Dear Readers,
I think that I was the only one working like a maniac over the Christmas holiday.
My children are home and it has been quite an experience. I wonder how a 4 year old and a 13 year old can argue over doing the dishes.
Anissa, the 4 year old will run and tell me how Gianni has not dried the the dishes well and that she had to do it herself. I can always see the mischievous smile on her face because she has discovered another way to one up her older brother.
On another note, my children have become better cooks in the past few months. After many kitchen mishaps, they have realized they must wait, watch and listen or they will mess up dinner.
They are right there though running to the refrigerator for supplies being the perfect prep chefs.
I taught Anissa how to peel onions which is one of the jobs in the kitchen I dislike the most.
Amir the three year old was on the side line screaming, “Where is my onion? I want to peel an onion. What about me?”
So now I have two onion peelers and I can leave them to the job. As I type they are running back and forth into my office playing the secret agent game. This game consists of crawling on the floor and sticking their hands into my popcorn tin. You know its one of those three flavor popcorn tins you get when you work in an office envoirnment.
We got our tin from Alex “The UPS Guy”. He has become a good friend to the New Citizens Press family.
So the secret agents have decided that crawling is not good enough. Now Amir has a little scooter and as he whizzes by he tries to bend down and stick his little hand in the popcorn tin like Double 007 swiping important documents from someone’s hand while they walk along.
Believe me, it is hilarious house hold to live, work, and breath in.
We started drawing more as well. As, a college student I have a disturbing image from a psychology class I took. In one of my classes, my professor showed a movie that had minority inner city school children and white suburban children draw their families. At the end of the movie, the conclusion was that due to the lack parental involvement the minority inner school children drew their families as stick figures without defining body parts. Some stick figures had feet and hands but for the most part they were pretty stark.
On the other hand, the movie showed the white suburban children drawing family members with much more detail. I do not know how biased that movie was but it made a lasting impression.
So to make a long story short, always sit with your children and draw. Talk to them while they are drawing as well. I assure it will be one of the most interesting and humorous conversations you will have.
Anissa decided that she was going to draw a picture of Amir. It turned out to be very eventful.
She does not use pencil, crayons or magic markers. Her usual medium is an ink pen.
Amir asked, “Where are my pants?”
Anissa drew something that resembled pants.
Amir asked, “Where are my hands?”
Anissa drew two balls with five lines in them.
Amir asked, “Where are my shoes at?”
I was amazed at how well he remembered all the questions I would ask Anissa when she was drawing for me.
But I was not ready for what happened next.
Amir asked,”Where are my eyebrows?”
Anissa scribbled a thick one inch uni brow.
Amir began to scream, “Those aren’t my eyebrows, those aren’t my eyebrows. Those are loser eyebrows.” Every time I want to chuckle I look at that picture.
Spending time with my children is better than any comedy movie. They provide me with memories to smile about when I am not in the best mood.
Sincerely,
Rina N. Risper
