in the eyes of the beholder

Where to start? It’s been a little while…or has it been a long while? I have the world’s greatest reason to have been off the blog for a while. My baby made the long awaited leap into toddlerhood. It’s funny how everyone’s life changes when a little one starts to walk. Taking a break from trying to accomplish “other” things throughout the day so I could keep my little guy safe has reminded to me to take more moments to experience life through the eyes of my kiddos.

I am jumping back on the horse (the horse being this blog), but probably going to stick to short rides for a while. This first one actually started months ago when I decided to do a weekly wonder. Oh, how quickly that idea became a thing of the past. It was one of those “good concepts, bad execution” type of things where I thought I actually had time to fit 400,000 things into each day. The weekly wonders didn’t last long but the concept got me thinking more from the perspective of kids. My kids just love it when tractors drive by or work in the fields behind us. Truman had an automatic obsession for everything tractor so I decided to do a couple simple, quick paintings for his room. Little did I know that these quirky, basic paintings, would be such a huge hit with him. He literally screeches when he spots them from across the room. Squirmy diaper changes are no more when I give him these paintings to hold. He carries them around the house and pushes them across the room on his knees. I wrote these painting off as being too basic and not “perfect” enough to print or even post…. That is, until my son’s tiny perspective changed my mind.

Art is interesting in a sort of “beauty is in the eyes of the beholder” kind of a way. I have seen art impact my children thousands of times. My son’s love for these paintings made me realize that it doesn’t take perfection to grab a child’s attention. My kids aren’t searching for the perfect anything. They just like what they like for whatever reason that they like it. Do you like that sentence? Wow, that’s a lot of like. But that’s about the best way to put it, so I am leaving it. Anyway, I decided that before Truman destroys these toys paintings, I should capture them, post them and offer prints for sale. You never know, maybe, just maybe there is another tractor obsessed boy out there who might like what he sees!

pure joy!