Ah, procrastination!

My wonderful, sweet, intelligent daughter has done it again. She's put off an assignment until the last minute. This one is a writing assignment, a story (mystery, tall tale, or realistic fiction), must have handrawn illustrations (done by her), and completely written and typed by her. This isn't the first time she's had to do this assignment, either. It's school-wide, called "Author's Convention". Not only is this the third year we've done this, this is the second time this year that we've done this....last one was in the fall. To make matters worse, she's known about this for a good month, and the teacher has had a count-down display in the room! When is it due? On Tuesday, and this is Sunday. She's still writing the rough draft, too.

Now I know how my mom felt with me. I can't remember how many assignements I put off until the last minute! So Elizabeth certainly comes by it naturally, bless her heart. Her teacher has been giving them time in class to work on their stories, so either Elizabeth hasn't been using that time wisely, or just got stuck, I'm not sure which. Of course, she hates writing, not just the handwriting, but the whole writing process. She's got such a wonderful imagination though!

She's got a good start on her story, and I'm looking forward to reading the rest of it. She'll write a part, then bring it to me to read....wonderful! Except she's teasing me! Did I mention she's writing a mystery? And I absolutely love mysteries, too. So I'm looking forward to her complete story. She really does have a great, wonderful, huge imagination, which makes coming up with stories not too hard. It's just getting them started.

In her defense though, mysteries are one of the hardest stories to write, according to my sister, a 3rd grade teacher. I tend to agree with her, too. There's the plot to figure out, the plausability of the mystery, who the culprit(s) is/are, motive, opportunity, etc. And doing this on a 5th grade level, too! She's got her work cut out for her, but she's going to finish this. Quitting isn't an option, especially since this is for a grade. Think she'll learn something about procrastinating? If she's like me.....sadly, no.