I Was That Kid (Amy’s Version)

By sunflower on April 28, 2011 • ( 2 )

Amy blogs at kids in the studio. She describes the wonderfully creative art projects her three children — ages 2, 6 and 9 — do in their basement art studio. Amy’s ideas about art are much like ours at Sunflower. She provides her kids with materials and maybe a suggestion, and lets them experiment. Check out her blog to see the result… and to find ideas you can use with your own kids.

I was the girl who couldn’t wait to go to school like my older brother and sister.

I was the girl who insisted on getting my long hair cut short when I was five.

I was the girl who stopped sucking her thumb cold turkey in kindergarten, when a first grader said, “You don’t still suck your thumb, do you?”

I was the girl who asked to go to the art museum at five years old.

I was the girl who wanted to be a writer and an artist.

I grew up into the girl who believed, for a very long time, that art wasn’t for someone like me.

(Then I grew into the adult who didn’t care and took art classes anyway.)

I was the girl who raced my siblings and cousins, all older, around my grandfather’s really large garden.

I was the girl who joined the cross-country team after failing to make the cheerleading squad.

I was the girl who longed to be a character in any number of my favorite books, and I was a girl who loved to read.

I was the girl who worried—about my father when he traveled, about my sister during her junior year abroad, about a fire burning down the house while we all slept.

I was the girl who didn’t tell anybody how much I worried.

I was the little girl who had two surgeries for lazy eye and had to wear an eye patch.

I was the older girl with glasses and braces and a painful awkwardness.

I was the girl who always behaved in school and tried to get good grades.

I was the girl who wished she could trade being smart for being able to hit a softball.

I was also the girl who was sad and angry a lot of the time but didn’t have the words to explain, even if I understood it myself.

I’m the girl who grew into a mother, guiding three more souls through childhood and beyond, hoping to raise authentically happy children.

And I’m the girl who grew into the woman with an amazing life full of all the sweetest, most ordinary pleasures that, for a long time, I thought would never be mine.