Everything Has An Author

On Friday the girls and I went to the library to look at cookbooks. Whenever I’m feeling overwhelmed with my writing I go to the library to find something new to concern myself over; like how to make my own starter for sourdough bread, or how to make a pie crust with cute crimped edges.

Hadley found a book club cookbook and read out loud from it while Harper pointed to pictures in the Big Fat Cookie Book, all the while saying, “Ooo! Let’s make that one!  OOOO!!!  I want to eat that one!”

The three of us sat in the cookbook aisle for awhile and I started to feel a little better. We took the cookie book with us to the Children’s section and I looked through it while the girls pulled books from the shelves, found a table to sit at, and plopped themselves down in chairs. I don’t know, but is there anything more satisfying then creating a big stack of books for yourself?

The girls took home  Fancy Nancy Aspiring Artist, a Magic Schoolbus book, and a dinosaur book for the weekend. In the Fancy Nancy book, Nancy creates an art studio and Hadley and Harper thought that was splendid (that’s a fancy word for “great,” for those of you who read Fancy Nancy and know she likes to use the fifty cent words ).  So on Saturday, they made an art studio for themselves.  They wanted stations, so I helped them make a paint station, a “make your own story” station, a stamp station, a coloring station, and a write on transparency paper with vis-a-vis pens station. (Do teachers use those anymore?)

Harper wanted an arts and crafts station, so Hadley pulled out Fairy Things to Make and Do and Things to Make with Recyclables, which is published by Usborne.

“Hey! These are both by the same author,” she said.

“I didn’t know art books have an author,” Harper said.

“Yes, Harper, everything has an author. Like, whoever made this house is an author.”

“And whoever made our trashcan is an author, right Hadley?”

“Harper, WE’RE authors!”

“Cool! Watch this!” Harper held her finger over her paintbrush and flicked it on the paper so paint sprayed all over. Hadley was impressed so she tried, too.  I grabbed the camera.

Later, I scrub down the splatters from what my little authors didn’t get on the page, feeling slightly regretful I had to erase those marks.