Polish Paper Cuts

What a wonderful workshop! I was suppose to be going on this art adventure with Angie who used to be an art teacher, but she ended up leaving town for the weekend to visit her son. Because of this I took my friend from school Abby with me to the workshop. I had no idea what to expect… All I knew was that we would be learning Polish paper cutting at Cartwright Hall in Lister Park and that was it.
It ended up being a lot of fun. When we got there we were a bit early so we had a look at the exhibition that was there on Polish Paper Cuts. That was intimidating, but exciting to see what we were going to try to do.

I most start by saying, our Instructor was legit. She was a Polish women, dressed in a traditional Polish dress, speaking Polish and no English. Lucky for us, she had a translator to help us. Apolonia was her name and she was amazing. Everything that she did she made it look easy as pie and she did it with shears! We were required to cut with tiny scissors that the kids at school use which made it more challenging, but I think we still accomplished a lot considering.
We started out by making a circular pattern that is very similar to the snowflakes we make around Christmas time, but more intricate and with better designs. My favorite translated quote of the day was, "If you have psychological problems this truly calms you down." That made me chuckle.
After that technique she showed us how to do another symmetrical cut. Of course she did hers in 5 minutes and it was perfect. Ours took much longer, and we not perfect, but she was actually very impressed. She kept saying that our class was the best class that she had had there at the museum- well, she said it in Polish… I did a lot of smiling that day because I had no idea what she was saying! ahah! She did come over at one point and ask if I was an artist. Unfortunately, I was discovered. I felt like Monica in the T.V. show friends when she goes to a cooking class even though she was a professional chef. She finally gets outed and then it is less impressive.
She had asked me what I was doing here, and after explaining through interpreter that I was here volunteering in school but used to be a florist, she was excited to show me how to make the crepe paper flowers, and I was really excited to learn how to make them. I have a list of materials that I know how to make flowers out of and I was excited to add crepe paper to that list.
She was only going to teach us a few, but we were such a good class, as the interpreter explain that she taught us 7 or so different flowers. She kept going because she didn't want to stop until we were there 30 minutes past our time. I didn't mind though! It was really funny our interpreter just kept saying, "she wants to show you another one…" and "ok, she is going to show you one that her mother used to do, but I have not even seen." I felt honored that she continued for so long and I am excited to make all of the different kinds!
Overall, I am so glad that I went and I loved the company from Abby! Afterwards she even introduced me to a Cornish Pasty and a weird cookie called a....dunno. I'm sure she will enlighten me soon! Hopefully I can go to other events like that in the future! Angie missed out, but next time I expect you to join! :)