Owen the Artist

My sweet little baby boy is getting big so fast these days.  He's getting really good at communicating what he wants/needs...sometimes by lying flat as a pancake on the floor face down and then arching his back to cry as hard as he can towards the sky, eyes closed (pathetically cute most of the time)...other times sweetly pointing, babbling and laughing....it's becoming clear to us how much he is watching because without being specifically shown, he is doing things like pretending to fill a cup out of the faucet of the play kitchen and "drinking" it...I recently started encouraging him to sit on the little potty with his clothes on and after sitting there a few seconds, he goes to the sink, climbs up on the stool and asks for me to turn the water on and get him some soap to wash his hands.  He loves brushing his teeth and has started asking for floss too and today was loudly "spitting" into the sink after brushing, running the toothbrush under the water, brushing and spitting...etc...so so freaking adorable.

Almost all of this has taken me completely by surprise.  It's funny having a second kid because life is happening around him and it's so interesting and exciting to watch him just pick things up on his own (as opposed to the hovering we did with Zoe and the constant evaluating of the stages she was in).  One of the most fun surprises I've had in regard to this lately has been his interest in art.  My friend Jessica and I run a Kid's Art Group for Family Housing here and our goal each month is to let the kids be totally free with paint and stuff.  We put down a big tarp and give the kids huge, head-to-toe smocks to wear and we let them get super messy.  This last time we had the group, I was headed over to our community room where we hold the group and asked Owen if he  "...want(ed) to get messy at Art Group today?" and he immediately nodded his head yes and smiled.  So, although it was a fairly tame group that day, I did let him go to town with the supplies and it was so fun to watch.  Then today, Zoe asked me to get the paints out and Owen was asking to get in his high chair to paint too, so I decided to let him make a huge mess and deal with clean up only when he decided he was totally done (not when I decided).  He explored and experimented quietly for a good 20-30 minutes (long after Zoe had lost interest and gone into the other room)...so cute...I'm happy to say that cleanup wasn't really that bad either!  Thank goodness for washable Crayola paints!

Art Group...painting logs

I made this sun shape out of masking tape before giving the paper to Owen to go crazy on so we could peel away the tape afterwards....

I helped him spread the paint around on the paper a bit when he started getting more focused on painting his PJ's.

This picture warms my heart...

Finished!  Next time we do this I'll definitely use stronger paper because there are a couple of big tears but I love it all the same.

Now just exploring the paint...I did let him go ahead and paint his PJ's by the way...

Stacking the jars.  He then tried dipping the brush in the top jar and we ended up with a beautiful splatter all over the floor...way to be, Owen!

Love love love it...that's my boy!