Nell

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Zoey

My hair is perfectly combed, I have a clean shirt on, a simile on my face, a suitcase in one hand and a paintbrush in the other. I moved here from China to live with my aunt and uncle. My family will move here when they can afford it. Neither my family nor my aunt and uncle has a lot of money. I like it here, even if I do not see my baby brother. Every morning I wake up, go to school, come home, work in the house and go to bed. Then one day something happened ... it was the most wonderful thing!

__I__ was walking home from school listening to birds chirping and dogs barking when I came upon a garden. It was beautiful! I wished I could paint it, but then I remembered I was not good at painting. In China I would draw and paint, and the other kids would laugh, giggle, tell secrets, and make mean faces at me. One time I got up from my artwork and some of the other kids put a piece of paper on my artwork that said, "No good at art." From that point on I was petrified. Now I do not draw or paint. I am afraid someone will make fun of me.

I ran home crying. Thinking of those kids in China did not make me feel good.

Whenever I am sad my aunt tells me to draw. She says "I will throw it all away when you're done." That makes me feel better. The next day my aunt told me to meet her at the garden. So at the end of school the next day, I met her at the garden right on time. She had a big bag. She told me to look inside. Without thinking, I opened it up. Inside there were lots of little bags filled with different kinds of seeds. Then my aunt pointed to a patch of dirt and said, "that's ours."

I knew from that point on, that patch of dirt was going to be a part of my life.

We got to work, digging, weeding and planting our seeds. Then we had an idea ... we were going to make a fence, not just any old fence, but a colorful fence! And I was going to paint it! My aunt had told me I was amazing. It was my time to shine!

The next day, we had the fence in place and lots of colorful paints by my side. I started to paint. I got so into what I was doing I lost track of time. When I looked up, there in front of my very own eyes was a fully flower painted fence. My aunt said it looked wonderful, but I wasn't quite sure about it.

After school the next day I went to the garden with my aunt. There we watered our plants and weeded. When we were weeding a guy in a straw hat and a big smile on his face came up to us. Then he said, "who painted this fence?" Before my aunt could speak, I blurted out "it was me!" He stared at me for a few seconds with a blank face. Then he look at me again, but only this time a smile shown bright on his face. He said, "I will give you $15 to paint my new fence." My aunt rushed over to where he was standing and said, "of course she will!"

With my bucket in hand, my cheeks were red and I had a big smile on my face. I knew I was happy.

My aunt and uncle were not rich, but after I started painting people's fences and selling my artwork of the flowers and vegetables we had planted in the garden, we were living a little bit better. I kept going, not stopping. I was not full of myself, just proud of what I had done and what I was doing.

So if you see those kids in China who were making fun of me, tell them I have made a lot of money selling my beautiful artwork.

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