It's a red letter day! I finally completed the mosaic commissioned for a friends 60th birthday. I say 'I' and but actually that should read 'we'! It has been a hands on, all family affair across the generations! My mum kindly took us on a family break to Centre Parcs at Easter at the start of the assignment and spent a reluctant few evenings covering broken tiles with sticky back silver foil. I don't think she quite got it really. It's hard to see purpose in holding a piece of broken tile and spending a laborious 5 minutes drawing round it, cutting out the template and then sticking it on random piece of tile. She did well really. (At 76 she must also have been the only granny to score a strike on the first go when bowling! ) When all's said and done it was commendable that she survived a week with me, hubby and two teenage girls.
I'm finally happy to be emailing her the photo of the finished product. Admittedly it has been a challenging journey. My youngest daughter ended up sacrificing all her 'gold' covered pieces of tile, created in anticipation of her own masterpice mosaic. (Sorry Ella, I promise to replace them one day!) Her generous contribution helped speed up the process. When we finally had enough pieces to lay jigsaw like across the design, we then needed to lift, stick and grout every single carefully positioned piece. If you have ever been involved with kitchen/bathroom tiling you will know that this challenges the toughest of finger tips. The carefully positioned broken tiles ripped our fingers to shreds!
It's at tmes like this I am thrilled to be married to a 'completer finsher'. Hubby added the final touches of carefully prepared varnished wood as a frame around the sides and screwed in the necessary hanging wire.
This weekend we will be presenting the completed mosaic to our friend. Somehow I don't think he'll be aware of the blood sweat and tears that have gone into finishing this piece. but hey, he's deserving of every drop of blood!
