Two “art schools” for children have opened in our town in the past month. They offer both mother-and-child classes and drop-off classes, or as Husband alerted me, “Cheap babysitting.” It sounds like a no-fail business model, doesn’t it? I mean, who wouldn’t want to drop off her kid for a few hours on a Saturday afternoon, the better to run a few errands or have a mani-pedi? Small businesses in our town tend to fail pretty regularly and pretty spectacularly, though, so I’m withholding my investment dollars. Even high-end businesses, like the well-designed and quite delicious New Zealand-themed restaurant, don’t get the numbers they need. Unaccountably, though, the shoe stores that only carry one size of every style hang on for years.

The local mothers’ club arranged a members-only class at one of the art schools this weekend, so I took Aitch to check it out. The school is in an old mill building that has a number of other shops. The space was kind of odd: a long, thin rectangle with a really high ceiling, under which was tucked a little loft. The bottom floor space was taken up by a large, low table, with the tiniest little chairs I’ve ever seen. I mean, they weren’t kindergarten chairs or even toddler chairs: they were seats for children that had just learned to sit up. There was no other seating, so all of us, adults and children, had to perch inches from the ground with 25 feet of space echoing above us.

The teacher told us that the theme of the week was Emotions, because any time two or more infants are in a room together, there must be a Curriculum: that’s the law. We started by singing an introductory song, which struck me as a kind of benediction before the main event. Then the teacher passed out construction paper and shiny paper and announced that we were going to make mirrors, to reflect our Emotions. It hit me, all of a sudden, that an hour and a half was a long time to do art projects with a two-year-old. Heck, ten minutes was a long time, in my experience. And I hadn’t eaten lunch yet; Aitch had not yet napped.

The object was to glue the shiny paper on the construction paper to make the mirror, then glue a construction-paper frame over the top of that. The teacher stressed, though, that any and all parts were optional: “There’s no wrong in arts and crafts!” That’s not strictly true, though. Sure, it may not be “wrong” for Aitch to squirt glitter glue all over the face of his mirror, but it’s definitely “wrong” for him to empty the entire bottle of glue just for the pleasure of watching it squirt out. When we did sand painting, it wasn’t “wrong” for him to mix two different colors of sand together, but it was “wrong” to dump the sand on the floor. I discovered that this is why I hate arts and crafts. We give kids license to make a mess, but not unlimited license. There are boundaries that nobody knows are there until they are crossed. Policing those boundaries is exhausting for the parent.

It was hard to tell if the kids were really enjoying themselves. The little girls worked diligently, producing projects that followed the teacher’s model. The little boys, who were younger, were more unfocused, but not particularly giddy. I suppose the strange setting and unfamiliar people dampened their spirits a bit. Aitch was very interested in the glitter glue and sand, and he seemed fascinated by the other kids, but he didn’t talk or laugh too much. Still, it was a really nice outing for us together. The next day, he said, “Aitch have fun at party, Mommy. Aitch like arts and craps.”

Hmm. A combination art school…and kiddie casino? Now there’s a sure-fire moneymaker.