Kids - eh?

Hello there.

I know you will all be on the edge of your seats, dying to find out the next exciting installment that is part of "A Colourful Life". Well, here it is!

Like all good laid plans, there is always that small moment in time that we dread that throws a proverbial spanner in the well-oiled works. You know the sort - earthquakes, swarms of locusts, world migration etc - OR - asking a newly reached 7 year old a simple question! So it was with the newly "completed" acrylics and my granddaughter.

"Oh Paby, they are just so good so far that I could faint, but they are not done, yet." She lovingly told me. "WHAT!" I turned in slow motion - mouth agape in disbelief. Where, why, what, how?

"Well, you haven't painted in their eyeshadow or eyelashes yet." Don't you just love kids; especially smart ones, even though they are your own?

But, to be honest, once I had come back off the inhaler and the medication had been given time to kick in, I was glad of her honesty. It was such a blatant mistake on my part - one of those so glaringly obvious that I had missed it.

Now we are "cool" or "chilled" again - let's take a practical look at the situation. I had given a fresh pair of eyes a chance to cast a critical eye over what I had done, and those young eyes had found a very valid fault. This brings me to say, that no matter how finished you may think something is, always leave it for a time so you can keep looking at it for faults before handing it over, or get someone else to take a look at it for you and give you their honest thoughts. Better still - DO BOTH!

A situation such as this also highlights the fact that everyone, no matter how young they may be, can have a truly valid point to make, and should only be discarded at your own peril. It gives you that final chance to make sure you have gotten it right, whatever it is you are working on, and saves you making the silliest of mistakes. Then, and only then, can you hand it over, safe in the knowledge that you have achieved your aims, and that the child really does have the right to faint!


As a result, the photographs will now appear in a future edition. Stay tuned!

Paul