Is. has been asking lately–passionately–to paint. In
fact, "paint" is one of those five-alarm words around the house: we know that
saying it will tip Is. into such intense determination that, once it is said,
there is no getting out of some sort of painting. D. will happily set out
the water colors for her on the kitchen table (at breakfast this morning, Is.
pointed to lingering brush marks on the wall and proudly claimed it: "Baby
paint!" But she is almost as content with the graphics tablet and
digital canvass. I can
map the tablet to the exact size of the blank canvass on the interface and
assist her (by mouse) with choosing colors–all a far better match with my own
material preferences when it comes to painting. Whatever else can be said
of it, Is. is picking up on subtle distinctions between colors (i.e. dark red
and what she calls "yellow-white," although I’m still not always sure what this
latter one is). And, on any given day, she gets enough of the water colors
and enough of the graphics tablet to refer to them both as "painting" (a word
you must not mutter in our company unless you want to alter the course of our
lives for an hour).

Above, the first is just some futzing around with colors.
The second looks to me like the end of the purple dinosaurs or the smoke monster
from Lost knocking Mr. Echo onto his back.