An Unexpected Apprentice

Fourteen month old Annelie decided to help me out with my latest drawing. A little bit unexpected, of course. She has begun climbing things lately, but I never expected to walk into the kitchen area and see her sitting in the middle of the table happily drawing all over my picture with some red colored pencils.

But there she was: My little artiste, colored pencil clenched in her fist, happily scribbling away.

And to add insult to injury, the dog was under the kitchen table chewing on one of my colored pencils (Tuscan Red, for crying out loud. I love that color!!!).

It is amazing how quickly kids at this age grow. And get into trouble. It is so true when people say, "Oh you can't take your eye off them for even a split second." Because that is seriously all it takes for little ladies to climb up to your drawing board and scribble away!!

In the end, I think Annelie did some good for my picture. I hadn't expected to cut out the airplane flying sock monkey, but I refuse to give up on a good drawing. Luckily she was using red, so I was able to blend most of her handiwork into the airplane and then cover the damage with more shading. She also drooled all over the monkey, which I hid with some black shading. I hadn't expected to use so much black, but that color certainly did the trick.

As for the background-- I think I like it better with acrylics. And the blue from colored pencil doesn't always show up nicely when I print my pictures, so it will make for a nicer print anyway.

And as for the devastation of having a picture scribbled over... well she is easy to forgive, especially when she crawls into the TV stand drawer to watch "Barbie and the Magic of Pegasus." Pretty cute, for a little hellion!