The Best Sheep on the Fridge

Rowan is seven. Her grandparents have a farm near Kendal. In spring there are new lambs in the field behind the house.

One lamb is very small, with pink ears. Rowan sits on the grass and draws it. The legs are wrong — long and thin, not short and fat.

She tries again. This time the lamb walks away, and she draws a sheep with no head.

“Rowan! Come and cook with me,” her grandmother calls.

They make a dish with potatoes and carrots. Rowan's arms smell of grass.

After dinner she draws the lamb again. The lamb is not there now, but she remembers the pink ears and the short fat legs. This time it is right.

Her grandfather looks at it for a long time. Then he puts it on the fridge, next to an old drawing of a horse. “Your mother drew that one,” he says. “She was seven too.”