I Call Times!

my way isn’t the only way

Not only am I learning to let go but I am also still learning to let my kids do things their own way. Today I had the perfect opportunity to practice.

Last year, my daughter asked me if she could paint her room. Since I believe kids have very few spaces that are unregulated and in which they can express themselves fully, I try hard to let them keep their rooms the way they want. I said yes, and she did - a bright blue and lime green color. She painted for a few days and then stopped leaving just two small walls of her room unpainted. It drove me a little crazy to have the project undone but it is her room and so I let it go.

Today she decided to finish the job and in the process grabbed a can of Pastel Sage paint from the garage. It was left over from some project we can’t remember. She came in and asked if it was the same color I had originally picked out for the hallway. It wasn’t the same but it was close. She then asked if she could paint the hallway with it. Ummmm, well the hallway did need a fresh coat of paint. It was currently a flat off white and since the boys room is at the end of room, all you could see was their dirty hand and finger prints. But, ummm it is the hallway, outside of her room and ummmmm, well I don’t know.

Then I remembered reading this post over at Pass the Torch and thinking when I did so that I needed to remember to find opportunities for my kids to do things on their own. This was the perfect opportunity. She could paint he hallway and if she totally screwed it up, well then we could just paint over it. That is the beauty of paint right?

She got started with a drop cloth that I thought was too small and poured what I thought was too much paint in to the tray and she even started on the middle of the wall instead of cutting in around the edges and corners first. She didn’t use painter’s tape and she didn’t remove the light switch and outlet covers but just used a brush to paint around them. This is not the way I would have done this AT ALL!

But I stayed out of it and paint the hallway she did and you know what? She did a fantastic job! Dont you think?

And she did it her way! The hallway looks brighter and cleaner and the best part is that the paint she used is a semi gloss which means IT CAN BE CLEANED! No more dirty finger prints Thanks Kelley for helping me remember that my way isn’t always the only way and that there are plenty of ways to let my kids learn and to empower them.

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