Power Puff Girls

My checklist for our Super Bowl party:

• Steaming slow cookers of chili
  
• Baked potatoes
  
• Cheese and sour cream
  
• Chips and salsa
  
• Veggies and dip
• Giant cookies
  
• Puff-painted “I Heart Peyton” t-shirt
  

That’s right. Puff paint. Peyton. It was a fabulous combination.

Let me explain that I don’t know that much about professional football. I like watching college football, but to me, the professional version seems to have a lot of bells and whistles, plus a generous smattering of illegal and distasteful shenanigans going on, like with the Minnesota Vikings, for example. It’s safe to say that I can’t match the teams to their states with the exception of maybe three lucky teams. (I mean, which Carolina gets to claim the Panthers? It’s like saying something is from Dakota.) When Super Bowl comes around every year, it’s more an excuse to get together with friends than a serious sporting event for me. And I do enjoy a good commercial.

I really enjoy a commercial with Peyton Manning, especially the one when he puts accountants on his fantasy team. Ha. I like that he hasn’t been arrested. I enjoyed his tango in an 8th grade musical. I saw an endearing interview with his mom before the Colts-Giants game and she was so cute! And there we have my main reasons for liking Peyton even though I have no clue about the rest of the Colts. There was no better way to express this affection than with a puff-painted t-shirt.

Fortunately, I had an accomplice in this operation in a friend who was coming for our Super Bowl party. She loves Peyton with fervor approximating my own and also enjoys a good puff-painting session. Last Friday, during a game of Monopoly, I said jokingly, “I thought about doing this to surprise you, but would it have been scary or pathetic if I puff-painted Peyton t-shirts for us?”

She whipped her head around. “No! Let’s do it tomorrow!”

“Yes!”

And so we did. Hunched over my kitchen table, we dressed up plain black t-shirts with sparkly puff paint in lopsided letters, footballs, horseshoes, tufts of grass, and lucky #18. JG noticed a strange lack of conversation between the two of us and remarked, “This is serious business, huh? No small talk, even. Wow.”

That’s right. The shirts were amazing. One of the other girls at our party took one look at the two of us and simply said, “Oh. My.” How about that for admiration?

Now that I’m no longer nine years old, jittery from soda at a slumber party, or lacking fine motor skills, I’m actually kind of good at puff-painting. If this skill were even slightly profitable I might try doing it more often. And look – the Colts won! That is what puff paint can do.