I am the Editorial Assistant for The Fort Scott Tribune, where I have been employed since March of 2008. I live in the country near Mapleton, Kan., with my husband and our two children. I graduated from Uniontown High School, Uniontown, Kan., but before attending Uniontown, I moved around several times during my childhood. I love to take photos, write, read and spend time with my family. I am also a member of our local fire department and enjoy attending church with my family and appreciate everything a small town has to offer. I look forward to watching my children grow and spending time with my husband and family while living in the country.

If messes were like art, I'd be living with Picasso

Posted Tuesday, January 13, 2009, at 3:37 PM

Lately my son has been really interested in coloring. I gave him an old notebook of mine and some colored pencils, which he has gotten may hours of amusement from. We tried normal crayons, but that ended after he colored on his toys, a plastic chair and the wall. Apparently, he found his artwork impressive, however, I did not.

On Saturday, we took the kids grocery shopping at Wal-Mart. I was the in the store way too long, and by the time we got out of there, Colby was much overdue for a nap. I bought him some of the twist up colored pencils and his own notebook, with Lightning McQueen on the cover, which he loved. He sat on the floor in the kitchen and colored in his new notebook while I put the groceries away.

He decided to "help" me make supper, which is something he does quite often now because he loves to cook. We decided to make hamburger helper and brownies. Me, being the multi-tasking person I am, decided I could do all this while entertaining Colby in the kitchen. The making of the brownies was successful, but he became bored with waiting for the brownies to bake, so while I finished the Hamburger Helper, he decided to play in the kitchen. Colby kept distracting me and trying to pull on my clothes, so I told him to sit back down and color some more. After that, he became very quiet, so I figured he had decided to color more pictures.

When I finally took my eyes off of the skillet of hamburger helper, I found my son had dumped a box of pancake mix out on the floor and was coloring pictures in it and dancing in it. When I asked him what he thought he was doing, he simply said "LOOK! COLOR!" He was very proud of his artwork in the pancake mix, but I was less than amused. Then he began sliding on the floor and playing in the pancake mix like it was a sand box.

As unhappy as I was that my kitchen floor was covered in pancake mix, I kind of had to laugh at how much fun he was having.

Sunday, my son was being the two year old terror again. I decided to bake blueberry muffins for the next morning and he wanted to help me. I let him stir the mix while I got a few things I needed. I guess stirring the mix got boring, because he decided to fling it at the wall instead!

Then, after he had his bath, I decided to take my shower. This left his dad to watch them both, which can be kind of crazy. As I was washing my hair in the shower, I could hear a loud sound of water running. I turned off the shower but could hear it even more now. I opened the shower curtain and saw the bathroom sink was overflowing and my son was just standing there watching. I yelled at him and he said "Uh-Oh" and ran out of the bathroom. I jumped out of the shower and turned off both faucets, but water was everywhere. It took me about 30 minutes and at least 6 towels to clean up the mess.

On a positive note though, my bathroom floor got a good cleaning, I won't have to mop it for a while now.