Ever since Gary posted the question about how artistic you were, I’ve been very sad and depressed. See, on a scale of 1-10 I’m like a 2 in that department. Of course, it depends on what kind of artistic you mean, but I’m thinking drawing, painting, sketching. I just can’t do it. My stick people look like sticks and my trees look like the stick threw up! It’s not pretty! Ok, I’m not sad and depressed, but it did get me thinking about my siblings and all the talents/things we have in common or do not.
There are four kids in my family. I am #3 of 4. I have 2 older sisters and 1 younger brother. My second sister was born in April of ’78 and I was born in Sept of ’79. Yeah, somebody was busy! Out of all of us, people usually think I’m the oldest. I don’t know if it’s the way I look or more the way I act that make people think that. I’ve been told for a long time that I was so mature for my age….blah blah blah. I mean, thank you very much I think. The similarities and differences only begin there.
Three out of four of us have blonde hair. Sister #2 got stuck with brown. Three out of four of us are tall. Sister #1 is short. Well, short to us but really I guess she’s average height! I’m 5′ 11.5″ so everyone is short to me!!! Three out of four of us are right handed. My brother is the lefty like my dad, but my mom is right handed. Funny, all the girls are right and the boys are lefty’s! Three out of four of us played an instrument in school. Sister #2 never showed interest, but I really don’t think she’s got a musical bone in her body! Three out of four of us did NOT play sports. I’m the only one that played and ya know what? I didn’t suck! My brother can golf, but only played on the school team one year I believe. Artistically, like I said above, I have no talent! But, my 3 siblings can all draw well. My brother use to make cartoon characters, my sisters can both draw, and sister #1 can paint well. She is also very crafty. She can go to the craft store and buy a bunch of stuff, take it home and make it into something to sell! She makes wreaths for Christmas (or anytime of year) she makes coasters with pictures on them, she does signs, she makes knick knacks. The list goes on! That all skipped me! Academically, my brother kind of got left in the dust by us girls. Don’t get me wrong, he’s smart and has great common sense and life skills, but us girls all got A’s in school. He got B’s and C’s and some D’s! (Not that B’s and C’s are bad!) I think he just didn’t like school like we did so he wasn’t obsessed with getting A’s. Believe me, us girls had to get A’s. I don’t know why, just the way we are. I couldn’t figure out why mom and dad never pushed him to do better, but they didn’t. I never heard them belittle him about his grades. It was “just try your best”. Kind of irked me sometimes.
Ok, this got way too long, but I find it interesting how it’s always 3 against one in our family. Is your family like this? Do you notice that you and your siblings are “split” on what you do well and what you don’t? Do you take after one side of your family more than another (whether that’s mom or dad or grandparents)? Thanks Gary, for posing the question that got this all started!
Us Girls..Our Views 
First I cant draw either.I also make stick people.But Sibling differences add spice to life.I am the oldest of five.We are all different,yet we have some things the same.Our differences are what make our family unigue.I believe that each person is different and unigue in ther own way.We all bring something of ourselves into the family dynamics.I look at my kids.They are all so different,yet so unigue in their own way.Life would be boring if we were all alike.As for talents,i guess we all have our own special talents to contribute to this world.
I have 6 sisters and 5 brothers. I’m #11 of 12. Second to they youngest. I love to draw but it looks more “cartoonish” instead of realistic. My brothers and sisters all have major talents – me, I’ve never been the crafty kind which honks me off. I have tried and it never works out for me because I tend to try to hard to make things “perfect” and arts and crafts are not necessarily perfect.
For me, I have my hand in too many pots at the same time. I knit, write, draw, quilt, blah blah blah, but if I could just find the ONE thing to do that I LOVE, I’d be killer at it. I’m just spread to thin all over the place. I need to focus!
I’ll bet you are wayyyy more artistic than you give yourself credit for. Do your siblings write? You sure as hell do! That’s a form of art right there!
My sisters can write well, but they don’t blog or anything. Writing is an art form, but I want to be able to draw or make something that looks good!
I am #3 of 6. I can’t think of many things where there’s 5 vs 1 or any male-female patterns. Mostly we’re on a continuum. All of us are very interested in music and at least care about academics. All but one of us are introverts, with the baby being an extrovert. We all have blue/hazel eyes and are right-handed. We range from blonde to almost black hair. We range from slim to quite roly-poly. None of us is huge on sports (other than watching football) but most of us dabbled a little in school sports at one time or another. Most of us can draw OK but are not art fanatics.
My nephew is the odd guy out in our family. He is the only one with brown eyes and the only lefty in the entire bunch. He gets those from his mom.
If there’s any sibling rivalry in our family, it’s my sister wishing she could do the things I’ve done throughout our lives. I was the best academically and artistically, fairly capable musically, and very strong and fast; while my sister was clumsy in all these areas though she tried to “emulate” me. So I unintentionally caused her all kinds of frustration, I guess.
It’s interesting to watch my daughters grow, as they are very different in many ways, though they will be in the same grade at school. The little one has already started to surpass the older in some areas, while showing no interest in others. It will be interesting to see whether they develop any jealousy over the obvious differences.
I used to write poetry in high school. Just random crap but I had this small group (2) of followers. They always wanted to read my crap and they always seemed to appreciate it. It was kind of strange. I don’t know what happened to all of it ..I am guessing it all got destroyed at the old homestead 😦
I can draw a little and would always hurry up and draw when that one probably phoney college ad would come in wanting you to draw that turtle and send it in for them to grade for drawing. I just sat home and drew the animals in the ad for my own fun. I did a freehand drawing of Fleetwood Mac one time. I think that got ruined too. Everybody thought that was pretty good. My mom could really draw so what little bit I could sketch had to have come from her.
I am the youngest of 4 …all girls (oh my poor parents)! There are only 3 of us living. The sister that passed away is the one who could do macramai (you know tying the yarn….big in the 70’s)…she did counted cross stitch. I think she had all the artsy fartsy craftiness of the girls. The other 3 of us took up cooking. That’s about all we can do.
I am totally envious of anybody who can sing or play instruments. I wanted to be in a band so bad. I can play a couple different instruments just not good enough to fill any demand of when they get specific and say ..”band needs GOOD……. player”…can we take good out of that requirement?
I was in band and not too bad at it, but I always wanted to be able to sing. Not just kind of sing in church, but sing like the pro’s and celebrity’s and make millions at it. Maybe if I get a vocal cord transplant!!!
I was just thinking about this the other day Sue. My brother when we were young would take anything a part. He just couldn’t help himself. I on the other hand could care less how something worked. I think Siblings can be hard wired differently. I think Creativity can run in a family, generational. Some times I feel like the feeling a person is not creative keeps them from having fun with it. I use to feel like that and when I realazied I would have to do some ugly art for awhile as I learn, that was helpful. I also started out with stick figures. I also think there are 100000 of ways to express creativity. Even decorating a room ,taking pictures, cooking,putting outfits together. To me being creative with something puts me in the moment right brained. I think picking something that seems fun to you, is important. The idea of it being relaxing and not judging it or comparing to others. But just doing it because it’s fun to do. I think you probably are very creative you just haven’t tapped into it yet.;+)
This was fun to read. I didn’t know a lot of this stuff about you guys. You also don’t give yourself enough credit. You said you wouldn’t be good at scrap-booking and look how well you do. What about your trumpet playing AND what about the track record THAT IS STILL THE RECORD??? Your name is still THERE! That is cool!
Darryl and I are alike “basically.” We are both quirky and our personalities are similar. We are both shy unless we know you. We were both fairly good at any sport we tried. We know what the other is thinking. We are pretty close. I have to say that our “differences” may just be gender related. Just your plain differences between men and women. I was talking to my mom about this this morning and she was quick to point out our differences but they were mainly I’m a woman and he’s a man. Not “personality” related but gender.
Does that make sense??
Oh suuuuuuuure, blame it ALL on little ole me! (bowing head in shame)
I am #1 of 2. My little sister and I are pretty equal when it comes to playing sports, creativity, art, etc. About the only thing we are not equal in is intelligence. I love my sister to death but to put it mildly, she is a moron. She however knows she is a moron and makes no attempt to hide it. Other than that, we are about the same in everything else.
I can’t draw or paint worth a darn! I do feel that I am pretty artistic when it comes to photography and photoshop. I make my art with my camera and computer.
Sister #2 is our moron, Gary! Actually, she’s very book smart, but when it comes to common sense, it completely passed her by! Some days she makes me want to beat her with a stick b/c all of us “see the light” and she can’t figure out what we’re looking at! You are very artistic with your camera and maybe someday I’ll be too.
I am a jack of all trades and a master of none.
Funny subject for me. If I would have answered this yesterday it wouldn’t have been very nice! My sisters really suck sometimes! My brother pisses me off so as of yesterday they didn’t do anything right or better than me!
Today’s a new day! Although they all kinda suck still! I love them, really I do!
My brother is the very passive one who is very artistically incline. I’m OK, not anything to be bragging about! To tell ya the truth none of my sisters are great at anything. We all had a hard life and they just live day by day. I’m #4 of 4 sisters. #1 and I are stay at home moms who have daycare in our homes. #2 is a Mary Kay Consultant, she’s very confident and says what’s on her mind! #3 is in the nicest way I can say this…hopeless. None of did very well in school and only one of graduated. #3 has no common sense and just doesn’t get at all!
I didn’t grow up with #2 and 3 so not too sure about how they were growing up. I grew up with my brother and oldest sister. None of us will be writing Pulitzer prize winners, but you may find one of in the loony bin before too long…not saying which one!