Nurturing a Culture of Creativity at Home

Welcome to Week One of the month-long Carnival of Creative Mothers to celebrate the launch of The Rainbow Way: Cultivating Creativity in the Midst of Motherhood
by Lucy H. Pearce. 

Today’s topic is Nurturing a Culture of Creativity at Home. Be sure to read to the end of this post to find a list of links to the other carnival participants.

Join the Carnival and be in with a chance to win a free e-copy of The Rainbow Way!

November 27th: Creative Heroines.
December 4th: Creative Inheritance.
December 11th: The Creative Process.

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Lucy from Dreaming Aloud asked that I take part in a blogging carnival to help celebrate the launch of her gorgeous new book and of course I’m late as usual in posting my contribution! Oops! Nonetheless here’s my view on being a creative mother!

As I sit typing this our walls are adorned in colourful crayon scribbles. The contents of my makeup bag were, this morning, looted resulting in iridescent shimmering eye shadow pigments finely crushed in between the wooden floorboards. It’s a typical scene in many a house with small children. I have decided to see all of this as creativity rather than destruction. Perhaps I’m being naively optimistic. It may be early days yet. My two year old and ten month old boys operate silently and with purpose. Like a highly skilled swat team they crawl into the kitchen on their bellies, raid the fridge of yogurts and disappear again without a sound. Leaving only a trail of sweet smelling strawberry yogurt streaks on every surface.

I’m highly creative. I literally feel sad if I don’t have a project on the go. Every day I need to make something. I need something so that, at the end of the day I can say I created. Before I had my children this could have been anything from curtains to a stop frame animation. But suddenly I’ve found the creativity coming into my home in a whole new way, a different style of beauty and exploration, seeing things afresh through a childs’ eyes makes everyday  tasks creative and exciting. Instead of trying to fit my creative time around them I involve them. Of course I still do lots of typical baby projects like finger painting etc. but I make them help me do things that you usually don’t see two year olds do. The kitchen is where I find most of our successful projects happen. Making wild garlic pesto and letting my eldest wash the leaves, elbow deep in the sink, soaking his socks as he does it. Pressing the button on the food processor, Scraping down the sides, blitzing again, tasting as we go. Washing the jars and potting it up. Making nut butters or nut milks are also favourites. Anything that involves the whir of the food processor. My morning juice is a thing of immense beauty to them, watching in amazement as the beetroot juice froths up the glass and mixes with the bright carrot juice. I pour little shots for them and we all clink our cups together.

Chubby toddler hands working pastry or pizza dough is the cutest thing ever. Of course anything that overworked is inedible but they love to do it anyway and half the dough does disappear somewhere. Stirring warm toasted granola then scooping it into bags, stamping out shapes from scone dough and studding it with plump sultanas, picking herbs from the garden and picking the leaves off to dry. Smelling and tasting everything.

I love to involve them in the kitchen. It’s the place where I’m most creative and I hope that by leaving them sort through the vegetable peelings, paint the walls with tomatoes and make ‘sand art’ on the kitchen floor using oats I will encourage them to express themselves     and never lose that sense of wonderment.

Lilly x

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ORDER YOUR SIGNED COPY of  The Rainbow Way!   and grab your free extras (first 200 orders only!):   – exclusive access to a private Facebook group for creative mothers   – a vibrant greetings card and book-mark of one of the author’s paintings.   Kindle and paperback editions from Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.com, Book Depository, Barnes and Noble or order it from your local bookshop!

Carnival host and author of The Rainbow Way, Lucy at Dreaming Aloud shares an extract from the chapter Nurturing a Family Culture of Creativity.

Lilly Higgins is a passionate food writer. Now a mother of two boys, she’s discovered a new calling: to instil in them a love of food and creativity in the kitchen.

 

DeAnna L’am shares how visioning the New Year with your child is an invitation to be inspired: use creativity and resolutions to create a fun road map for the year ahead.

 

Molly at Talk Birth on Releasing Our Butterflies – balancing motherhood with creativity.

 

Laura shares some of the creativity happening at Nestled Under Rainbows and a few thoughts about creativity.

 

Georgie at Visual Toast celebrates her own unique culture of creativity at home.

 

Esther at Nurtureworkshop spreads the love of the ordinary, the delights of everyday things that can be an adventure of the imagination.

 

For Dawn at The Barefoot Home creativity is always a free form expression to be shared by all in a supportive environment where anything can be an art material.

 

Naomi at Poetic Aperture is a mother, artist and photographer who tries to keep her daughter away from the expensive pens and paints.

 

Aimee at Creativeflutters writes about keeping your sanity and creativity intact with small kids in the house in her post: Mother + Creativity – They Must Coexist.

 

Amelia at My Grandest Adventure embarks on a 30 Days of Creativity challenge…you can too!

 

Becky at Raising Loveliness explores creating with her smaller family members.

 

Jennifer at Let Your Soul Shine reveals how children help us connect to our souls, through music and movement.

 

Mary at The Turquoise Paintbrush shares her experiences of creating with kids.

 

Brooke at violicious spent too much time worrying and trying to be creative instead of letting it flow.

 

Joanna at Musings of a Hostage Mother explains why creativity at home is important to her in her post “I nurture a creative culture.”

 

On womansart blog this week – nurturing a creative culture at home.

 

Creative woman at Creator’s Corner loves color and uses it to paint, draw and decorate to inspire herself and her family.

 

It took until Amy at Mama Dynamite was pregnant aged 35 to discover her dormant creative
streak – she has found lovely ways of tuning into it every since.

 

Anna of ArtBuds is a trained educator and art therapist. She has been creating all her life and nurturing her daughter’s creativity at home is a priority.

 

Deb at Debalicious shares how her family enjoy creativity at home.

 

Emily at The Nest explores how creativity runs through her family’s life together.

 

Jennifer at OurMuddyBoots sees that encouraging creativity in children is as simple as appreciating them for who they are: it just means overriding everything we know!

 

Lisa from Mama.ie has discovered that a combination of writing and traditional crafts can provide a creative outlet during those busy early years of new motherhood.

 

Anna at Biromums shares what nurturing a culture of creativity means to her.

 

Zoie at TouchstoneZ argues that the less they are interfered with, the more creative children become as they grow up.

 

Darcel at The Mahogany Way celebrates creating with her kids.

 

Molly at MollyLollyLoo explores her family’s shared creative times.

 

Liz at Reckless Knitting shares how she celebrates creativity with her family.

 

Sally (aka The Ginger Ninja) of The Ginger Chronicles is continually inspired by her own mum and grandmother.

 

Just being creative is enough, says Nicki at Just Like Play, as she ponders her journey of nurturing a creative family.

 

Allurynn shares her creative family’s musings in her post “Creativity… at the Heart of it” on Moonlight Muse.

 

Laura at Authentic Parenting explores how being creative saves her sanity.

Mama is Inspired talks about how she puts an emphasis on the handmade in her home, especially in the holiday season.

 

Kirstin at Listen to the Squeak shares with you several easy ways for busy mamas and dads to encourage their children to be creative every day.

Chiswick Mum believes that a healthy dose of chaos is the secret to nurturing creativity at home.

 

Mila at Art Play Day always lived in her dreams, sleepwalking through life … now she is finding out what creativity is all about…. her inner child!

 

Sadhbh at Where Wishes Come From describes how picture books can nurture creativity in young children.