Snowman Update #1

If you happened by here the other day, you might remember me mentioning the children were going to help William build his first snowman -- and that he'd chosen his template for said-snowman from the Calvin and Hobbes idea catalogue below:

He and Gabe landed on this picture to try and copy:

Though they were disappointed they couldn't manage to round up a reasonable facsimile of a canon for the first cartoon, I think they pretty much nailed the general idea of the second one.  For better or worse.  Here's the finished product:

Do you suppose I should be worried about these guys? Not these guys ^^  I mean the little guys that built these guys... Most of my friends' facebook posts over the last snowy week have featured photo shares of their children's cute smiling snowmen, complete with carrot noses and Norman Rockwellesque poses...

 But, well... this is what we've got over here.  I'm not surprised, of course. And I'm really not worried. An ironic sense of humor is especially prized in this environment, homicidal or not (See this post?).  These guys love a twist on the ordinary.  I do, too -- and it's all in fun. No, really it is!  Don't call social services on us, ok?  Even though this snowman "scene of the accident" looks a little violent,  we don't have a TV feed, carefully screen the movies we watch, don't play computer games, and don't go to malls, large sporting events, or public high schools.  I can't even remember the last time we had an altercation in the family that ended up in anything more violent than someone rolling their eyes at someone else (inside their own heads, of course, not at each oth...  Never mind.)

 The extent of these kids' exposure to real violence is vintage Bugs Bunny,  Calvin and Hobbes, and our dog, Penny, chasing down and eating rabbits.  (Oh and there was the very interesting drama today involving a dead possum under the boys' bedroom window.  "And it wasn't playing possum, Mom!" But that's a whole other blog post.)  But...  really.  A sense of drama, of irony, even of the macabre is normal, and for most people I expect you could say it's played out in their Halloween traditions.  We don't do Halloween, but you'll find some of that same drama and irony played out here with an edge (or a shovel full) of humor in snowman sculptures, crazy kid-authored novellas, whiteboard drawings, and sarcasm --  all year round.  Makes for all kinds of interest, let me tell you.

Thank-you, God for my great big cuh-razy family!

(I wonder what will show up out in the snow tomorrow?)