Inspired children

 

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Inspired by the Inspired

It was the first day of the half term break and my daughter crept into my bed for a snuggle while the boys were happily tipping soft toys out of the bucket in their room. I love mornings like that: my husband had already left for work, the children were all feeling the chilled out vibe of no commands to "Get dressed", "Eat your breakfast" or "Clean your teeth." There was some animated nonsense on the TV and I was catching up with the very important things that might have happened in Facebookland since I last checked about eight hours earlier!

As she glanced at my phone, my daughter gasped, "Wow, what was that, Mummy?" as she scrolled back up the newsfeed. She'd seen an image from Caroline Rose Art - one of the many pages that sprinkle beauty onto my screen - and she wanted more. There it was, instantly recognisable as a 'this is my thing and I want more of it' moment, and at just six years of age. We spent a few minutes looking through the photos on Caroline's page and chatting about her work. I explained all about collages and that we were looking at beautiful scenes made from lots of small pieces of paper. She was most smitten by this amazing street scene:

Street scene collage by Caroline Rose Art

Our leisurely breakfast was peppered with questions about types and colours of paper, how to cut fancy edges, whether to use a glue stick or gloopy glue and if you can eat spiders and slugs. Happy half term! Then, almost immediately the last Cheerio was swallowed, a miracle happened: my daughter cleared the table of all pots, all ... by ... herself! And of she scurried to the paper drawer and my pencil case for scissors.

It began ...

... and it continued ...

 ... and then it was finished ...

                  

... and boy, was she delighted!

She was so very, very proud of her work in this beautiful new medium that she wanted to write to Caroline Rose to tell her all about her exciting paper adventure! The wonderful Caroline was very obliging and gave me her address, and off we trotted to the postbox. Roughly one gazillion times a day for the next five days, my girl asked me if the postman had been/was going to come/would come again today!

Caroline and I exchanged a few messages, and I have to tell you that she is a lovely, kind-hearted lady. She knows what it is to capture the creativity of a small person and to run with it, to encourage it and to reward it in a way that will make it grow.  She wrote back to Beatrix, using an actual pen and actual paper, and sent a very special parcel in the post. 

That evening Beatrix read the letter from Caroline Rose over and over again, and I watched as my little girl had found something new outside of everything she had known before: she was inspired. She hadn't been instructed or directed, nobody had suggested that she 'might like to' create something. She had seen something, it had moved her, she had an idea and she went to make it happen for herself. Then she shared her work with someone else, a stranger, and got really lovely feedback, something it took me over thirty years to manage. She is on Cloud 9! Her beautiful gift, however, is not even on the wall yet; we're looking for a pink frame! 

 You can find Caroline Rose Art on Facebook and buy her utterly beautiful work on Etsy and on Folksy.

Two reasons you MUST have lining paper in your house

 

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Just 2 of the 101 reasons you need lining paper in your life...

Disclaimer: this blog post has no work-related content from me. It's the school holidays and my days are tiring! Still, creativity takes many forms, right?

See this roll of lining paper? It's from Poundland, and represents one of the best value singe pounds that a parent could spend in the school holidays. It's 7.5m long and is strong enough to get it wet with gloopy glues, paint, etc. Seriously, do not waste your money on rolls of craft paper that are twice the price but offer half the options because they're pretty flimsy in comparison.

I'm all for encouraging creativity in my children, and try my hardest not to stifle it if it takes a form I wasn't expecting, but sometimes, when it all gets a bit messy, I'm as twitchy as the next mum. I think I'm pretty cool with mess for the most part - as anyone who's visited my house in the middle of the day will know - but I definitely have types of mess that are more acceptable than others. Motionless mess is fine, like the pile of paper and coloured pens you'll find surrounding Beatrix for approximately 12 of her 13 waking hours! Mess that moves a little way is cool too, if annoying. That's the kind of mess that Jasper makes; he fires cars off ramps, they fly through the air and land, usually in the kitchen, before travelling a few metres further. No problem, though, because it's fairly predictable. The kind of mess I'm not so good at is Abel mess: his mess is mobile. He carries pots of glitter, sprinkling their contents with every step. He stores sand from the sand pit in his trouser turn-ups and empties it when he lays on the sofa. His paint-covered hands go everywhere with him and he touches every single surface on his travels. So I like to contain mess, or more accurately, take it outside.

We have a dark-ish and relatively unused corner of our back garden that lends itself perfectly to mess: the grooves in the decking make it easy to wash dirty debris and the rest is flagged. There's no lawn to kill, and if it gets really messy, only our immediate neighbours are witness to the destruction because that part of the garden is completely enclosed. Lengths of lining paper cut to the height of the children's reach, plus a bit more to catch the bulk of the mess that drips down, simply attached to the fence with drawing pins, and ta-da! Messy fun outside. Fill your boots, kids, and when you're done, hose yourselves down under the outside tap!

Use old takeaway pots for the paint: you don't need a pot for each colour - mixing it up is half the fun! 

 It's interesting just to sit back and watch them get stuck in: when they went outside, they naturally placed themselves in age order!

And they left in age order, too! First the little man had had enough of bold moves, then the middle man had finished and filled his circles so it was time to leave, then the boss lady, who had used all of 'her' space for a masterpiece scene.

And when you need to contain an indoor activity? Stick the lining paper to the kitchen floor using masking tape, lay the children down and draw around them, then let them turn their own outline into a dress-up doll! This is really fun to do as a sticky activity, using scraps of fabric and paper to make clothing collages.

This is not Beatrix glowing: it's her hair! Check out her choice of dress, though - the girl is so Mama, it's scary!

We've also used the paper to write large picture menus for our cafe (which only sells wooden food) and to draw place settings for the diners. Do you use lining paper for craft activities? Please share your ideas!