Garden Art Journaling 2010 :Take One

The 4 year old and I have begun work on our 3rd garden art journal!
This is becoming such a great tradition,
and I imagine I will treasure these journals for years.

We started last week when we planted seeds in cups.

He didn't want to draw, only copy words and ask for spelling.

Today, we took a look at our first daffodil bloom.
Many more are set to bloom very soon,
so we felt good about bringing one in from the rain to observe.

Again, he wanted to write, a great area of interest for him these days.
He said I could be the "illustrator" and he could be the "author."

I was glad when he decided to draw one after we counted the petals.
He was working on both of these pages at the same time.
After writing his labels on one page, he added that element to his drawing on the other page.
Some of his details are lost in the drawing as he used the same color marker.

I was working on my pages at the same time as well, trying to think of questions that would ignite his curiosity about daffodils without simply force feeding him information.
I did remind him of the word trumpet after talking about the middle of the flower.
We used a book to find information about stamens and stigmas, but honestly- he was resistant to looking at the book.
My suggestion to break out the magnifying glasses was greeted with much excitement though!

I wrote the words he wanted to copy in big letters at the bottom,
while asking him questions and dictating his responses.

Then, we added our pages to the journal, where he insisted his pages go first.
After we took the pictures for blogging,
he insisted that his pony Starsong be in a picture too.
He is an insistent little guy, not always as pleasant as I would hope!

I think this year's journal will be fun, but there are also some challenges we have to face if this is going to continue being an enriching experience.

He is comparing his drawings to mine, and expressing frustration over his pictures not being perfect. Perfect is his new word, and I don't know how I feel about it. I want this to be an experience that is engaging, full of learning and exploration, and an opportunity for him to develop his own style of observing the world and expressing it through art.

I'll have to keep my thinking cap on this one for awhile. I want to share my own art with him, but also don't want to set a standard he feels he cannot reach.

For example, he so badly wanted me to draw pictures of a crocus for him to color in, so it would be PERFECT. I stood my ground and told him that I cannot make art FOR him, he has to make his own. We ended up skipping the crocus art and starting with daffodils. I am not sure exactly how I feel about that. Lots of thinking and learning to do!

Have a blessed day and I hope your vernal equinox was a beautifully balanced day!