Tips for Raising a Creative Child

It's always nice to receive a special home-made gift or picture from your child, but what do you do with all these creations? My oldest child is always creating and crafting something. Usually it's just with a piece of blank computer paper and some tape. Empty Kleenex boxes become a home for a stuffed animal or a hat for her little brother. Sometimes I find myself hiding the empty boxes or cardboard rolls from toilet paper, so Jenna doesn't see they're available to use. Eventually these creations start to pile up and I just don't know what to do with them. I hate having clutter around and I would really just love to throw them in the burn barrel, but that would hurt her feelings.

An example of what we have around the house at any given time: 1. Mother's Day tissue paper flower; 2. Bulldozer (too big to be in the house);
3. Littlest Pet Shop house; 4. Doctor kit; 5. Bed for a stuffed animal; 6. A shoe box filled with Tim Horton's lid creations; 7. & 8. My Mother's Day gift - a stationary set; 9. School project - diorama of man vs. nature; 10. Bug homes made from tractor light boxes; 11. Robot made at March Break camp;
12. Kites

Some of my tips for dealing with a child
who likes to create a little too much:

1. Ask first:

Mom or dad, grandma or grandpa, babysitter or caregiver should be the first to ok a new project. Keep supplies out of reach and out of sight. Our craft supplies are locked in a cabinet. Set limits: teach your child that he or she shouldn't start a new project if there isn't time to finish it or if there is already another one on the go. Always finish what you start. For the longest time, Jenna would have a pile of papers with one sticker or one crayon mark and notebooks upon notebooks only half-filled. She insisted we had to keep them all.

2. Waste not want not:

As good as it is to recycle unused items to create something with, if you have to use new items for the creation, then it doesn't always make sense to make it. Sometimes Jenna will have gone through an entire roll of tape for one creation before I can stop her. She understands the concept of reusing and recycling, but needs reminded of the reducing aspect.

3. You can't keep it all: 

If you have to start limiting what creations (and especially school projects) you need to keep, I always do a 3:1 ratio. Out of three things, I keep only one. Usually it's the one thing I know she worked hard on, or did the best job at colouring it, etc. At the end of the school year I lay it all out in front of me and do the same again. Then you're left with a manageable amount to put away in storage. For any larger projects you don't have room to keep, you could take a picture of and then dispose of properly. Keep it all labelled by age/grade if you want. Your child may appreciate this in the future, or they may wonder why you kept all that "stuff." My mom kept a small bin of my school papers, and so far in the almost 9 years of my oldest child's life, I've kept a fairly large bin of papers. I might have some work ahead of me.

4. Your supplies:

Buying crafts in kits and limiting your supply stash is a good way to keep your child from getting overwhelmed by all the items they can use. The dollar store is a great place to find reasonably priced craft kits. Then your child can create away with only what comes in the package. You don't really need a pack of construction paper plus scrapbook paper or glitter crayons and regular crayons. One or the other is probably more than enough. I'm all for options, but if it means more clean-up afterward, then less is more. Keep supplies organized so you can see what you have or need or need to get rid of. If you already have a supply problem, it's a good idea to set some things aside to use down the road, or even donate to a daycare or childhood centre. We somehow managed to collect a plastic shopping bag full of toilet paper rolls, so I donated them to a local daycare centre.

Following some of these tips should help you to make, and hold on to, special memories with your creative child (or at the least make the clean-up a little easier when it's all said and done).

There is a Time for Everything

I have been planning in my mind over these last few weeks about what topic my next post would be about and then I came across another bloggers post. I learned a new term after reading it: "farm widow." Farm widows are the wives of husbands who farm and are left alone most of the time during planting season because their husbands are busy getting crops in the ground. The particular blogger who wrote this post doesn't like the term (and either do I), but I'll get back to that in a minute.

A few weeks ago, the start of a week was particularly stressful for my husband - things just weren't working out as they should and he was trying so hard to organize everyone so he could get the seed drill and corn planter into the fields. And then I had a ton of yard work I needed him to help me with, and the kids weren't helping matters with the fighting and getting into all sorts of trouble. This was all happening after I had a previous rotten week (potty training spiraled downward, things broke, pets died and kids got into mischief).

So the beginning of that week we were texting back and forth. I think I had a question for him about an invoice or something. He told me how his day was going (which remember, was not good), and he asked how mine was going. I felt bad things weren't going good for him and replied that we were fine at home (but obviously I was pulling my hair out). I never bothered to ask him when he was going to get fertilizing the lawn (from the bags we bought two years ago - still sitting in the same spot), or that I needed a limb moved, or ask him I needed a garden tool rack built or that Jacob had 3 accidents already that day. It just didn't, and doesn't, seem right to bother him with these insignificant things. So maybe significant to me but on the grand scheme of things (ie. hundreds of acres of seed that needs to be planted), not at all important.

Now back to "farm widow." The obvious is that it's like saying your husband has died. I can't believe that some people use this term for that reason. It can also most definitely be interpreted the wrong way and it's so disrespectful to your husband. Besides, I am the one who married a farmer and I don't do the field work, so what else is to be expected when planting season is here? But hats off to all the women out there who help in the fields, plus look after the kids and paperwork, or even do all that and have off-farm employment. I guess my point is that the farm husband is out there working hard to support his family and it's never an easy or simple job. There is great passion, sweat, blood and perseverance put forth. How could I get in the way of that?

After being married to a farmer now for almost 10 years (on June 3rd!), I know that things get done all in good time. Usually things are timed in such a way that it all works out in the end. And if not, then it can always wait for another day, or even another year like those bags of lawn fertilizer. I think I pestered him about that on more than one occasion last year and I've only mentioned it once this year. I don't think he needs a reminder about that job because 1. the bags are sitting beside the back door where he can see them and 2. if it gets done, it just means the grass will grow much quicker and I'll have to cut it more often!

Always remember to love and support your husband through planting season. 

Jacob waving to one of our hired guys.

I'm reminded by this scripture verse:

What do workers gain from their toil? I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. Ecclesiastes 3: 9-13