Catching some of you up on my life, since I have a few new followers. I have 2 grandchildren and my daughter living with us. We are fast approaching their 1 year anniversary back with us (Sweet Man and me).
Gerea is 10 (bright, happy, an old soul, active and artistic), Ry is 6 (chatty, charming, loves to build, also an old soul, active and high functioning Asperger with ADHD), Shelley, my lovely hard working, sweet, children loving daughter.
Both my grands draw all the time. They have learned to use both sides of the paper. They have learned to save the "best" and use the rest for recycle paper projects. They are drawing machines. I majored in Art Education in college, with a minor in earth sciences so I was well educated to be a grandmother, art teacher, flora and fauna appreciation director and I have taken additional classes in art therapy to be able to help some of the teenagers with whichI worked long, long ago in a galaxy far away. This has also proved to be invaluable with Ry.
He has this "thing" with claws. Every happy, sad, adventure, fantasy thing he draws has claws. I know that this stems from having been "clawed" by someone. Clawed equals grabbed, yanked, pushed, pulled, hurt, redirected, punished. Can't touch Ry on his shoulder, upper arm or forearm without him wincing, pulling away and being emotional. And if you touch his head......omg. So readers, he has been abused in this manner. This is both clinical from his therapist and textbook. His thereapist asked me not to make a judgement about the claws but lovelies.......I cannot handle seeing such unhappiness on paper, day in and day out. So I banished my birthday twin, grandson to 1 hour of happy drawing.
So now during happy hour, tee hee, it makes me laugh when I announce, "it's happy hour". I wanta break out the little umbrellas and snacks, but instead everything drawn is to be happy, no worries, no fretting stuff. We only started happy hour less than 3 weeks ago and the results are fabulous. Ry has given me the gift of happy hands. He even includes them in robot, pirate, dragon, dinosaur and the bad people drawings. I am not trying to get in the way of the "work" he needs to do but that's there and it's happy hour here....and it isn't even 5 o'clock (but it is somewhere).
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I love the idea of happy hour. I think this is something I'll use with my neices when they get all pissy with each other!
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad Ry is finding his "happy hands."
What a wonderful idea!!! Ah, to have young ones in the home. I miss it.
ReplyDeleteMary
Thank you for the catch up being new here it helps :) happy hour sounds wonderful x x x
ReplyDeleteDrawing therapy is a wonderful outlet! But his counselor is right about not reading too much into the claws......afterall he is a boy! That crazy chromosome they carry! LOL ..... YAY for happy hour! I think I need some of that myself!
ReplyDeleteHappy Hour is the best idea I have heard in a long time, I think I will try it with my grandchildren when they come to visit.
ReplyDeleteWhile I always enjoy my happy hour (because with the RV Vagabonds it's ALWAYS 5 o'clock somewhere), I like yours much better. It's pretty obvious that moving in with you and SM was the best thing your daughter could have done, at least for this moment in time. It appears there's a lot of healing going on in your household.
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful idea, Linda! And it's so good that Ry is reacting so well to this! know how you suffer watching him dealing with his little demons...
ReplyDeleteYou made me happy tonight!
Kisses and love from us.