One of my daughter’s favorite pastimes is o-egaki (picture drawing). Even before she could walk, she was scribbling with crayons…the washable kind, a set of 12 colors that my wife and I got for her at around her birthday last May.

We quickly learned the sagacity of covering most of the living room floor with old newspapers as the little artist created her various masterpieces on the back of discarded printer paper (urakami). Unfortunately, newspaper doesn’t stick quite as well to the walls, or to the chairs, or the table, or the bookcases, or…

The Artist and the Chair

Our daughter soon decided that she preferred to sit in her “eating chair” while drawing…on the chair itself, of course. When she graduated to a high chair for dinner time, we turned the “eating chair” into an “artist’s chair,” and it was decorated by many a work of creative inspiration before being retired a few weeks ago (since our daughter has gotten too big to sit in it).

Now, our daughter uses an old coffee/card table as her art studio space, usually drawing while standing and chanting, “Usagi, usagi [bunny, bunny]” or “Daddy, daddy” to herself. She’s gotten pretty good at the letter O. Just this past week she repeatedly asked us to draw balloons (specifying which colors she wanted us to use), within which she drew three Os…for eyes and a mouth.

Before scarring them all with incredible purple and black zigzags. Picasso, watch out.