Thursday, January 24, 2008

Flushed and glued!!!

"We spend the first twelve months of our children's' lives teaching them to walk and talk and the next twelve years telling them to sit down and shut up."...Phyllis Diller


And I just did that!!
And hours later I am still eaten by guilt. The look that crossed the little one’s face broke my heart. He had kept to himself all evening, not troubling me, working hard on his craft work. Cutting and sticking pieces of paper…


Toilet tissues have found new uses thanks to television channels showing interesting programs on craftwork . My kids love these programs, and so do I. When I’m tired and having no energy to function around a 2 boy household, I thank my stars, these programs are aired on TV.
In spite of all the war that goes on against TV watching for kids, I subscribe to the fact, that a good program can work well for your child , and so it does.

Now my family is thrown out of gear…after the
hand wash episodes, now it’s the turn of disappearing tissue paper. Whole rolls of paper is water washed into balls, human figures, painted and glued together, so that makes another item in the house dwindle, the scotch tape, or if nothing else (actually more preferred) the insulation tape, in all sizes and colors.
Now this tape can wind itself around a very normal, healthy tennis ball ( It bounces better ma!!) , it holds two seemingly innocent sticks together for some deed its always unaware of…sometimes it could be used as the catapult, or maybe a bow and arrow, but it can be used…none of those shop bought stuff hold a candle to these lopsided craftwork

When the
presenter Neil, smiles his trademark one, and does his various stuff, little does he know how the mommas on this side of the TV would like to wring his neck…Inspirations aside, I have now, small stones, pebbles ( picked off our own apartment neatly manicured garden) , shells, sticks, vague looking objects, sand, mud, charcoal from the dhobhi’s space, all brought in to satisfy the little ones’ creative outbursts.

He spent a whole morning, stooped and pensive posture, working hard on his new Pièce de résistance, my entire drawing room, resembling a stonewashed sandpit. …and turned around to proudly showcase it to his tired-migraine-hit-momma, when she turns and screams with horror.
She sees first the floor, not the little piece of paper, he’s proudly displaying…and gives him a earful.

Thankfully for her, he knows she'll immediately regret it and come and hear him say, "Ma! Look what I did…awesome isn’t it???"

And she, after her initial mad reaction, sees his work and can’t stop herself from giving him a big warm hug and laughs when he tries to squirm out his wiry body from her blotchy, potchy kisses…

While trying her best to not show ,her mind furiously working hard and trying to trace the next batch of tissue rolls kept in storage….

22 comments:

aMus said...

this was so sweet...and creative...

don't feel bad; they know us much better then we know ourselves :D

maybe a carton filled all kinds of odds and ends, can fuel his passion...and save your mansion ;)

i try to save all kinds of stuff (toothpaste boxes, aluminium foil rolls,etc..) n a carton for those creative attacks...:D

Keshi said...

so darn sweet!

Keshi.

Anonymous said...

The crafty momma with the creative kids..:) I know you get seriously mad at the bachcha parties for finishing up your stocks.. but my! Your lil one is super creative:)

Guruprasad said...

games mommas play and the price of living in mommydom!

for my son its not so much about the world being his canvas. its more like the apartment being his cricket pitch. he drives his mom and dad up the wall with his constant (and i mean constant!) running up and down screaming at the top of hi svoice like a commentator and bowling and diving to field the imaginary batsman's stroke and screaming at the umpire with an appeal for lbw!

i know exactly what you mean!

Prats said...

@TA oh they sure do know us better...and so do their friends...
they go around saying " don't worry, ya, aunty will not say anything" :(

I store them in huge cabinets to no use...

@keshi...thanks....maybe you should come over and do babysitting for me for a while hehehe

@ziah.. its more about finishing stocks just when u don't want them to....but yeah the lil one's creations are so amazing sometimes...I feel small in front of his ideas

Prats said...

@ guruprasad....thank your stars he sticks to commentary....My sons have knocked of Lakshmi's hands ( the idols in the pooja mantap) Ganeshji's trunk.....and then I had to ban them all together....

Thankfully I live in a place where lots of outdoor space is available for their balls and bats

AK said...

So sweet!!! If kids won't do all that who else will?Those are the incidents which proudly sit in your memory for years!!! May be one day when you see your kid grown, you would desperately feel like getting him back to 'this' form :o)

Rambler said...

I like that show too , Art Attack right..

Preethi said...

:) So sweet.. and sometimes I wonder too after I have had a meltdown.. Nantu can still be calm and wait for the moment when I will just give up and mend fences, hug him.. smother him with kisses and let him have his way.. These kids do wrap us around their little finger!!

Prats said...

@akshata....So true...in fact I'm always smiling on things they've done over the years...so its very precious these moments....and yeah who else but the kids can get like this.....


@rambler. Yes it is Art Attack an dit is really good....

@preethi Big time.....the kids are too smart for their boots and also very sensitive to our feelings.....I really wish we as parents also get to be like them...

Keshi said...

aww I'd love to! cos I love kids and they love me too :)

btw check out my latest post and plz do add to it lol!

Keshi.

--xh-- said...

:) kids at their creative best.. and a migrane-attacked-mom.. hm.. why do i think it resembles something from my life ;)

Hip Grandma said...

Give your little one a hug from me.and no getting angry eh?BTW you are tagged.

Unknown said...

Thanks to the telly, kids are creative now a days. Or they would have done what I had done. Rip apart every little toy that caught my curiousity.

You are tagged.

Prats said...

@keshi Be warned I might just take up the offer...hehehh....will come over and read up your latest...


@xh Do you think it could be a birth one, get one headache free kinds??!!! lol

@HHG Hugs given and sonny boy squirmed out yet again...( they sure do grow up faster than we can imagine :( )

@j Telly gets them to be creative even while destroying those ripped apart toys....somehow they like to make some other contraption from the very expensive remote cars' motor...thats creative...

Looks like tag downpour out here :)

Anonymous said...

I like this!

Tys on Ice said...

kids have short term memory and thank god for that...i spanked my son out of reflex and he just stopped and looked at me stunned before bursting into tears...i felt like a worm...

but 5 minutes later he was all over me..

thank god for their short memories

Preeti Shenoy said...

Oh yes--This is the same scenario in my house too!
By the way you are tagged.

Prats said...

@steve Thank you...

@Tys Oh yes!!! but sometimes I do feel, I as a parent need to be a little more patient with my own kids. We don't react like that with others...so why with our own...And you're really lucky you have a warm sweet child in your son

@ps heheh....Its kind of relieving to find others in the same spot too....shall look up your tag...

Unknown said...

aww. Poor little child. And the innocent look they give doesn't help either..

Its funny how when they stop annoying you, it becomes so quiet around the place that it gets on your nerves...

well, the "war on tv being bad" is only for those who make it a habit to plop their kids in front of the tv just to keep them occupied.


lol...the various uses of tissue paper... i can see it new..the next tissue paper advertisment.. "keeps kids occupied and enhances their artistic abilities"


ohhh...yea, i never realized that its the mommies who clean up the mess..
but naturally, when the kid shows his masterpiece, the anger settles quickly..

reminds me of something..
a kid was drawing on the wall..then he heard his mom's footsteps. From past experience, he knows that she is going to yell. He quickly adds these words on the side of his art.. " - for mom".
She was touched at the heartfelt gesture.


kids are fun. nuff said.

Prats said...

@hershey Welcome here! You said it right....their absence can literally grind on our nerves. I had a post on that earlier ..here


This tissue craft can really look good after its all done, but its the workplace thats all messy...and yes, kids can just turn their momma's around their little finger lol

and yes, kids are fun!!!

UL said...

oh this had me smiling...very nice