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| Valentine for his classmates. By my son at age 7 |
Long time readers of my blog as well as my unfortunate offspring will know that I have rather rigid rules for school Valentines. (See this previous post for example.)
- First, you must give Valentines to ALL your classmates so as to avoid hurt feelings.
- Second, and this is the even more important one: no crap TV character ones from Walmart. You have to make your own.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha HA!
Okay. The truth. What they resulted in was a bunch of crap "homemade" Valentines. Usually wonky construction paper "hearts" slathered with strange assortments of stickers, stained with tears shed during the inevitable frustration tantrums, and finished with lollipops taped to the front obscuring their signatures. If they bothered to sign them. But at least the cards didn't have TV characters on them...
That was until I discovered the six secrets to getting boys involved in public declarations of love (or at least sort-of-liking).
- Let them use normally off-limits equipment in my studio, like the fragile light table or dangerous xacto knives
- Encourage them to incorporate their current passionate interests
- Assist with the boring parts like signing their names, putting the cards in envelopes, and addressing them (by "assist" I mean "do it for them")
- Incentivize frequently with samples of the candy included with the cards
- Maintain low quality standards
- Have them write love poems
"I love you,
I love you,
I love you divine.
Please give me your bubble gum.
You're sitting on mine."
The Valentine featured here took my fine-motor challenged child hours and hours to make. Not to mention the ages he spent creating the verse. In the process:
- I let him use my light table (which is how the writing is more or less in a straight line). Also I let him use the xacto knife to slice a piece of scratch paper to shreds, even though that had nothing to do with his project.
- I let him incorporate his current and longstanding interest in loud burping.
- I allowed him to sign his name only once and then photocopied it. And I did all the stuffing and addressing.
- I fed him lots of lollipops while he worked. Lots.
- I mentioned the lack of rhyme in his rhyming verse and the half-finished border around the heart only once and didn't say another word when he insisted he was done.
- I laughed - genuinely - at his funny poem and drawing. Actually I rather liked the absence of the expected rhyme. It was another little touch of humor (though I'm not certain it was intentional).
1 Comments on Homemade Valentines (of the Borderline Inappropriate Sort that Boys Might Be Willing to Make), last added: 2/9/2012
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Those of us who've had boys (or brothers) know that you've got boys pegged exactly! I'm reminded of some boys named Jack Prelutsky and Shel Silverstein...? What a fun post - can't wait to find the book!