Kid-Friendly Animal Art

Or, as my son says, aminal. Mispronunciation is so cute when you're three! I remember when he was just learning to talk... sweet potato was fee-po-doh. Muffins were muff-men. Oh, and the day we finally got the second 'na' in banana! Kids are so great!

I've been writing some essays for scholarship applications for school, and one is about a love of learning. Well, that isn't so hard for me... after all, I've jumped into school again! One of the things I wrote about was how I hoped that my kids would love to learn as much as I do, and that seeing their curiosity about the things and people around them is so amazing and wonderful. How do we lose that as we age? It seems like there are too many "right answers" for all of life's little mysteries. My husband is the curious type... me, well, yes, but I also like to leave some things as a mystery. Rainbows for example. Yes, I know about light refraction and wavelength and all that, but isn't it much more romantic to just gaze at an atmospheric miracle? And maybe just maybe pretend that there really is a leprechaun's pot of gold or a wish at the end of it? Or that a double rainbow is a good omen? I don't want to lose all of that... just compliment it.

Speaking of my kids, my son is on round two of medicine for his ear infection. We spent the afternoon together meandering through the grocery store, reading Charlotte's Web in the waiting room, snuggling on the bench waiting for the prescription... it was, with the exception of the illness, quite a lovely time just us together. I find that I'm usually brimming with love for both kids all weekend and I think it's because I don't spend all day every day with them anymore. I miss them. Chris is also sick... he has a fever and I'm a little worried about him. Hopefully the morning brings good news.

Now... enough of me babbling on about my life... tonight's painting is called "Nuzzle" and is a giraffe and a baby giraffe. It sort of looks like the baby is snuggled up to his/her parent. I guess my default is to say mother since I'm a mom, but I'm not quite sure of the giraffe family dynamic. Can't really make that call. So... take it as you will... either way, a parent and child of either gender can snuggle. I was feeling a lot of warm fuzziness today so I suppose it came out in the painting! It's on a stretched canvas, but I'm afraid I don't recall the size. Between 4x5 and 5x7 for sure.

I think I'm going to try to continue with some kid-friendly animal art this week. I really liked painting an elephant so I might try to do something with elephants again. For now, I'm going to snuggle up to my own personal bed-heater and hope that my boys feel better in the morning. Happy thoughts and good night all!

P.S. I emailed Mic Mac Mall today about signing up for the community booth sometime in November and/or December. Here's hoping something comes of that!