She colors on EVERYTHING...

Good lord help me! I still think to this day, there is something not right with my boys. :laughing: They NEVER got into mischief that I read on here or hear elsewhere. No taking off clothes, fooling around in bedrooms, taking off diapers, climbing out of cribs, emptying wipe containers, getting into diaper cream, writing/coloring on the walls, furniture, etc etc. Seriously. None of it.



And then.... There's Annabella. She's a whole new ballgame that child! We got the kids an art desk for Christmas. Nice, white, big..great. Except She has covered every white spot with crayons. Now, I don't freak out because Magic Eraser takes it right off. But my goodness! She has moved onto the stools as of late. She also colored on the wall. You know, the freshly painted walls. Again, thank you Magic Eraser. Chalk outside? Yeah, she colors on the wood, the wall, the cozy coupe's, the chairs. Has she ever heard of the driveway?!? And the other day she got quiet(I know, I know...), I found her in my room, on my bed. My nice new bedset, with the 'show' pillows. And in her hand was a pencil, to which she said to me, "Look Mommy! I color!" And man, was that child proud! LOL! Let's not forget it's a white pillow...

So-aside from locking up the crayons...what did you do to curb this behavior? Even when we go out to eat, and she's given paper to color on...she opts for the bench, the chair, the table... You get the drift!

 

Yeah, my guys are a total menace when it comes to any sort of writing implement. About a month ago I found Jack in our bedroom, permanent Sharpie in hand (that he'd snagged out of Dada's drawer ), standing next to a black scribble on my lemon-yellow, custom-upholstered chaise lounge. :gah: I'm still not sure how I'm going to remove that.

I basically have to lock up just about everything that they can write with. ardon: They do have some *washable* crayons on their easel, but everything else is locked up or they will be used to draw on the walls, floors, furniture, themselves.... Even if I tell them not to do it, and correct them, they just can't seem to help themselves! If they're misusing their crayons, I will tell them that I'll take the crayons away if they write on anything but paper. This helps in the short term, but they'll forget and do it again in an hour or so! :laughing:

 

Do you make her help clean it? Maybe that will help. Although my girls think the Magic Eraser is super fun, so that backfired for me. Sorry I am not more help, but I do understand where you're coming from! We plan on repainting when they get older.

 

Our boys can't be trusted with crayons and markers yet either. Granted, the crayons wipe right off of our hardwood floors, but I get tired of cleaning up. So just last weekend I bought some of that Crayola "magic" paper and markers. They can use those markers on anything but no color comes off of them. They ONLY "color" the special paper. I think its pretty darn cool! I'm hoping once they use those special markers/paper enough they'll know, or only care, to use crayons and such on paper as well. We'll see!

 

We only use the Color Wonder paper/markers here too! But reading your stories always cracks me up! My boys are total "troublemakers" so I'm hoping Hannah is opposite! Seems you have the vice-versa!

 

I'm glad you find humor in this!

Man, I never thought of her helping clean it up. Probably because it would take an eternity to do so! LOL! But I will definitely try it. I hate to ban all crayons being out due to her. But as of now, that's how it is. We do have Color Wonder as well, of which she took regular crayon/markers to the paper and colored them all in. And she's taken that marker and wrote here, there, and everywhere.

I really think I need to sit down and model the proper behavior more often. On my to-do list!

And Kim-I hope Hannah isn't a "troublemaker" but I don't have high hopes for the girls!

 

I would also lock up everything until she earns the privilege of having it around.
Please for your sake, lock up your sharpies. Keep them somewhere where she would never find them. Awhile back someone had a pic of a leather sofa "decorated" with black sharpie marker.

The coloring pages might be the right way.

Can she play at a friend's house where they color only on the paper?

Good luck!