Lara is a Children's Book Author? Nah, She's just Conscientious.

 Once upon a time, there was a lady trying to entertain her three young nephews without the use of screens—a task roughly equivalent to defusing a bomb with a spoon.

"Here are the Legos," she tried, gesturing hopefully at ten thousand tiny plastic barefoot stepping hazards. Nope.

She knew the "Let's read books!" trick would no longer work, since they'd graduated to independently reading graphic novels and chapter books—apparently her dramatic read-aloud voices had lost their magic somewhere around age seven.

Baking up something yummy in the kitchen didn't appeal to them either, since home-baked goodies taste different than store-bought ones and they prefer the unvariability of the store-bought ones. 

Playing a card game worked for a while, but then someone got grumpy that they didn't win, so that endeavor went down in flames faster than you can say "Go Fish."

Then, when one of them asked for paper, writing utensils, and a stapler so he could start writing his own comic book, she decided to join in on the fun.

Now, please keep in mind that Lara is not an artist, nor is she an author. In fact, the list of all the talents she does not have is approximately 40 gazillion items long, and one might say that she may be one of the least naturally talented people on earth. She's pretty sure that when God was handing out talents to everyone before they came to earth, His bag was running low on that fine day in April, and so Lara got funeral program maker, the gift of interpreting the language of 2-year-olds, and conscientiousness. It's a random assortment of skills to be sure—like getting dealt a 2, a 7, and a joker in poker—but she's done the best she can with it. And it was her conscientiousness that would not allow her to give in to their cries for screen time that day.

So, without further ado, here is the comic book that she created for the boys.  Be prepared to be slightly bemused and to continue thinking/knowing that Lara is a bit of a weirdo.   

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"The Adventures of the Three Brothers" by Aunt Lara 

Three boys went up and over a mountain.  

They went through the forest fighting off wild chickens along the way. 

Next they went on a long voyage across the ocean. 

They fought off sharks and narwhals along the way. 

Then they landed at the North Pole and built an igloo. 

They made friends with the reindeer and visiting penguins. ( She couldn't let them believe that penguins actually lived at the North Pole, so she had to put in the disclaimer that they were visiting.) 

And together they fought off the space invaders trying to kidnap Santa. 

Dedicated to Manuel, Isaiah, and Jesus.  The end.  

 

 

Yes, yes.  I know it's amazing...

 

...ly lame.   Especially compared to Sonic the Hedgehog... 

But it impressed them for approximately 4.2 seconds after which they started asking all about the snowball gun on the last page.  

What do you think?   Should Lara start writing and illustrating children's books in her spare time?   

Never mind, you don't need to answer that. 

Back to conscientious funeral program making she goes, while trying to get as many facetimes as possible with Ollie ...


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