Image by StockSnap from Pixabay
A magazine suffered a hard, hard fate when it came to the Ludlow household if the Ludlow grandparents did not think it was of sufficient informational value, and yet not harmful in its imagery for their grandchildren.
Eleanor (11), Edwina (8), and Amanda (7), woke up from their nap and started working on their weekly allotment before dinner – the neat disassembly of magazines for various art projects they wanted and the Ludlow grandsons wanted to do, from collage to papier mache once a week.
Blunt scissors, an eye for colors, and the ruthlessness of Captain Ludlow their grandfather himself – it took all of about ten minutes for Eleanor to break apart a magazine and give a third to Amanda and Edwina before they broke it all the way down. Large scraps were put in the papier mache basket for when Mrs. Ludlow made paste with them; the rest Eleanor swept up so well you would never know how many magazines had met their end that way.
In addition to the girls' personal projects, since nobody knew how to draw all the things the little Ludlows wanted in their upcoming comic book, Eleanor kept a sharp eye for things Andrew (10) said they might need, and George (9) also came and took a look at what Eleanor put to the side for them.
“Yep, definitely, this right here,” the two boys said often, and carefully put side characters and landscape pictures into folders.
“The girl characters need to have some flowers and pretty things around,” Edwina said, “so just don't take the boy stuff. Girls matter too.”
“Oh, all right, all right,” George said. “Nobody said they didn't anyway!”
“Remember,” Andrew said, “all our pictures are going to be in the book too, so, nobody and how handsome and pretty they are with all the stuff they love is about to be left out.”
“Okay,” Edwina and George both said, and the moment passed.
Captain Ludlow referred to Andrew some times as “Lil' Captain,” because the eldest boy actively worked on the cohesion and organization of his peers, and thus was the natural leader.