Years ago I framed my own pictures. Of course I was just out of college and making little at my job so I used posters I found on family travels and had them put on foam core and glass cut, and used uniframes. These are plastic clips that tie the glass to the picture on foam core.
After years, the edges start to separate. My husband cut his hand one the other day.
I like to get art framed and enjoy making framing decisions with experts. What I’ve learned in terms of home safety is not to leave sharp glass in any entryway or hallway. I can save some of my Italian madonnas and saints for a far office wall.
If someone is going to brush by raw glass, that’s a negative. Frame it or put it elsewhere. So, I’ve re-done our entry completely. It’s not perfect but it’s a start.
If you look to the right of the front door eyes are on a Tuscan lake, something like the lake we look at every day. Then there’s a painting of an Aboriginal design, very colorful. Both were done by my father, who took up painting at age 80.
Then there’s a crayon picture sent to me by my dear Aunt this year, that I did at age five of Dorothy (little me), the scarecrow, the cowardly lion and the tin man. It’s my husband’s favorite so I framed and hung it but it doesn’t belong there, he wants it in his office.
Is it safe to say I don’t uniframe anymore? I’m concerned in passageways of guests getting hurt by glass. Yes, I usually double-mat and pick a suitable wood or metal frame for anything for keeping for life, plus do a conservation glass that filters out 98% of sunlight.
We also have two lovely family quilts on the walls so I take down the blinds every morning so that they are safe from sunlight as well. Lest you think we’re on a large country estate, we are in a 1,200 sf city apartment with two bedrooms and baths.
For students and newlyweds there are plastic frames with cardboard backing that will work for now. Also glass frames that don’t need matting. I have my best photo in a simple frame with no matting. It is important to me because his mother gave me that frame the day we met. Yes, we met all the parents, then eloped and called them.
M now has a pear tree and a red oak and crape myrtle for Mothers’ Day and needs to know that the five days of interrogation before I married her eldest son were summed up in one poignant moment: she already knew we’d have memories to celebrate so she gave me a picture frame the moment we arrived from the airport. J gave me two dozen roses upon arrival. I think they thought their son was serious about this girl he brought to dinner half a country away.
Of course we had separate rooms. Others had to sleep in the den or on the sofa. M gave me a 100 year-old quilt from her greats and we pieced together one of hers from the ’70’s. In closing I will tell you that I engineered much of this entry way with Dad’s paintings and colors to bring one into the living room with M’s highly colored quilt that we designed to have all the seasons. It is a joy to me and my husband and will always be with us. Memories? Let me know. Dee
Cooking with Dee 