Who Hung Wu

A couple weeks ago I received a phone call from my sister Sarah:

"Hi, whatcha doin'"
"I'm in Utah shopping with Danielle and Avery."
"Oh, well that's sounds like fun.....so.....um..... do you know how to make a

giant golden Buddha?"

Her question gave me pause. My mind went racing to paper mache, chicken wire, balloons and spray paint.

"I think I could probably do that" I answered, but I would need time to think it through. "Let's talk about it when I get back to Washington."

When we talked again she had changed her mind about the giant Buddha.

(thank goodness, because on further contemplation a lot of doubts about my sculpting abilities had set in)

Sarah now wanted my help painting sixteen, six foot high panels, that she had made out of wood frames and heavy brown paper, so that they would look like Chinese screens.

You might be wondering what Sarah was up to.

Sarah is a party thrower extraordinaire. She throws parties that kind of blow your mind. She was throwing a murder mystery party called, "Who Hung Wu" and wanted to turn her family room into a Chinese Dining Den.

Now, painting large scenes on stuff - well,
that is something I absolutely DO know how to do!

Here are 4 of the panels as we were working on them. I painted everything that was red or yellow and she painted everything blue or black. As you can see she still had to fill in some of the black lettering.

Here are a couple of scenes featuring cranes that are drying in the hallway.

We painted until late in the evening, and I went home a tired and happy woman. What a fun way to spend a day!

Do you want to see more of the party?

So did I, and so I went back on the morning of the big day. The set up wasn't complete, but you will get the general idea.

The party included a Chinese dinner, and so Sarah's husband Mat whipped up this low table as the centerpiece of the room. Just perfect to seat 8 costumed party goers as they eat and try to guess which one of them is the murderer.

Sarah hung three Chinese lanterns over the center of the table with fishing line and thumbtacks. I love it!

She made a huge stack of pillows for the guests to sit on. Cute, don't you think. Sarah is very frugal and so she gathered up all the pillows she has around her house and just made covers for them. After the party they went back to their original look. That is brilliant in my book!

She scoured all the discount places around town and found this stuff to set the table with.

Sarah made these cute place cards for her guests, and also the menu card. Notice the item second from the bottom on the menu. Sarah has a sense of humor. I love that about her!

Here is a sample place setting for the dinner done with all of her finds. Very pretty!

Here is how she decorated her mantle. The large gold fish is the reason I got out of making a golden Buddha. She found the fish at TJMaxx. If you are like me you have to wonder why in the world anyone would ever manufacture a giant gold fish object. On purpose, I mean. You know, someone approved the production of this as an actual product. Oh, well, it made a nice swap out for Buddah and that is what is important. Right?

Sarah painted the banners to hang beside the fish. I think the one on the right says "day old chicken feet half off", and the one on the left says, "this way to the men's room", but of course I am not sure. I don't read Chinese. Then again, Sarah doesn't write Chinese so I could be right.

And here is the partially set up room with the dragon screen that we painted. As I am not the greatest photographer, I didn't get a good shot of the crane screens, but they were really pretty too, and they went on opposite ends of the room.

See what I mean about Sarah's parties?

Now you might be wondering how we got the screens to look so nicely drawn. I have a trick up my sleeve for sure. I'll reveal all in my next post.