The Serene Queen of the Tween Scene

The Love of Reading continues! This one, The Serene Queen of the Tween Scene, didn't make it as a greeting card because it really wants to be square and my greeting cards aren't square, they're 5x7's. However, my daughter singled this one out as her favorite and she picked out a big ol' square print from my new printer (which still works like a dream). Do you want a print? Let me know, I'll add them to my shop. I size the prints for the IKEA Ribba frames, which are inexpensive but substantial. I like them.

The inspiration behind this drawing: pretty simple. It's got a nice rainy-day feel, with a bean bag chair (which I am told are the very best furnishings for a reading nook -- my daughter's principal said so) and a suggestion of a beaded curtain, or a suggestion of rain. Our pigtailed tween is digging on some poetry; she is growing up, but she is not all grown up yet.

I am enjoying my daughter's tweenhood so much. Every year is better than the last -- and I started out pretty dang besotted with her -- so it's almost unbearably wonderful. I'm serious. But in the tween years, there is a great pressure on kids to leap forward, to grow up already. One thing I keep telling my daughter is that this is the only time she gets to be a child. Childhood is so short. Adulthood goes on and on and on. There's plenty of time to be an adult.

Lately my daughter has enthusiastically discovered the Jackson Five. About two weeks ago I dropped some stuff off at our local Goodwill and our Goodwill guy was singing a Michael Jackson song. (The Goodwill Guy has a beautiful voice, by the way.)

Me: "Oh, I miss Michael Jackson."
Goodwill Guy: "That really touches my heart."
Me: "My little girl is really into the Jackson Five now. I showed her their videos on YouTube, and I told her that Michael is about the same age as she is, and she's amazed."
Goodwill Guy: "That's why he was so messed up, though. He never had a childhood. It's so sad, what happened to him."
Me: "You're right."

The luckiest of us spend our childhood being children.