Makers Of Wonderful. Marvelous Pigs

I think the crafty gene skips a generation. Through my own informal research (which has been exhaustive if not scientifically vetted), I’ve determined that most of the people I know who love to create things out of other things do not end up with children who share their passion. But they almost always seem to have a grandparent who passed their love on down the line. I don’t know if it’s because children always try to define themselves in opposition to their parents, or if kids get so sick of the trappings of crafts that pile up everywhere in the creative process, or if they have never had to stretch their creative muscles because their parent already knows how to make whatever they want, or what, but I have seen this pattern play itself out time and again. My aunt lives for crafting (one of her world-famous sock monkeys was even featured on the “Ellen DeGeneres Show”), her daughters not so much. I come to life behind a sewing machine or crochet hook, but my mother, bless her heart, who has come through in a pinch when she has to, dreads the fabric and yarn domain. So, it seems we are either crafty or not. And some things will resonate with us or they won’t. Phoebe Gilman wrote a book about a freckle-nosed girl with a messy room and a penchant for making stuff. She called it The Wonderful Pigs of Jillian Jiggs, but I think it’s really about me.

http://www.amazon.com/Wonderful-Pigs-Jillian-Jiggs/dp/0590413414

http://www.phoebegilman.com/home.html

Read To Me

Shortly before Keilana was born, Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses set off a firestorm of controversy over an author I had never heard of before. When he began getting death threats, the popular media aimed the spotlight on Rushdie for his fifteen minutes. I particularly remember one interview where he said that, in his family of origin, the written word was so sacred that if someone accidentally dropped a book, they had to pick it up and kiss it in remorse. That kind of commitment made a soul-deep impression on my young, pregnant self and I vowed to teach my soon-to-be child an appreciation for books. I took a whole stack of them with me to the hospital and began reading to her the moment we were alone. I read to her every day, including the day we sat in the pediatrician’s office for her two-week checkup. When I told the doctor that his staff spent our entire wait mocking me in quiet nurse-y voices, he asked me if the baby listened when I read. Defensive, I launched into a detailed description of how Keilana’s eyes would get bigger looking at the pictures and how she would sit quietly and…and... When I finished, he just said, “Well, then, it doesn’t matter what they think.” And we just kept reading. So, it touches my heart when I watch my first baby, now a beautiful woman, share Phoebe Gilman’s Grandma and the Pirates, or any of her childhood favorites, with our little caboose.


http://www.amazon.com/Grandma-Pirates-Phoebe-Gilman/dp/059043425X


http://www.phoebegilman.com/home.html