May 18 2009
She's the crafty one, not me
Having fond memories of my mom teaching me to watercolor, as a new parent I looked forward to doing arts and crafts with my children. I envisioned hours spent quietly drawing, or wearing artist's smocks and painting at easels. I even created a crafts drawer in my dining room hutch, filled with coloring books, crayons, stickers, and markers. Then Nathan ruined my mommy art fantasy. To him, crafts are like chores, best to be avoided or done half-heartedly. He has as much patience coloring as he does making his bed.
Paul's had a much better time getting Nathan to do crafts. They've made elaborate homemade Valentine's Day cards for me and Nathan's teachers. Granted, he's starved for male attention and would do just about anything for his dad, including using glitter paint and gluing lace on to paper hearts.
Lucie's the family artist. Being a self-starter, she gets paper and crayons out on her own and raids the hutch drawer, making sure to restock her backpack with stickers and markers. I try to encourage her as much as possible, keeping the diaper bag filled with crayons and paper, so we can doodle together at all the meetings I drag her to.
Even so, my heart's not into doing crafts. Maybe it's my failed attempts with Nathan. More likely it's because I'm still burnt out from my four years of art school -- back in the '80s. There's a reason I'm a writer and not a graphic designer -- doing art is just not my thing any more, no matter how much I wish it were.
However, I'm not worried about Lucie suffering from crafts deprivation. My friend Julie puts together a craft project for the kids at our mom's club monthly meeting. She's the one who forces me to sit down with Lucie and patiently do art projects with her. Today, we created a flower out of a Popsicle stick, markers, glue, and foam cutouts. Then we stuck it in a plastic cup filled with dirt and flower seeds.
The dirt's been shaken and stirred so often, that I'll be shocked if the snapdragons bloom. Although I happily put in my monthly craft duty, I'm looking forward to when preschool begins and I can turn over the craft duties to Lucie's teachers. Boy, if my art teachers could see me now.
