Time for Art, with Dogs

About two months ago, I left my home in the small town of Naco on the Mexican border. I’d lived there or in the area most of the time for 52 years, so it was more of an extraction than a simple move.

Surprising many, I left my large home on 3/4 of an acre with vistas in every direction for a city, to live in a mobile home community. A senior mobile home community.

A kind of place I swore I’d never live in, on both counts—no mobile homes, no senior communities. And yes, I’m coming to the dog part.

I remember when my parents moved into a senior community. I thought it was good for them, but my father wanted to leave. “It’s only old people here.” I feared I’d have the same reaction.

But amazingly, I like it here. A lot.

One reason I like it is I found a spot with a view.

Another reason is there are interesting people and some interesting, and occasionally very interesting, activities. Like dog painting.

I get every message that goes out to community members and look at them all. When I got the one that said “dog painting”, I knew I had to go.

I showed up about 10 minutes before the event was to start. A woman had a table set up with small containers of acrylic paints on it. There was also poster board, a package of gallon-sized Ziplocs, and jars of peanut butter.

What did dog painting even mean? Painting dogs? Were dogs going to stand there and let us paint them, cover them in non-dogly colors? Or was it painting portraits of dogs? No, neither one. The dogs were going to do the painting.

The first dog to show up was Bailey. Bailey’s human chose a few colors of paint to put on one of the pieces of poster board. She and the others were all warned not to use too many colors because the painting would turn muddy.

Then, peanut butter was plopped onto one side of a Ziploc bag and smeared around. The poster board with paint was slipped inside the prepped plastic bag and it was sealed.

Bailey’s human set the closed Ziploc on the cement patio. The idea was Bailey would lick the peanut butter which would spread the colors inside the bag around on the poster board as the dog licked up the treat.

But it turned out Bailey didn’t seem to like peanut butter very much. She basically ignored the art project.

But her human mom was prepared. She knew Bailey hadn’t had peanut butter before and wasn’t sure if the doggie would like it. Mom had a little baggie of cubed chicken with her. She sprinkled chicken pieces on top of the peanut butter, and Bailey went at it.

Soon other dogs, too, were busy with their art.

And then, voila! Finished artwork.

The artists studied their finished products.

A good time, and easy for anyone with a dog to try. Have fun!

By the way, you can enhance your dog’s piece, should dog allow that.