Last Friday, Robbi asked you guys to draw robots:
Draw a robot! Tell us what it’s made out of. Tell us what it does. Does it destroy cities? Does it swim underwater? Does it rescue kittens stuck in trees? Does it eat huge stacks of waffles?
We got some great responses, the first one from Joe.
According to Joe’s mom,
“Joe’s robot eats blue grapes. (Why? Just because~)
He is made of some green cubes that are translucent, so you can kind of see the inside.
He wears a pirate hat. (Why? Just because~)
He counts the amount of blue grapes with his feet.
And, he lives in a bulldozer, Joe says. *_*”
Look at those amazing feet! They do seem to be counting something. And why blue grapes? And why translucent green cubes? And why the pirate hat? And why the bulldozer? I love Joe’s imagination.
And now from Spencer. His mom says:
“Spencer has a pair of pajamas with a robot on it that says, “Time to sleep!” He drew a picture telling the story of that robot. From Spencer: “The robot’s mother is in the cave, saying, “Time to sleep!” The child robot is saying, “Huh?” Everybody else is already sleeping in their houses since it’s at night. The child robot is made out of blue pipes and gears. That’s how food goes through his body.”
I had never thought about it before, but of course it makes sense that even robots have to sleep. And that they must even have mothers to tell them that it’s time to go to bed.
And, from Tyler:
“My robot is on a boat in the ocean at sunset. His hair is made out of purple fur. The waves are splashing on his boat. He’s saying, “Yes!” since he wants to go swimming instead of being on the boat.”
While I admire the adventurous spirit displayed by Tyler’s robot, I wonder if he knows that taking a swim is likely to result in traumatic short circuiting. Or maybe I’m overthinking this? Maybe furry robots can swim like otters.
When it came time for Kato to draw his Robot, he decided that he wanted a bit of help. So I got things started, following his cues.
He wanted a triangular body, so I drew a triangular body. He wanted a robot with two arms, two legs, a head, and a “king crown,” and I did my best to follow instructions. At that point, Kato got inspired to take over.
Here’s what he had to say about his robot when he was done:
“This robot’s name is Kato. He likes to play. He likes to read books. So many books. He stands in the green grass. He has a heart.”
Note that the robot is surrounded by books of many colors. Kato, who did not feel up to the task of drawing books, asked me to add them. Note that the robot has two hearts. Kato drew his and then, unsatisfied with his efforts, enlisted me to draw another.
At first, Alden seemed game to draw a robot, using colored pencils instead of her preferred watercolors. She worked industriously while Kato and I doodled the fellow above. When she was done, she showed me her drawing and I asked her what kind of robot it was. Her reply?
“It’s not a robot. I want it to be a mouseling instead. It plays and reads books and spells her name all by herself. The mouseling is named Penelope Sunelope. It’s a pretty name, but funny, but nice.”
And there you have it. Not a robot. Please don’t mistake this mouseling for a robot.
I was tempted to let my collaboration with Kato suffice for this week’s drawing, but knowing how much Spencer likes to see what I come up with (this, according to his mom), I decided to do a drawing of a robotic elephant named Clarence. Clarence is unstoppable because he has two wheels and two skis. So he can basically go anywhere. Unless you sneak up at him and throw a rock inside his gear panel, in which case, you can defeat him in seconds.
And lastly, here is Robbi’s drawing.
Robbi says:
“This robot wants to make friends with the tall buildings, but I think he’s in for a sad surprise.”
My favorite part of the drawing is that sickly green sky. That’s exactly the color I think the sky would be on the night that the giant robots invade (even if all they really want is to make friends with our tall buildings).
Thanks, everyone, for sending us your robots. I’m glad that they exist in your imaginations and not right here in Chestertown.