Christmas Pictures

Well, they aren't exactly the Christmas pictures you'd expect to see a couple of days after Christmas.

On Thanksgiving, my mom gave all her children, grandchildren, and my dad a 5X7 canvas, paints, brushes, and instructions to return them to her on Christmas painted. No excuses. That's all she wanted for Christmas.

So that's what she got! The Spicer children, for the most part, took her instructions to heart and had a great time painting a canvas. The Spicer mom and dad also took it seriously. At the same time, we all had fun creating our very different paintings.

Anna painted a bridge to a path to a home on a hill.

Alex made golden trees.

I think Dean's started out as two orange houses but turned into a purple polka dotted tree.

Song created an ostrich on the savannah.

Emma's is just like her--sweet.

Ella is holding her lovely abstract work upside down.

Better!

I'm not sure if Vera's abstract work is upside down or not. Pretty sure she doesn't care.

Luke was not going for the paint. He used pencils to create a cool house.

He insisted this is his mug shot.

All good mug shots deserve a side view. Sigh.

It's hard to tell, exactly, but those are clay flowers attached to the canvas.

The clear winner, in terms of artistic beauty and merit, was unanimously awarded to John. He took a picture of part of our landscaping and then painted it (taking many liberties as to the actual beauty of said landscape in its current winter incarnation). He also took shards of rock from our yard and affixed them to the painting in certain spots. It looks really cool. John has not painted anything since junior high school. I think he was as surprised as the rest of us that it turned out so beautifully.

It's hard to see again the background of his shirt, but it was really pretty.

I guess next year we'll have to actually buy NiNi a gift...