As Isia continues to get bigger, I enjoy revisiting projects that we attempted when she was younger. For instance, giving her a piece of paper with a hole cut out in the middle. When I first tried this activity with her two-year-old self, she insisted on another piece of paper. Now that she's three and a half, she was a little bit more intrigued and eager to give it a try.

The hole seemed to break up the drawing plane for her as she worked her way around the hole. First there was a little bit of drawing in one corner, then gluing the cut-out pieces (from the hole) in a couple corners before adding her letters in the final corner. She was quite proud of it, and wanted to "give it to Daddy"- the highest acclaim an artwork can receive around here (wink). All was well, until curious little brother fingers found it... and ripped it into pieces. I intercepted her fury, and promised her that all was not lost. Then I quickly hid the pieces away for another day. 

A few days later we revisited it once again. What can we do next? I asked. Isia thought that tape would be a good idea. So we got out the washi tape, and she began assembling the pieces back together. 

But she still wasn't finished. She wanted scissors to alter it a bit more more, then "It needs another piece of a paper, Mama, pink." I was happy to oblige, and the glue-stick came out once more. 

So there it was- taped up, re-glued and looking very little like what we started out with. Isia wanted to continue the transformation and asked for the markers.

She picked out the blue marker once more, and kept drawing on it until it was finally declared "Done." Now in Isia's mind, she probably didn't realize she was problem-solving when she taped the ripped pieces back together into a cohesive whole, or that she was practicing determination when she assembled the broken pieces into a new creation instead of tossing them into the recycling bin. She might not realize that she focused her letters on the top and most of her drawing on the bottom, but included both in the middle. Or that repeating striped tape around the perimeter of the drawing helps to unify it as a whole. The chance to realize these things, and keep them to myself, is one of my joys. 

To watch her evolve on her own, into the artist she already is.