The Extremes

I'll be honest.  They are kind of kicking my butt lately. 

Here they are: 

15 year old boy becoming a man but still hating anything in 'the box'.

10 month old baby becoming...well...bigger. *sniff, sniff  - and THANK GOD all in the same breath.*

12 year old girl starting to notice clothing, makeup, and hair.  And care about those things.  A LOT.

10 year old girl who is still trying to figure out if she wants to play with farm animals, dress like she's color blind (LOVE IT now that I can appreciate it), chase butterflies, or care about the stuff that her big sister buddy is into now.

Everyone needing LOTS OF WORDS.  Ack. 

I know they're all normal.  Maybe I'm the one who's slightly 'off'.  I'm needing to up the anty, so to speak, and I'm not remembering where the heck I stored my 'anty'.  Each of them needs me in a different way and I'm feeling rather pathetic in this multi-tasking realm. 

Charlotte's diaper bag is a funny visual for me.  I have diapers, wipes, baby toy, bottle, formula - then there's the book Love and Logic for Teens, hair stuff for the big girls, someone's ipod and headphones that they stashed in there so they wouldn't have to carry it themselves, and some school supplies. 

There's not the glorious flow from one color to the next like those pictures of crayons melting as gravity has it's affect and the color just seeps to something new, bright, and beautiful. 

It's more like that Jackson Pollack picture of splatters of paint colliding or crashing on and around the others.  I'm not fond of that one.  (Don't hate me, please.  I never said I was a great art aficionado.)  That picture has *always*, always reminded me of vomit.

Yikes. 

It's all artwork though right?  Somehow or another the picture that emerges will be amazing to look at.  I'm just hoping and a prayin' that it's not put in the 'What NOT To Do' or the 'WHAT THE HECK??" section of the museum of our family life. 



I just made myself snicker at something as I wrote that last paragraph.  I never did well in art class. Yeesh.  God does have a sense of humor. 

Here I raise my glass (okay, coffee cup and Charlotte's bottle) to a new learning curve in  'Art Appreciation Class', all of us crammed into the same 'boat'.  I hope we have some fun while doing it.