Our family attends a lot of community events. I love to take the kids out on a Saturday morning to whatever festival or celebration is taking place in beautiful Spokane. If you attend enough of these events, you won’t be surprised to encounter some of the given attractions such as kettle corn, prize spinners, photo booths, and chalk art.

Uh oh, I missed one. Actually, no, I didn’t, I just wanted to save it for last for dramatic effect. After all, it is what this blog post is about.

I am talking about face painting!

A photo of Sloan after she got her face painted at the Spokane County Interstate Fair in 2021.

My kids are crazy about face painting. They will apply the full court press on me to get their faces painted and if it is free, I will usually relent. But daddy, why would you put up any hesitation at all? Well, let me give you a couple reasons…

– The wait can be brutal. A long line plus the love/care that a lot of these artists put forth while doing their craft can be a big time suck.

– It is hard enough for me to keep my hands at my side, let alone my children. They are always touching their faces and if they have face paint applied it seems like the tendency to touch their cheeks increases tenfold. Not a big fan of smeared face paint and stained fingers.

– It is Murphy’s Law at its finest. If Beau doesn’t get his face painted, he most definitely won’t fall asleep in the car on the ride home. IF he does get his face painted, he will fall asleep the second we pull into the driveway. When the latter occurs it creates a dilemma of whether we place him in his bed peacefully so the paint will rub off on his pillow OR attempt to wipe it off while he is sleeping and risk waking him up (which always happens).

– Speaking of wiping off face paint art, sometimes it can be really hard, even if my kid isn’t sleeping while I try to do it.

I mentioned that Sloan and Beau got their faces painted the past two weekends. On Aug. 17, we attended the Unity in the Community event at Riverfront Park. There was a booth sponsored by the Filipino American Northwest Association and they had a professional face painter who was painting the faces of kids for no charge.

Beau getting his face painted at the Unity in the Community event.

Then this past Saturday we encountered another free face painting booth. We attended Millwood Daze and found ourselves at the West Valley High School Senior All-Nighter table. Although the artists weren’t professionals (they were just high school seniors trying to score some donations), they did a wonderful job.

After getting his face painted the prior weekend, he once again got his face painted this past Saturday at the Millwood Daze event.

Although letting my children get their faces painted isn’t my favorite thing in the world, I do appreciate the joy it brings them and the attention they receive from the artists. Now if only Beau wouldn’t fall asleep with a fully painted face. Don’t Blink.