We were all ready to some painting. I moved the table out of the house (to minimise my cleaning up, hur hur hur) and prepared the Crayola finger paint, some brushes and drawing paper. I told my little Picassos to let their imagination wild and fill the paper with whatever they liked. I gave them little styrofoam bits that came with the laser printer we bought a while ago, and the kids were very excited.

I got things ready for Nat as well, who was anticipating eagerly on the high chair. He’s not new to painting; he’s done it a couple of times at infantcare and his teachers said he was a focused learner who enjoyed the activity a lot. They say he’s never put anything in his mouth while painting. So they say.

Was he interested? Certainly. For a grand total of five seconds. He then spent the next few minutes licking the paintbrush, smearing paint on his tongue and teeth, and frightening me silly eating red ink and making slurping sounds.

The next time Nat paints, he is painting with food colours.