what made you start face painting?

I wasn't sure where to post this..

But, I was curious why or how you got into face painting?

For me I was a cosmetologist for over a decade. (I also worked as a makeup artist/esthetician for several years) I quit the biz 6 years ago and never looked back due to extreme burnout. I do however miss the artistic outlet. (though not the nasty chemicals!)

Anyway a new friend of mine does face painting and got me interested recently! (I debated buying a kit and supplies for the last 6 months and finally bit the bullet and here I am! )

How about you?

I have always loved to draw and paint but didn't like the solitary aspect of it. Face painting is a very social art... just what I was missing!

um.... lack of income.

There are absolutely no jobs hiring around here. I've been a stay at home mom for 5 years and everyone looks at my resume and laughs. So, after having a clown for my daughters' birthdays, I thought, "I can do that." And so began my clowning journey. I started out with balloons since that is what my mentor clown said she needed someone for and she has handed me some of her overflow work at times. Last xmas, I felt I had a pretty good handle on the balloons part, so I got some face paints to add to my repertoire. Since then, I've been getting more calls for face painting than balloons, but I still do both along with my music/games stuff for parties.

One of my best friends growing up became a pro face painter and has now been doing it for a couple years. I saw what awesome things she could do and got interested, and she was totally helpful and supportive! Plus it's flexible, and I was out of work for several months for medical reasons so can't really handle full-time work, and am pretty much bankrupt. This is a great opportunity to work PT freelance, and really interesting and fun too! Too bad expenses have been more than income by far! Either way I've come to truly enjoy it, learning reading and doing!

I was bored..My husband was doing his balloon art and I was messing around...(I mean as a clown, his silly partner). I decided to pick up a paint brush and use my creativity and love of fantasy on faces
I love working with the skin, and was a beauty control consultant, and a wound/skin nurse..I deal with lots of messed up skin...It's nice to work with young healthy skin for a change..Plus I love children..I have 5 of my own

I did some painting back about 12-13 years ago with a youth group to raise money, but it was the horrible acrylic cheek art stuff.

In 2001, I was working with Amnesty International and decided to rent a fundraising booth at a local fair. I looked into face painting (I'm a researcher at heart - you would find me jumping into anything without researching it for a ridiculous amt of time), found Snazaroo and full faces, and haven't looked back.

I've always been artsy... I was selling arts and crafts at a local Christmas festival and since I wasn't making anything I decided to do face painting... of course my first time was with those crappy walmart paints *shudders at the memory* At the time I hadn't looked up anything on face painting... then at a festival in a nearby town I saw a little girl running around with a butterfly painted on her. Still no idea who did it, but that night I was online doing research... I got a small Snazaroo kit to use at my next festival booth, and the rest is history

I was a make-up artist - theatre, film, tv... and then we moved up north ... not a lot of film and tv, and only one theatre (which I hooked into immediately!)...

So I was looking at other things to apply my skills and my kit to. I had a couple of books I'd picked up in sales bins - for make-up reference purposes. One was "Making Faces" by Sian Ellis-Thomas and I thought, now I could do that! I had Kryolan Aquacolours in my kit so started playing around with designs and started marketing my services - lots of word-of-mouth through the theatre to start with.

I had a business plan already for my make-up business so was already marketing that aspect of my work, face painting was an add-on that, fortunately, took off REALLY well for me.

Thanks for sharing your stories.