Being A Modelling Father

I am the father of four girls, one who is just about to turn fifteen, and who believes a world can only exist if it can be accessed by her laptop or mobile phone, an eight year old who doesn’t understand why the sisters that she worships think she is an annoyance, and twelve year old twins who are still at that age where they think I am the greatest man on earth. These two also like to build things ( when they’re not playing with Sylvannians ) and ever since I showed them how to make a diorama each for their animals have been keen to make more.

I have a large box of models from my first year of modelling that I call my practice models. These are kits I bought already made, halfmade, or cheap for the sole purpose of practicing skills and techniques on. Since I’ve moved on to better quality kits these older Tamiya and Italeri kits remain in a box gathering dust. So when one day I casually mentioned this box when they were having a boring wet, Saturday afternoon I was in seventh heaven when they both proclaimed that they would love to build a tank, having always believed that I was doomed to never have a child to whom I could pass on my ageless wisdom.

So I pulled the box out, they each chose a kit, one an old Tamiya Leopard, the other an old Tamiya Stuart, and then I sat them down and began to impart wisdom. I talked about how to cut the parts from the sprues tidily, how to clean up the mould seams, how to test fit the parts, how to read the instructions. You get the picture. By the 10 second mark they were looking bored, by the 60 second mark they were checking what the cat was doing, by the 90 second mark they had that “are you going to drone on forever?” look. I took the hint and shut up.

They then proceeded for the next few hours to assemble their tanks with not one mould seam removed, several large sprue attachments still there, several remarks along the lines of “oops” and “hmm, I missed out this part” followed by “oh well” and the part simply being cast back into the box. At one point I saw a large screwdriver being used to remove a spade that apparently “didn’t look right there”. Once done and with the glue still wet they descended upon my paints and half an hour later we had a Leopard with unpainted wheels, a pink hull and a white turret ( that apparently will get repainted purple the next time she feels like it ), a purple Stuart, and a box full of “I don’t really need that” and “this bit won’t stay on” parts.

As a modeller I was beyond words, as a father their smiles at their creations could make the coldest winter night seem like the brightest summer afternoon. And I then remembered my Grandfather, a modeller, trying to teach me when all I wanted to do was build fire-crackers into them so I could then explode them ( yes I was one of those children ). Now I know how he must have been torn between his wanting me to do it right and his wanting me to do it the way that made me happy.

So what’s the point of all this ?  Well if you haven’t worked it out yet, it’s the realisation that modelling is a different hobby to different people, especially new people to the hobby. Over time some may eventually go from building them with firecrackers and painting them with a one inch brush ( it’s faster you see ) to using an airbrush and PE. Others will always just build them in a few hours, throw them in a box and never think of them again.

So if you have a child that you want to bring into the hobby don’t expect them to do it your way from day one. Give them something cheap, something simple, let them do it their way, and along the way just very gradually try and steer them in the direction that will build and develop their skills. And expect them to lose interest at fourteen and come back to it thirty years later like so many of us have done.

Sow the seed, give it time to grow. Give a kid a model.