Oh, well hello there Tantrum. I was wondering when I was going to meet you!
It is so very hard for a toddler to be told no. No jumping on the couch. No dumping your cereal bowl over. No throwing, hitting, biting. For most things, and most of the time, we're pretty good about redirecting and telling Elliot what he can do, instead of what he can't do. In those moments, tantrum averted! But there are those times, too, when he simply must just be told No. Then, watch out. Head shaking, arms flailing, usually a full-body drop to the ground and lots of screaming. Pretty textbook.
But what's interesting is watching Elliot process those tantrums later, after he's moved on and is no longer upset. It could be at any point in the day that he remembers, and often he wakes up from his nap he launches right into remembering a tantrum that he had earlier in the day. Reenacting it, he'll shake his head and arms back and forth, stick out his tongue and says, "ahahuaghgthsh, what's dat?" Then he looks at you for an answer. If one doesn't come right away he'll repeat his question, head and arms flailing back and forth, "ahshghchsugaaahh, what's dat?"
"Oh," you say to him. "That's when you were tantruming."
Then, each and every time, he responds to that by doing the sign for crying (a finger pointed to the eye and drawn down the cheek). And he says, "Cwhy."
"Yes, that's right Elliot. You got frustrated, had a tantrum, and then you cried."
This memory and reenactment happens over and over each day. He watches us so intently as we discuss it with him, often reenacting it ourselves. And it goes in the same order every time. Always ending with, "cwhy."
Then we were exploring with wet chalk. Great big chunky chalk is a wonderful medium when it's dipped in water and drawn or painted with on paper. This project really works best on thick water color paper (which can be spendy--so I like to take my 50% off one item coupon to the big-box craft store and buy my good art paper that way. This makes big rolls of easel paper more affordable, too). But back to the wet chalk--it turns into more of a water color medium, but you can draw with it too. And if the chalk is really saturated and gets banged over and over on the paper (as toddler artists are likely to do) it comes off in great gooey heaps and adds texture to the painting. It's great, too, because I can set one picture aside to dry for a day or two then give it back (taping it down so that it doesn't slide around) and Elliot's wet fingers and new colors of chalk completely transform the picture into a whole new piece of art (again, it really takes thick water color paper can stand up to this).
And now the easel has migrated inside and Elliot is exploring with his first easel painting. I found an inexpensive set of regular Crayola washable paint and I took our smallest little tupperware containers and cut a hole in the top of each to help hold the paintbrushes upright and detract some from the sticking-of-hands into the paint cups. Not that it's not okay to get good and painty when exploring at the easel, but it also helps guide this new process of this new form of art.
So, yes. I am loving Elliot's interest in art. It does bring with it more messes and more times to have to say "no" and, sometimes, more tantrums. But my excitement to bring these experiences to him, and his interest and delight in doing them, make it all so very worth it.
One of the sweetest things we did with Elliot's Nan when she visited was to head out one afternoon for the sole purpose of finding a pink cookie (and an afternoon cup of coffee never hurts). So off to Big City Coffee we went, because if a cookie is what you're after then Big City Coffee is the place to go. And although they didn't have any pink cookies per se, this gorgeous sugar cookie with pink sprinkles worked just fine. And with Nan painstakingly picking off all of the pink sprinkles for Elliot to eat, we were all in pink-cookie-heaven. 
Elliot was in cookie heaven. I'm pretty sure he ate more cookies, sprinkles and chocolate chips in one afternoon than he's eaten in his whole life combined. Yes, happy happy happy boy! And sweet enough to share. 
