overheard in the art studio -adopshun March 3, 2012

“the snowball fight” artstudioforchildren.com

“you can sell your baby for real you know. If you are tired or poor or lazy you can sell your baby. People sometimes don’t want babies even if they are cute. They can put a sign on their house or on their front lawn that says Babies For Sale and then those peoples  who can’t have them can  drive right by and buy them. For real. Right, Nancy?”

5 year old artist addressing the class

 

So many hot topics that arise in the studio. Some faves include-

Can a man marry a man?

Can a woman marry a woman?

If a man marries a man how do they make babies?

How are babies made?

They are made when a dad kisses a mom for a very long time. Like the longest kiss there ever was, like a kiss that goes on for days and days. And nights too

My friend kisses everyone he knows on the lips and doesn’t make babies. My mom says lip kissing is for family only. What do you think, Nancy? Do you kiss people who aren’t family on the lips?

You live with your sisters right?

Why are you not married?

My dad and mom don’t live together because he always left his dirty underwear on the floor

When I was in my mom’s belly I could see out of her belly button, so I have been to Disney

Nancy, my friend says you live upstairs is that true? Right upstairs?

They  chatter because their hands are busy and their minds are quiet. Whenever anyone says they want to have a tough discussion with their child I always say do something with them  side by side  (skiing and chairlift riding, hiking, art, fixing the lawnmower, fishing etc) because this is when we all feel it is easiest to talk.

Talking is maybe too easy for me but this week I found it hard to answer these and other compelling questions. Click here to find out why

 

the museum of weird gifts February 13, 2012

Did you ever notice that often when an adult gives you a gift that they often  say “it is nothing” or  “it is just a little something”. They diminish its value at the onset.

But when a child gives you a gift – and mainly it is  something they have made-they give it wholeheartedly and with such pride that the way it is given is really better than the gift.

As I am still celebrating my birthday month, lovely things are still trickling in.

My  artists give me hysterical gifts-I have been given a shoelace, a tiara, a spider in a tupperware container, packs of stickers,  hockey cards,  a bubblemaker, origami things that twirl if you drop them from the sky, silly putty (used), bubblegum (thankfully not)  a pair of ballet slippers, and a bag of half eaten movie popcorn. I call this collection the “museum of weird gifts”. The artists insist I keep them on display.

Ocassionally I feel like asking them “how old do you think I am?”. But I don’t because the real  answer will scare them as it does me. I prefer to keep it this way- the way they see me-well under 10.

Last week I got a gift from a  most excited little friend. She fished it out from the depths of her very busy and overstuffed grade 1 knapsack. She could hardly contain her excitement.

“Oh Nancy, you are going to love my present” she whispers breathlessly.

She handed me a ziplock sandwhich bag.In it was a tube of half empty glitter glue. Something no girl should be without.

and a decorated matchbox and inside a hand made fairy for good luck

and some shells collected on a vacation in Cayman

and strangely $1.13 in cold cash

and a  pipecleaner ring with a heart (my very favourite item)

a tatoo (her favourite item)

The museum of weird (cherished) gifts is growing.

if homemade = love then prepared feels like cheating, right? This divorced girl wants to talk about every woman’s biggest secret -CHEATING.Click here for my cheating revealed

It is such a miracle February 8, 2012

 

Sometimes in the art room, the kids are so delighted with the magic that can happen. I love this moment.

4 year old last week screams looking at her art work-

” It is such a miracle”

then, feeling a need to explain this to her classmates, turns to them and says

“that is a fancy word for GREAT”

 

I feel the love with these little people- they seem to have it in their back pockets all the time. How can we copy them and live this way? I have a note on my mirror that reminds me to be like them – click here for what it says

 

 

 

better off September 2, 2011

New friend comes over to pick up some books and mentions with a little gulp, that she is newly separated.

“I am so sorry” I say. “I had no idea”

It is 5 years for me in a matter of days so I figure everyone knows- besides I write about it- but just in case, I declare ” You know, I am divorced.”

You all know how I have come to love that moment. It is like I am the ambassador  to the UN. The UN – marrieds, that is.

She is clearly shocked.

Why shocked, I always wonder. Does our happiness, peace,  and stability look more married than single?

I tell her- it is okay , we are good and life is wonderful and that it had to be and we are all better off this way.

I turn around and my children are there.

How can they tiptoe at times like faeries and stomp like elephants at others?

I don’t  hide anything from them but I do try to be sensitive to their version of life.

When new friend left I said to them- “Was that okay that I said that?”

‘Yes’ they both said smiling. ‘Because it is the truth.’

She dropped in unexpectedly the next day too and asked me a question that left me speechless. Click here for that rare moment

PLU (people like us) July 11, 2011

“We have fancy windows now. They open.” 10 year old son announces.

Friends in a house as old as mine whose original windows, now replaced with new ones,were mainly painted shut except for one important one that could open but needed to be held open with a hockey stick for otherwise it would slam down with the force of a guillotine.

“A little behind on dinner, are we?” Man asks gently as he arrives home to find  smouldering pot of dinner  cooling  in snowbank  burnt to a  crisp.

Fire alarm goes off. Hungry kid runs downstairs screaming “Dinner is ready!”

Little girl turns to grannie and says” How old are you?” Grannie says she is so old she does not remember. Little girl says- “if you have forgotten just look in the back of your panties. Mine say five to six”

 

Why is harmless flirting potentially playing with fire? Click here for new post on this

drama queens September 27, 2010

Something about girls from the start-we just love drama. It is not enough to say you are tired -“you are exhausted” dying even , your foot is not sore “it may be broken”, it is not a small cramp -you are doubled over in pain. We are not just a little hungry “we are starving to death”. We don’t think we might like something, we  actually need it, crave it like oxygen.

We never just like something. We are mad about it, crazy in love with it. The knapsack is sooo heavy, the sky is fantastically blue, American History class was so fantastic, gym class was impossible, the party was the best ever, the new top is so magic, the meal transforms you, the day was perfect.

We don’t walk, we leap

We aren’t just looking forward to something, we anticipate it with every bone in our body

Clothing is not just for staying warm or decent-it is an expression of who we are and the part we are playing

I live in a dramatic house. It is a pink house- all girls- all drama, all the time, bulging at the seams. It is like we are all trying out for the biggest part in the play and each day must be our best most dramatic performance.

It is so good to be alive and be a girl.

a new entry called “piss me off ” can be considered by the click of this.

Just posted-what is behind a name? Check it out by clicking here

I know the “c” word, mommy November 20, 2009

My entire extended family was around the dining room table at the cottage, after one of those perfect days where everyone got along and no one ended up at Emerg. The  laughing, singing and eating were dramatically interrupted when my then 8 year old said “Mommy, I know the “c” word”.  I am no church mouse but the ‘c’ word has always reduced me and sent a shiver up my back. As we had been on an eight year sabbatical  from all good and raw swear words above “stupid” (parenting does this to you), I asked my cherub to whisper the word in my ear. She was flushed with responsibility, thinking maybe she would be the first to introduce me to the word. She carefully, quietly whispered in my ear, “crap”. I somehow was able to pretend that it was the big one I thought it was and told her, “now, my darling, you have in your vocabulary the word you will use when you slam the door on your finger.”

These days , as a single parent doing everything for myself and my girls in a very busy time in a house built almost a century ago, I find I swear like a seasoned truck driver. There was the flash flood in my basement, the tree branch that fell on my car, the leak in the shower that came through to the kitchen, a Mercedes SUV that took off my side view mirror and did not stop, as I sat parked on Yonge street, and extreme volume of other nasty stuff that, if I listed it here, would make me revisit it bitterly. Suffice to say my swearing has made its way through the entire alphabet but still the only”c’ word I use is the one Charlotte taught me. Every truck driver has to have her boundaries.

I know the “c” word, mommy

My entire extended family was around the dining room table at the cottage, after one of those perfect days where everyone got along and no one ended up at Emerg. The  laughing, singing and eating were dramatically interrupted when my then 8 year old said “Mommy, I know the “c” word”.  I am no church mouse but the ‘c’ word has always reduced me and sent a shiver up my back. As we had been on an eight year sabbatical  from all good and raw swear words above “stupid” (parenting does this to you), I asked my cherub to whisper the word in my ear. She was flushed with responsibility, thinking maybe she would be the first to introduce me to the word. She carefully, quietly whispered in my ear, “crap”. I somehow was able to pretend that it was the big one I thought it was and told her, “now, my darling, you have in your vocabulary the word you will use when you slam the door on your finger.”

These days , as a single parent doing everything for myself and my girls in a very busy time in a house built almost a century ago, I find I swear like a seasoned truck driver. There was the flash flood in my basement, the tree branch that fell on my car, the leak in the shower that came through to the kitchen, a Mercedes SUV that took off my side view mirror and did not stop, as I sat parked on Yonge street, and extreme volume of other nasty stuff that, if I listed it here, would make me revisit it bitterly. Suffice to say my swearing has made its way through the entire alphabet but still the only”c’ word I use is the one Charlotte taught me. Every truck driver has to have her boundaries.