Possible New Crayon Policy
Z loves his crayons. He knows the bin of them lives on the kitchen island, and we have learned that when he reaches toward the island and fusses, he's telling us he wants to color. We set him down in his high chair with a stack of paper and the crayon bin, and he goes to town. When we first gave him the crayons a few months ago, he couldn't exert enough pressure to make more than a faint mark; now he scribbles with an intensity worthy of Van Gogh. He covers a page with a few purple scrawls, switches colors, scribbles with concentration, then imperiously hands us the paper and demands another. We're not sure how he knows his masterpiece is done, but done it certainly is--there's no handing back the same page, even if it only has a few marks on it. Some days he's a minimalist, and that's all there is to it.
Even using scrap paper--and he doesn't seem to mind if the pages already have writing on them--keeping this kid in drawing paper may contribute to world deforestation. The thing is, he occasionally misses and ends up marking on his high chair tray. And sometimes if we're slow off the mark getting him a new page, he scrawls on the tray until we catch him at it and slide a new sheet under his hand. Fortunately, the tray is easy to clean, and the crayon comes off with a little soapy scrubbing--which Z is happy to help with.
So I had this idea. Instead of destroying rain forests and stressing out over him writing on the high chair tray, why don't we just treat the tray like a white board and *let* him color on it? We end up scrubbing it off anyway, so what's the difference?
EDIT: We've trained him too well. If we hand him crayons, he sits and waits for the paper. If he starts to color on the tray, he often says "no!" before we get around to stopping him.
Even using scrap paper--and he doesn't seem to mind if the pages already have writing on them--keeping this kid in drawing paper may contribute to world deforestation. The thing is, he occasionally misses and ends up marking on his high chair tray. And sometimes if we're slow off the mark getting him a new page, he scrawls on the tray until we catch him at it and slide a new sheet under his hand. Fortunately, the tray is easy to clean, and the crayon comes off with a little soapy scrubbing--which Z is happy to help with.
So I had this idea. Instead of destroying rain forests and stressing out over him writing on the high chair tray, why don't we just treat the tray like a white board and *let* him color on it? We end up scrubbing it off anyway, so what's the difference?
EDIT: We've trained him too well. If we hand him crayons, he sits and waits for the paper. If he starts to color on the tray, he often says "no!" before we get around to stopping him.