Pretty as a picture

As promised, here are some of Miriam's drawings. This first one is a picture of Rapunzel. Obviously.

The black and orange one is a picture of Miriam with a ghost—the biggest black circle being the ghost. She's the Rapunzel-looking character (orange circles with a line running through them). 

Sometimes she'll draw faces...I'll have to look for one of those drawings. Miriam draws all the time. And on everything. You should see the top of the colouring desk:

Today while Rachel was at school and I was in the bathroom, Miriam got into the library books. I keep them in my bedroom because I'm a wee bit anal about library books and the condition we return them in. I could hear her rifling through the library book box and called out for her to stop. Then I heard her pitter-patter away. By the time I got to her she had coloured in the library book! 

"Miriam!" I scolded, "We do not colour in books! Now, show me where you coloured!"

"Meme coloured Emily witch shoes blue! Emily witch likes blue!"

Which Witch is Which? is one of the girls' favourite stories. We checked it out from the library last Saturday and I think we've already read it upwards of twenty times. Emily witch does like blue. And Miriam had certainly coloured her shoes blue. Fortunately the pages were glossy so I was able to wipe the crayon off with my fingers. 

"Miriam, when we check out books from the library we do not colour on them for any reason! We don't even colour on our books at home. We don't colour on books at all—except for colouring books and I know you know the difference between a colouring book and a story book. Colouring on story books ruins them! What do we colour on?"

"Paaaaaaper!" she sniffed.

"Do we colour on anything else?"

"Nooooo!" she wailed.

And then I held her while she sobbed that "Meme just wants Emily's shoes blue!" and that she would never, ever want to "wuin de book!" She is the world's most remorseful child. Unfortunately she can't seem to keep from colouring on taboo items: plates, stools, tables, library books...

Rachel's been a busy little artist, as well. She drew this picture the other day—it's a princess standing on a balcony watching a thunder storm. Tears are running from her face and all the way to the ground.

Rachel draws crying people a lot. A whole lot. Sometimes it's a little worrisome. So I asked her about it.

"Why do you always draw sad people?" I asked when she handed me this picture.

"I don't!" she said, "Not always. This princess is a happy princess."

"Ummm...Rachel...she has tears streaming down her eyes to the floor!" I pointed out.

"Oh. Those," she said, smiling proudly. "Those are laughing-tears."

In that case, I'll cancel your therapy sessions...though this next person is definitely not laughing. Just look at that frown!

But here is yet another smiling, crying person. 

Perhaps she just finds tears fascinating—an interesting detail to add. Andrew often cries when he laughs and Rachel seems to have taken after him in this department so maybe that's what she thinks everybody does when they laugh. I don't know. 

This next picture kind of cracks me up. It's Potiphar's wife...with her "daughters."

I think Rachel's a little young for the orientalist definition of a harem—because that's what the movie Joseph and the Technicolour Dreamcoat shows. It's definitely not a familial harem—so for now I'm letting her continue to think that those really are Potiphar's children hanging around their mother.

And this last one is the narrator from Joseph.

And I just went through the stacks of pictures on my desk and put about three trees worth in the recycling bin. That's why we only ever colour on used paper. We draw a lot over here.