups of flour to a single batch to try to force it together into a ball, so I let it rise, mucked it all into pans, and made very strange biscuit-bread (pineapple enzymes kill the gluten, turns out). Now I have something to prove, and can't stop until I make perfect Kings Hawaiian Rolls. Even though buying a package of them would be much cheaper at this point.

My mother came over, made guesses about what 2 loaves of pineapple biscuit could be turned into (bread pudding? French toast?) and we sat outside chatting until dinner. We watched the chickens dig around for fallen lychees, and Plucky hopped up onto our laps so we could peel off the layer of dirt that had adhered to the sticky juice on her face and dried into a face mask. She's gorgeous now.

My mom took Zenny home with her for a sleepover, and I spent the evening moving a big concrete head around my studio, trying to find the right spot for my next painting. 

I bought the concrete head knowing it would arrive broken. All the reviews said so. But I had an idea for a painting using my new neighborhood florist, who specializes in locally-farmed flowers. Flowers around here are big and heavy, more tree than flower, so I needed a big heavy planter to hold them up. If it arrived broken, I figured I could just glue it back together, and the cracks would add visual interest. Well, it came in 3 pieces, but her face was thankfully intact, so I put it back together with industrial epoxy.

I can bullshit some symbolism about the cracks if anyone asks about it. 

While I was in mending mode, I took custody of two of my mother's paintings. I've been trying to encourage her to paint again, after she showed interest, but she's waffling. I think she's afraid she won't be any good at it after all this time. When I went to college, she took a painting class at the university and really enjoyed it, but they didn't teach varnishing or framing, so her unfinished paintings have been hanging on nails in the bathroom collecting dust and gecko poop since 1998. She needed to be reminded how much she enjoyed painting, and shown that her work is valued.

So I kidnapped the paintings, cleaned them, re-stretched one of them because termites had eaten the wood support, varnished, and ordered good frames. First one:

Such a difference! I didn't take a "before" shot, so imagine it dull and streaked with dirt, with raw unfinished edges. I'm still working on the other one, which was near a window and had more damage.

She took it home, happy, and then pulled out her paints, and set up an easel with a little canvas in her living room. She hasn't started putting paint to canvas yet, but it's promising.

At work, my co-worker has returned, and I lost the nice office and processing work. I'm back at the front desk, pointing to the toilets all day. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted.