I have been wanting to photo all those adorable Amigurumi toys that Juliana made for her siblings. Once I half-heartedly looked through the playroom and found two, got distracted. Another time I found one in the living room, had the thought to then keep looking but sunlight was fading. I always seem to see a few when I'm not ready to take a photo. (I'm pretty sure that this is a cruel truth of blogging.) But today, the first day in I don't know how long where I was entirely alone for an entire day in my home (happy dance), I thought that I would (rays of sunshine too) find all those little varmints and shoot their portrait. So, I looked. I found one. One duck. Ya know why I found it? Cause it's mine. Juliana made this one for me. One duck. One cranky duck who cannot find any of her dumbigurumi toy friends anywhere. What is with my kids!? This place is a complete and total mess! (I'm very sure that this is a cruel truth of mothering.) But on my hunt around the house I found.....
....this, we'll call it a weaving on the living room couch. I looked over last night between the chorus of family snickers at American Idol gafooeys and found Isabela to be doing this. She didn't ask me how, or anything, she just took it upon herself to warp and and weft this little piece of cardboard for fun.
On the girls' bedroom rug (which you really can't even make out anymore because of everything that is disguising it) I found this scarf that Eleni has started after I taught her how to single crochet over the holidays. She will pick this up and sit next to me any time that I have yarn in my own lap, and it is obvious how entirely grown up and smart this makes her feel at (as of last week) 7 years old. It sort of grows in all directions, though not purposefully. I found that the attitude that I give her in response to this unintended sort of wonkiness, is the attitude that she has officially adopted. It goes like this : "Oh well, its fun, and you get better the more you do it and its better than doing nothing."
On Eleni's bed I found Blueberry wearing her first attempt at a scarf that got really curly. Oh well, Blueberry needed a scarf anyway. I do remember too now, that Isabela crocheted a scarf and a teeny, tiny beret for her little owl Amigurumi, location unknown.
Inspiration is such a funny thing. In my naivete (after 19 years of parenting, it fades not) I presumed that all these little toys would get made, and that they would become the characters of hours of imaginative play, sit pristinely on a bedside table perhaps, or maybe tuck neatly under a pillow. (In fact they are scattered. Somewhere. I'm sure we'll find them. Or likely if I ask they can tell me exactly where.) It also reminds me how after Jeff had spent days building them a gorgeous house way up the in cedar trees, instead of playing in the new tree house they were mostly just inspired to nail wood to trees. Lots of trees. It seems that giving them handmade mostly inspires them to make. And what more could we give them really? As is typically the case, whenever a good thing has been done by us- the parenting portion of us, which increasingly includes Juliana,- it was undoubtedly and completely done by mistake.
A cruel, humbling truth.
But cause for joy, nonetheless.
Have a great weekend, xoxo, Anna