The Palette Junket

I started calling this palette a junket in my head on Monday night, and realized when I sat down to write this post that I wasn't even sure if I properly recalled what junket meant, so I looked it up. Here's what Dictionary.com has to say about the word 'junket'.

jun-ket

1. a sweet, custardlike food of flavored milk curdled with rennet.
2. a pleasure excursion, as a picnic or outing.
3. a trip, as by an official or legislative committee, paid out of public funds and ostensibly to obtain information.

As it turns out, it fits nicely -- two of the three definitions sort of generally mean what I think of when I go on these little colour trips and make me feel nice about having used the word.  And, somehow, all of the trashy historical novels I've read over the last 20 years have come in handy AGAIN.

Anyway.

Holly and I made the "mistake" of going to Pier 1 last Friday as a way of taking a break from the mountain of stuff that needed to be unpacked and put away. All we went in there for was a hook-thingy to hang keys on, and this is what we left with:

• Eight place settings of new dishes
• A pair of red scissors with a ridiculous woodpecker head on the handle
• A cheerful orange dish scrubber with a perfectly useless flower on the back of it
• Three tea towels
• No hook-thingy -- we ended up buying that at Canadian Tire

I've been feeling a bit guilty over the expenditure in a way I never seem to when I spend money on glass. Perhaps I've even been feeling a little like I cheated on glass by spending my money on other things. Who knows how my head works. Bear with me, I swear this is going somewhere.

So I was kind've regretting buying the dishes, even though I really love them, because I feel certain that they are going to start chipping any second and I'm scared I'll drop them and they might get scratched in the dishwasher or the dog might.... you get the idea.

But then, something cool happened. Monday night, I was laboriously rewriting and tweaking the same stupid list I've been making over and over again that traces out where I thought I was going colour-wise with the palette I started back in March. All of a sudden, I realized that I was pretty sick of it. And it's about time, too, since it's been almost four months. I pulled out a new piece of paper and started writing down the names of colours that I have real curiosity about, enthusiasm for and really want to be using instead. I'm actually excited to make beads this weekend, for the first time in a month or so, and it feels great.

Now that I've made you read all of this, I might as well tell you what colours got me so excited:

• CiM Lipstick
• REI Mystic Coral
• LAU Olive
• CiM Mojito
• CiM Ming (this was supposed to be LAU Steel Blue, but I no longer seem to own any of that)
• REI Ocean
• KUG B181 (aka Silver Brown, Silver Cinnamon)
• CiM Maple
• REI Porcelain
• CiM Charcoal

Plus the usual suspects -- some silver glass and my staple colours (Ivory, Dark Ivory, Black, White, Clear, Opal Yellow, Copper Green, Adamantium). It will be interesting to see what they do, and if they'll be as nice together as I'm hoping.  Fun!

How is this related to my trip to Pier 1 last Friday, the spendy, fear-inspiring dishes or anything else for that matter?

Well, here's a picture of the terrifying earthenware. The best part of this is that I had no idea those plates were inspiring me until the day after I made the palette when I retroactively realized why these particular colours were on my mind. I now regret nothing!