I mean, I can’t even get mad about it. THEY’RE LOVE NOTES. From my little boys. How is a Mama supposed to get mad at her boys when they leave her something like this?
This is a custom shelf my husband built for Mother’s Day to cover a terrible burn inflicted on the side of our living room chair by a house guest. We’re really good at starting, but not so great at finishing, so this shelf has been waiting for paint for three months now. Half of it is green and half of it…
Well, now the other half’s kid-handwriting art.
I’ve watched a progression of this art. One day I walked down the stairs and was met by a black love note on the corner of the shelf. Another day I walked downstairs and discovered the 6-year-old had gotten into the action, too, this time with red. Yesterday I saw the 5-year-old’s contribution, scrawled in red pen and all capital letters (not pictured here).
Now. My kids (at least the bigger ones) know and understand that it’s against the house rules to write on the furniture. But, in a moment of such deep and overwhelming love, they just had to express their feelings in a way that would forever and ever (or at least until it got painted) let me know their devotion. Like the picnic tables in junior high where kids would scratch their love notes and then scratch them out three days later. Like the desks in high school where couples would declare their undying love under a worksheet and then try to rub it off a few months later.
At least that’s the story I’m telling myself.
Because otherwise the story would be that my kids saw this bare piece of wood that was going to, eventually, be painted anyway and saw a prime opportunity to defy the rules and make their mark.
It surely can’t be that.
