By LAURA BROOKHART / Community Columnist

“Once, I glued crayons to the top of a canvas and melted them with a blow dryer. It looked like it was raining colors,” Jake Knight told me when asked about one of his more memorable creations.

“We have big bins of arts supplies that our grandparents bought for us and big sketch pads, “ added Sam Knight. “My room is dark green; Jake’s is dark red.”

“It’s crimson,” Jake corrects.

The identical twins will both have drawings featured in the first Helena Arts Council 2014 calendar, which will be on sale later this year.

“They have always enjoyed drawing and painting and have been encouraged to draw and illustrate since they could hold a crayon,” shared their mother, Stacy Knight.

“I think their teachers, especially Mrs. Lobell at Helena Elementary School, had a big impact on their early development in learning to draw,” she added. “Since then they have kind of taken off on their own using YouTube artists to teach them how to draw specific designs when they were stuck or just curious.”

Sam and Jake have grown up taking karate, gymnastics, and have played soccer, football and basketball.

At Helena Intermediate they were in choir and attended the Young Voices Choir Festival. This year at Helena Middle, they are in the band.

Since the twins are so connected, I asked them if each might recall an early memory.

“I have a flash of this memory when I was 8 months old. We had just moved into a new house. I can see my brother Zack standing with a play guitar, with the stairs behind him,” began Jake.

“Dad made a video of Zack playing his guitar and we were in our diapers singing and dancing along,” Sam added. ”Jake kicked me out of the way and got in trouble.”

“And how have your parents handled having twins?” I posed.

“I think pretty good. They’ve only gotten us mixed up a couple of times!” Jake grinned.

“I’m older by 30 seconds,” Jake confirmed.

“I’m taller by two inches,” Sam assured me.

“I am much better looking than him,” Jake countered. “Well, it’s true!”

“He talks a lot,” Sam pointed out.