It’s 15 degrees. The trees are bare. But this Saturday’s Operation Avoid Screen Time had the kids playing with leaves.
It’s 15 degrees. The trees are bare. But this Saturday’s Operation Avoid Screen Time had the kids playing with leaves. I had forgotten all about the late summer leaves we pressed until a few days ago. When I spotted the bound stack of construction paper, cardboard and dried leaves in the corner of the basement, I knew I had a good winter craft project on my hands.
I gathered the materials: an inexpensive laminating machine borrowed from work, laminating sheets, pressed leaves, and some scissors. I cleared the kitchen table. As I began removing the straps from the leaf press, I heard the pounding of little feet.
Andy, my six-year-old, was first to drag over a chair. He grabbed a small bundle of white pine needles as I flipped through the cardboard and paper layers of the leaf press.
“This looks like a squid,” he said.
Before long we had laminated those pine needles along with a few maple, ash, and cedar leaves. As a large basswood leaf with a hole in it dropped out of the laminator, Andy grabbed it, saying, “I’ve got to examine this.”
With our pile of laminated leaves growing, Andy pounced with scissors in hand. He did all the planning. “Teamwork, Daddy, you cut to here,” he said, pointing to the narrow space between leaves. “Then give it to me and I’ll finish it.”
I felt his attention beginning to wane when he asked, “Is this the last one?” I told him it was if he wanted it to be. He quickly replied, “Let’s do another one because I love this.” Guess I misjudged the situation.
An hour after starting, we had finished 12 leaves. While laminating and cutting I tried to teach Andy how to tell one leaf from another. To be honest, I don’t think any of it sunk in. He was perfectly happy just imagining the hungriest caterpillar chewing that hole in the basswood leaf.
