22/10/2024
Love this! Borrowed from another busy face painter…
⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️
Think what I do looks like easy money?
A tongue-in-cheek moan from a busy face painter…
“It’s just face-painting, I mean how hard can it be?” said one mum to her friend yesterday, who were commenting on how busy we were (and guesstimating how much money we were earning).
We hear these kind of snarky comments a lot in our profession, people think it’s down to the magic paints we use, or the special brush that makes it so easy … actually no, it’s us - its our flair, skill and expertise, it’s all the hours and hours of practice we’ve put in to our artistry that makes it look effortless and able to knock out a fairly decent unicorn in 3 minutes flat.
But painting aside, because that’s the easy bit… could you really do what I do?
Yesterday we drove just over an hour to our favourite magical pumpkin patch, where we unloaded our tables, chairs, paintboxes, litres of water, bags of sponges, coats, wellies, buckets and banners across a stony field and into a barn. In the rain. We then set up our stand with our freshly cleaned kit all ready and I actually managed to get to nip to the portaloo before we started …. By the time I got back we already had a queue and so there we stood for the next seven hours straight, literally painting non-stop. No p*e breaks - no lunch breaks - just solidly painting, powered only by one coffee and a small KitKat, nibbled when no one was looking.
The barn is loud as well; there’s an animatronic werewolf a few feet from us which howls intermittently, as well as other noisy characters sited around. There’s a fun house which plays the same music over and over on a loop, and there’s a coffee bar on the other side of the with a generator going constantly. Now add the hubbub of 6000+ guests daily plus lots of yappy dogs, and you’ll get an idea of the noise level. Now add some fire pits for toasting marshmallows which are just outside, and the smoke billows through the doors when the winds in the right direction giving you one heck of a sore throat after a few hours. For a neurodivergent like me, this is complete sensory overload!
But here come your customers, so you must at all times remain fun and friendly, patient, polite, understanding and professional, always maintaining the same level of artistry and good hygienic practices throughout … and whatever you do, do not let that smile slip at any point! Even when you have kids cough or sneeze right in your face, or parents argue with you that it’s fine to break your insurance policy and paint their 2 year old anyway. When someone steals your entire pack of wet wipes so now you have none to offer, but the kids faces are lagged in mud and sticky marshmallow.
When you hear people huffing in the queue because they’ve had to wait 15 minutes, or they are oblivious to their children literally punching your display banners but swear at you when you ask their kids to stop. When you get the umpteenth child climb onto your chair and kick you in the thigh with their very muddy wellies, or - I’m going to say it - really rude children barking their request at you, no “please” just “TIGER!” And of course there’s not going to be a ‘thank you’ either. It’s just a little thing I know, but it really starts to grate after a few hours.
And the parents … now I want to stress that the vast majority are lovely people! But then there are the helicopter parents/grandparents who have talk ‘for’ their child (even the big ones) and who feel the need to continually hold their hand or fuss with their hair, or even worse ask “does it tickle?” SERIOUSLY PLEASE STOP! It rarely tickles until you say that, promptly causing them to squirm and squish their entire faces up (and if you look very closely you may see a flicker of total exasperation on your painters face at this point) We deal with a lot of children so we are only too aware that some are shy, but honestly, they are usually much more capable than you give them credit for so stop smothering them and let them sit unaided in a chair. And also stop filming us working … most of really hate it.
Not only does it distract your child making them more likely to move suddenly (risking a paintbrush in the eye) but also it makes me really anxious and on edge, so no I probably won’t do my best work … also how would you like it if different people were continually shoving a camera in your face when you were working? That’s why we have a banner saying ‘please read’ the rules where it clearly says no filming or photography, but of course no one ever reads it…
Finally the queue dies off and we can hang out the ‘closed’ sign. Our heads are pounding, muscles aching all over but our backs … oh our backs feel like they may never really straighten properly again. We are completely physically and mentally drained, our feet feel bruised, we are covered in mud and paint, reeking of smoke from the fire pit. Absolutely priority is going to the loo before we have an accident, and we are so far past the point of hunger all we really want to do is have a hot bath and crawl into bed, but we need to pack our kits up ready to trundle back through the crowds and across the stony field … and it’s at this point someone will pop up saying ‘oh you aren’t closed are you? But can you just do one more?’ Um no, because everything is packed away … at which point the child starts crying and we get called all the nasty names under the sun (to be fair though at this point we are really beyond caring so it’s water off a ducks back).
We drive home mostly in silence as our ears are still ringing, just praying that there won’t be a holdup on the motorway because we know we don’t get to stop when we get home. Instead we’ll grab a drink and kiss our own kids good night as we unpack our soggy kits, shove our sponge bags into the washing machine for a boil and then get into the messy business of cleaning each individual pan of paint, sterilising every brush and every stencil used. Replenish what’s needed and re-order another £150 worth of products for next weekend, refill the water container and repack the rest of the kit, so we are ready to go again.
Finally we get to run through the shower and rinse the smoke from our hair. We might get to watch half an hours TV but our eyes are closed anyway so we may as well hobble off to bed - we’ve got to be up early and do it all again tomorrow…
Of course it’s not all bad - some of the children we meet are beautiful little souls who light up our day with their delight when we show them their painted faces. There are SEND children who need that extra bit of love and time, which we are so happy to give to make their day more memorable. There are children who start by saying ‘please may I have” and oh my gosh, yes you can - if you want a great paint, just be polite to the face-painter! There are parents who tip and parents who offer to go grab you a drink or something to eat, people from all walks of life who are lovely and appreciative of what you are doing. Seeing everyone having the most fabulous time and hearing squeals of laughter. Children you’ve painted before who recognise you and come rushing over for a hug or to be painted again … all of those little moments keep us going and keep reminding us why we chose this profession. And why we are so passionate about what we do.
But is it easy money? Well … I’ll let you decide 🙃
