Process Art

Years ago my sister, Amy, gave the family a lesson in “process art”. The general gist of the technique is to focus on the process of creating the art rather than on the finished product. It is a lot of fun and is the reason I still enjoy painting. I can paint for the sake of painting, and I don’t have to worry it about it “turning out”. I don’t really have the skills to paint anything life-like, but, surprisingly, I usually really like my finished piece.

Tonight I painted with my son, and that term, “process art”, and the memories of my sister kept bouncing around in my head.

Then, I was called away by the knee-huggers to read bed time stories. I read a couple of books then started in on Go Dog Go. My littlest was soon asleep, leaving my kindergartener and me to linger over the book alone. As I read, I started pointing out the words that I knew she could read alone. She smiled and snuggled in closer as she sounded out the words. I could tell that this was a magical moment for her. She could read the words in a real book! Lying there, I tried to soak in all of her joy. I knew it would be many months before she could decode every word in that book, but tonight, we celebrated because Katie Bug can read “dog” and “is”. I was reminded again how sweet it is to take joy in the process.