Paper Twins

Last week we were outside playing with sidewalk chalk when Catherine decided to just lie down right there on the sidewalk. Cameron asked her if she would like him to trace her and she said yes. They spent the next 20 minutes or so tracing Catherine and then drawing her clothing, hair, etc. As soon as they had finished she stood up to look at "herself" when...it started to RAIN. Poor Catherine was beside herself! "She" was washing away and it really upset her. She stood there in the rain, crying as she watched their drawing wash away.

Then Cameron suggested making another Catherine drawing on paper inside the house. After shedding a few more tears Catherine decided that sounded like an acceptable substitute for the Catherine drawing which had just been turned into colored puddles in front of her eyes. We all went inside and the kids got out the large rolls of paper and colored pencils and began to work on a new Catherine drawing. When they were done she was *SO* happy! (In case you couldn't tell by the light in her eyes in the picture.) We hung it on the wall at the foot of the staircase and she sat in front of it just looking at"herself" for a very long time. Cameron decided that he wanted to draw a picture of himself too, so he took his turn lying down on the large roll of paper while I traced around him, then he drew and colored his own picture and hung it up next to Catherine's. But the fun didn't stop there! They have spent chunks of time here and there over the last week adding to those drawings. All of the space around their pictures are slowly being filled in by smaller drawings, labels, descriptions and diagrams. There are drawings of Mom, Dad, their pets, their house, and their favorite toys, as well as of some of their favorite games like Club Penguin and movies like "Kiki's Delivery Service". Every time they think of another thing that they feel is important enough to be added they get out the colored pencils again and spend another 10 or 20 minutes adding to their creations. It's like an ever changing mural at the foot of our stairs. The drawings have become very important to my kids, especially Catherine. She even had to tell them "goodnight" last night as she was heading up the stairs to bed! (I believe her exact words were "Wait! I forgot to tell myself goodnight! LOL) My favorite part has got to be the word "IMAGINATION" curling out from the tops of their heads though. That just says it all, doesn't it?