Lamb Chop is immortalized in print

I'll admit, looking back on this, I'm a little embarrassed. I think to myself, "I was more imaginative than that! Why was everything about the food we ate?" But, I feel the need to share this anyway.

Oh, how I wanted to be cool! And when I got Football Lamb Chop, I thought, here is the key to my popularity! And a note about that: in second grade, I went through a phase of really wanting to hang out with the boys. I think it was brought on by my crush on the cutest boy in the second grade. He looked like Leonardo DiCaprio (Titanic came out that year, too). I thought to myself, if I like football, then we'll be friends, and then he will learn how I'm just an all-around cool girl! I should also mention that my wish for a boy to like me pretty much peaked in elementary school.

I would look back and say, "Oh, little Christine! Just be yourself! You're my favorite!" But looking back at this story, I realize that I was never betraying my true self. Maybe that's why my brilliant plan didn't work.

The crush remained all through third grade, though we were separated by classroom walls. By fourth grade, the first occurrence of this characteristic trend emerged: I couldn't be attracted to a crush for more than a year if I didn't see him often. It was over. He never knew. (He probably did. I wasn't discreet.)

But anyway! I'm making this sound like a tragic love story, rather than the glimpse into the neurotic, approval seeking nature of my childhood.

So, without further ado but with frequent comments throughout,

"Football Lamb Chop"

Lamb Chop was something I drew frequently. Footballs were not.

Yes, we get it.

I have no idea what I meant to express with this. Was I saying that Lamb Chop grabbed the pencil and wrote her own name? Or was I going to dedicate it to my family, and Lamb Chop sabotaged that plan?

I think they made us put like three blank pages in the beginning of our stories.

In case you didn't get it, this book is about football. Lest you doubt somewhere along the way.

Pictured: Lamb Chop in a shirt she didn't own. Also, I did some research for authenticity. I asked the boy who was sitting next to me in class, "What's another football team besides the Vikings?" And he said, "The Buccaneers."

Yes. If Lamb Chop is a member of the Vikings, then I can be their coach. Oh, and the confusion of our relationship! I'm her good friend, her coach, and then...what? Her mom? But before we move on, let me tell you what we ate.

Do you believe that I know a lot about football?

And here's where you start to have to ask yourself, "Who is telling this story?"
Also, come on Christine, you can draw better than that. Oh yeah. I just remembered, I wrote two versions of this story, and by the time I had to write this second one, I was running out of time, so the pictures kind of suck.

Ah hah hah...I set myself up for that one! Lamb Chop, oh you!

"when she's mad, she's really mad."

(Inside Picture) LOL. Also: never had an ice cream maker. I think I got the idea from Samantha from American Girl.

And then we played Monopoly for 2 hours! How do we ever find time to do these things with all our football practicing?

Then another day happened just like this one. Also, I didn't like pancakes. I think I thought that cool people like pancakes, though.

Oh my! The conflict and resolution is all happening so quickly! Such sudden details! This was my reasoning for me staying home because it was Lamb Chop's birthday: I had to make a cake for her and get the house ready for her party.
"I know where the Super Bowl is!"
And the detail about a dollar for pop after the game? Cute.

"About an hour later..."
Here's why I had two drafts of the story. The first one did not include all these details on the last page. But I realized that I had to rewrite it because I had this vivid image in my head of Lamb Chop victoriously waving her empty pop can in the air, and it needed to be expressed.
Could you make that sun a little creepier, Christine?

Sports: another thing the cool kids liked that I, in truth, did not like.

Under the "Complements" section, I was reminded of something else. When we read our stories in class, I brought in Lamb Chop and had her say all of her lines. I think my second grade teacher thought I was a little nuts.