So, I happened upon my second-born, Rachel (currently 7). She was totally absorbed in something, hunched over an array of small containers, with a good-sized stack of what I'd call metallic gold pipe-cleaners on the floor next to her. I think there is a new artsy-fartsy term for pipe-cleaners as pipes are largely a thing of the past, but let's just stick with that term for our purposes.
The kid is ALWAYS making crafts of her own design. For an example, see the flag made out of notebook paper and used straws (on the left). She can "see" a finished product out of the most obscure things. (click the link for more, plus you can click on the flag picture for a better view!)
I watched her for a while, but she never came up for air. She was very focused on her task! It seemed like she was cutting something. She's good with scissors, I think, for her age. Finally, still unable to see what she was making this time around, I asked:
Gregg: (curiously) Rachel?
Rachel: yeah?
Gregg: What are you making?
Rachel: (matter-of-factly) Glitter.
She looked up at me, briefly. Long enough that I could see on the floor in front of her a small container with a small but significant pile of gold glitter in the bottom of it...and a pile of pipe-cleaners completely stripped bare of the colorful portion. She looked back down and hunched over her work, again.
Gregg: Rachel?
Rachel: yeah?
Gregg: You know that you can buy glitter already made, right?
Rachel: Uh huh.
Gregg: Then why are you going through all this work to make glitter?
Rachel: Because I like to make glitter, that's why. Besides, Mom said I could!
She's been working on the little container full of "home-made" glitter for a couple of days now. I'm sure that someday soon, we'll see some incredible new craft from her and it will all make more sense to us.
Rachel: Look! There must be hundreds of pieces of glitter in here!
Dianne (the wife/mom): Thousands, I think.
Rachel: Yeah!
Amazed at her own success in creating thousands of pieces of glitter, she returned to work - her larger goal still a secret from us. I'm looking forward to seeing what she will make. She can see things that we can't!
That's so adorable. Maddy does stuff like that - she made a guitar from an empty tissue box, stretching rubber bands over the opening, then using an empty paper towel holder as the neck. We see trash, they see art.
Posted by: Kim | December 09, 2008 at 10:46 AM