Child's play

Last weekend Robert and I went to visit Nicholas and Delia and their family of rescue-critters, to talk about how to decorate the hall for Yule Ball.

This is set at a historic venue in Cambridge for early December.

I'd had a vague notion that we could make paper mache, but having not done any since kindergarten, if then, I was low on ideas in this area.

Fortunately, Robert is an old theatre hand.

So we started w/ reviewing the bestiaries and books we had of splendid creatures, and made a short list of candidates for table decorations.

Then we broke out the newspaper and cardboard, and the flour and water, and started slathering.

Nick and Delia are those useful types of people who don't throw anything away.

So we kept saying 'Do you perhaps have X?' and they'd say, 'why yes, I was supposed to get rid of it, but it's still in the shed...'

Out came scissors, masking tape, buckets and basins, cardboard, staplers, and plastic bottles to use as moulds.

So it transpired in this type of questioning that they did, in fact, even have chicken wire, the holy grail of large scale paper mache work, in the shed. Acres of it, in fact.

Also splendid firm plastic-coated wire, also originally for fencing.

Q:'Why didn't you mention you had chicken wire before??'
A:'You didn't ask for it before!'

Armed with this finest of armature foundation materials, the creatures promptly got far more interesting and ambitious. :-)

So between us we managed a series of table decor items, that at the end of the day still needed painting, but were well on their way to being very cool.

In the process we got to know the house rules: don't leave the lounge door open because the jack russell will snaffle the cat's food; don't love up one dog without offering equal time to the other; don't leave the gate open in case one or the other make a break for it; don't leave any drinks on the floor unless you're ready to share.

They have a very loveable family of critters, frankly, so it was no hardship - just a change from a low-maintenance cat to a constant-watchfulness canine setting.

I'm keen to see the finished works, and hope to visit again before Yule.