how to have fun with your kids

Well, I discovered a new game to play with my children. It's called "paint eyebrows on Mommy"....

My eyebrows have been thinning these past few weeks. I'm OK with it, I guess. I might look a little strange, especially since the left one is all gone (thanks to Frances, who plucked quite a few while I napped the other day) and the right one has just the outer half still hanging on. But what can you do.....

Watching my eyebrows change these last few weeks, I wasn't overly upset. After all, I had learned how to draw on eyebrows when I attended the "Looking Good Feeling Better" class (AKA beauty class for chemo patients) back in October, 4 days after my first chemo treatment. Our instructor, Bertram, walked us through everything we needed to know about applying makeup. The idea, I suppose, is this: even if you feel lousy during treatment, you don't have to look lousy.....you can put on some makeup and feel a little bit pretty. (Didn't Billy Crystal's character on Saturday Night Live say something like that, "If you look good, you feel good....and you look mah-velous"???)

I took the class because it was free (through the American Cancer Society) and because I wanted to learn how to draw on eyebrows. Really! It was the eyebrows. Although I did meet some very nice women in class. And the rest of the makeup tips were interesting, especially the part about applying mascara from the very bottom of the lashes and brushing outward to avoid clumps (not exactly sure why Bertram kept looking at me and stressing the word "clumps"). Not to mention, I aced the eyeshadow lesson, applied my 3 colors so perfectly that Bertram clasped his hands to his chest as he admired my work. He even said I looked like Amanda on Sex and the City (I think it might not have been a compliment, though, isn't she the tall gawky one with wacky hair?)

After my beauty class experience, I almost looked forward to my eyebrows falling out. They hung in there through chemo, though, which thrilled and amazed my doctors. But when the old brows finally did start thinning, about 3 weeks ago, I thought I could fill them in with no problem. Unfortunately, filling in eyebrows when you HAVE them is a lot different than when you can hardly FIND them. I did draw some on, but they looked too fake, too perfect! So I've been going "au natural" with the brows and just pull my baseball cap down a little lower.

So back to our new "paint eyebrows on Mommy" game.....Emma had a blast with that tonight. She was very serious as she sketched the left one with my eyebrow pencil, but when she finished, she doubled over with laughter. I took a quick peek in the mirror and joined her. She had drawn me a very lovely "angry" eyebrow. We ran down the hall to show John, Leah, and Frances, laughing so hard we couldn't even tell them what was so funny.

This was more fun than putting temporary tattoos on my bald head! On New Year's Eve, I let the girls put one (a butterfly) on my scalp. But now that my hair is growing back, it's hard to draw on my head or apply tattoos.

So it's convenient that my eyebrows have been disappearing these last few weeks. Maybe Leah will draw me some "surprised" eyebrows tomorrow.