My apologies to the author of If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.
If you give a kid an African Violet, she's going to need to repot it.
So you buy a cheap clay flowerpot and tell her she can paint it. You get out the acrylic paints and brushes and she paints the flowerpot. The flowerpot is left to dry and the paints don't get put away.
That night you stay up too late and since your son is gone visiting Grandma this week, you sleep til noon the next day.
When you get up you find that the kid has emptied eighteen tubes of acrylic paint onto a serving platter since her pallet wasn't big enough for all of them.
She has painted a wedding gift for her aunt on which she used exactly four of the eighteen colors.
She has also painted a picture on 20# bond printer paper that she wants to enter in the fair. It's a good picture but she can't enter it because it isn't on a canvas. It's on printer paper. You try to remember where you put the canvases you bought last summer for the fair but realize you have to buy more paint now and groan because those little tubes of acrylics are so expensive. So are the canvases but you bought a dozen of them last year expecting lots of do-overs and she only ended up using two of them.
She has ruined a total of four kitchen towels and her clothes. If there is anything that takes acrylic paint out of cloth you don't know what it is.
But you don't complain about any of it. You don't want to squelch her creativity. And anyway, it's your fault for sleeping late when you should have been supervising.
So, if you give a kid an African Violet, you're going to need new paint, new towels, and new clothes. And you're going to realize that it is time to start stressing about fair entries for this year.
And the violet still hasn't been repotted.
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More by Andrea "slackermom" R. |
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Comments: 25
I'm not he-ing at you... Really.
At least she entertained herself though while you sleeping. My 11 year old stepdaughter and 41 year old husband can't seem to figure out that concept.
Two: Can plants make noise?
Nope -- that's why I don't have 'em. Silent things are ignored and end up dead.
Three: The codicil to Two solves some problems. But, again, I'm not the yardstick my which to judge Humanity...
I collect blue and white stuff. I'm sure it has another name but I'm not thinking of it.
The other day at Lowe's they had little African violets for sale in the cutest little blue and white watering pot you ever saw. I had to have the little blue and white watering pot. My daughter adopted the poor unwanted violet.
My daughter's 13 years old. I can't tell you how many times I've played through something similar. The good news is that it reflects well on your daughter. Smart, creative children seem to do stuff like this more often and at least you get a product.
The bad news is that they seem to do stuff like this more often.
I say all that when my son, who has yet to produce a product, is the most destructive force known to mankind. I'm trying to look at the bright side, though, at his assured success in life if he takes up demolition.
You've never met Eric Kagen Larson. You'd change your mind quickly about that.
Lexie=DRAMA QUEEN!
But I love em' both!
And at least you know what your plant is.
I must be getting old, I can't remember our kids in their "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" phase. Our grandkids will probably do their share of destructive behaviour... let's hope they do them at their own homes.
I painted a copy of the photo of the kitten on a cat book and entered it into the sixth grade art show.
It was disqualified as a paint-by-number (it wasn't). I was so ticked...
now if gather would only get a arts/crafts sponsor, more moms could be helping their kids when they bring home flowers.
Start em now, start them often.