Friday, February 3, 2012

The Craft-less Mom

I often laugh about the fact that I just don't "do" crafts. What I mean is- I totally suck at doing crafts. I don't enjoy them. They often seem to take too long, make a mess, and honestly I feel like I could be doing a million other things.  I DO appreciate my friends who are super crafty. I think its amazing that people can knit blankets, sew clothes and even do basic things like use a glue gun. All things that are totally out of my league.

As my daughter gets older and we have started working more on arts & crafts, Bible stories, etc. this lack of craft skills is really starting to prove challenging.

A couple of weeks ago, Rafi was asking me to draw a picture of her.  Although it is not the best picture, I was able to get through the whole eyes, nose, hair part, but then she kept asking me to draw her hands and arms. So- I had to break down and tell my 20 month old I just couldn't do it. Every picture she has, looks just like this:





Recently we have been working on the 7 Days of Creation.  When we talked about God making the birds and the fish, I made a picture for Rafi to color. When she was done we hung it up in her room so that when Tony got home she could tell him what she learned about. After I put it up I said "now what did God make Rafi?" She looks at the picture and says "Fish and Bats." I realized I better put labels on it to help Tony later that day.



Yesterday we learned about Noah. After reading the story in her Bible, I thought we would do a little craft to really help the story sink in. My goal was to make the ark mobile, so I made a slit in the paper and made it to where the boat could move across the waves. A very ambitious task I know. Well, I didn't really know how to create the ark, but an even bigger problem was that I didn't know how to draw ANY animals. So- this is what we came up with. Obviously that is Noah in the boat.


All of these things should make me want to try harder, take a class, or at least ask for some help. But instead- I think I will just start using my printer more and doing a lot of coloring sheets to go with our stories. And let's be honest here, children retain stories much better when told over a bowl of ice cream as opposed to a craft any day. So- for any of my craft-less moms out there, have no fear! Just give your kid sugar, and you will be way cooler than the other moms ; )