“Give a kid a few pieces of paper”… my late Mom-in-law would say.
Our grandson Brian, turning 3 years old in February, lives nearby, so he’s a frequent visitor at Grandma and Pop-up’s house.
Brian knows just about where we keep everything.
Everything.
He’s at that age where he’ll pull up a chair to climb up to the cookies in the cabinet at the far end of the kitchen. The cookies behind the tea bags and oatmeal and cold cereal he doesn’t like.
He knows that his train set, the one he inherited from his older cousins, is in a big sturdy bag in the tiny coat closet in the front room.
He knows that the kids’ books, shelves full, are right at the top of the front stairs next to his girl cousins’ guest bedroom.
He knows that the toilet paper is stored on the bottom shelf of another kitchen cabinet for, well… you know, when he wants to wind toilet paper around his favorite things.
He knows that we keep all the grandkids’ inside games and puzzles and toys in a cabinet in my office and all the outside games and balls of every sports variety – in our garage.
Recently, Brian has discovered a new place in our home and new entertainment – Pop-up’s desk. Pop-up sometimes works from home, and keeps stationery and envelops from our family business, Barrington Printing, handy in our home office. Brian is a frequent visitor to our business location, as well, so he knows the work drill, very efficiently picking up a small handful of paper and envelops, always whispering, “Barrington Printing,” like it’s some magical name, going about his work of sorting, stacking, playing.
Playing his work, his wildly imaginative work!
I can hear my late Mom-in-law, as if she’s standing right next to me right now, with her words of wisdom, “Give a kid a few pieces of paper…”
Then she’d chuckle.
Because like all parents, Barry and I, especially around Christmas, would search for those perfect toys that each of our four kids would dream Santa would bring. Always those richly advertised toys or games, too… the ones in limited quantities, impossible to get.
It’s funny because I remember those days, but I have no recollection of the desired toys. Well, maybe the elusive Cabbage Patch Kids for Audrey and Jane.
But I will always remember our kids at their Nana Flo’s house, opening the bottom cabinet in her kitchen and playing for hours with her old pots ‘n pans and Tupperware. Or grabbing paper and kids’ scissors, glue and ordinary pencils from the top drawer of her little yellow set of drawers tucked neatly in her kitchen.
There’s a lot of wisdom in pots ‘n pans and paper.
And Pop-up thinks Brian is ready to join the family business, 3rd generation – (4th generation, counting that Flo worked for Barry at Barrington Printing, too)!
Yep. Give a kid a few pieces of paper and maybe there’s a CEO-in-the-making!
