Sewing and craft cabinet on back wall. We remove the table cover for messy projects.
Psst! I have a little secret to tell you...I love homemaking not only because I love making a comfortable place for the family and I to relax in at the end of the day, but it also gives me more free time to develop my artistic abilities (such as they are-ha!). And the really great thing is that as I develop my gifts and talents, I can use those same abilities to beautify my home and the lives of my family. Can it get any better than that? Well, yes because, I've not only worked very hard over the years, in my free time, to develop my natural abilities like writing poetry, guitar playing, song-writing, quilting, cake-decorating, and designing fabric art...but I have been able to teach those same pursuits to my children. In fact, art-- the making of it, the pursuit of it, and the encouragement of it--is one of the principle things that I see as my purpose as manager of our home.
My childhood home was filled with art and we were often busy with creative pursuits growing up. To me, that was just one of the things that I assumed would characterize our home when I was raising my own children. I watched my parents, helped them, and learned without even realizing what was happening. Music, art, textiles, drawing, painting, acting...these were the 'stuff' of every day life. I do know one thing that I think helped promote our artistic tendencies and creativity. One was that my father chunked the TV, when we were in junior high. He didn't want us sitting in front of the tube wasting the afternoon hours when we could be outside (hanging out in the trees like monkeys--we loved tree climbing!). We grew up 'deprived' because we didn't know what 'nano-nano' with the pinching fingers meant..(Think Mork and Mindy--70's era). So with tons of time on our hands, we found other things to do. The other reason for our creative energy was that Mom was constantly making, creating, and encouraging art in our lives. Messes were fine...as far as she was concerned!
If you have any aspirations to encourage your children whether artistically or academically, you will want to consider putting them on a stringent diet of as little TV or computer as is humanly possible! I consider TV watching at best 'junk food' for the mind, and at worst. 'poison' for the soul. (Just my personal opinion of course!) I don't want to start a debate, I'm just explaining why we all ended up so creative. My sisters, though not as geared towards the musical or artistic, were very skilled and creative according to their own natural bents. Heather is the craft queen--She knits gorgeous hats, makes feathered fans, puts together herbal gifts, and makes beautiful organic homemade soaps with all sorts of lovely designs. She teaches me lots of new stuff when I drop by. Lisa does hair, is a master seamstress, paints glass, and decorates cakes. (She doesn't think she's artistic, but I know better! Thanks to her, I can cut the boys hair, and began pursuing cake decorating years ago. (So so so much fun!) Trisha is a 'how to' person like me. We both have this weird need to make how-to manuals. And she is a very creative writer, when she puts her mind to it.
My father, as some of you may know, was a sculptor, painter, and drew..charcoal, pen, ink. My earliest memories, as a child, were of working with my own little lump of clay or drawing on scraps with pencils he wasn't busy with at the moment. This was the real stuff..not play dough! I loved making little things (I was infatuated with turtles and gaudy buttons) or watching Dad carve on some big chunk of something on his wooden base. When I was a young mother with toddlers, I had plenty of play dough..in fact, play-dough time or finger painting or drawing was always part of the daily schedule. But sometimes I splurged and picked up some real clay for the kids to work with. I love the smell of clay!
My third original design --an ocean themed quilt row (except for the block pattern) drawn, colored and embroidered by me.
I remember vividly, Dad, working on developing his own negatives and making black and white photographs. And I loved seeing him draw my mother,sisters and I. They were really beautiful portraits. Thanks to him, I loved drawing as a girl..and my favorite implement, was not the artist pencils that were so plentiful around the house, but the grey fuzzy rolled paper tube that you used for shading. From him, I learned that drawings had shape and form and that shading brought that out.My artistic goal for this year is to teach myself knotted Persian rug tying.It took a lot of research and staring at poorly done videos to figure it out. Certainly no one else is going to teach me-Ha!
She fascinated me with her rendition of the little old woman who swallowed a spider..I don't know why she swallowed a fly..poor old lady..I think she'll die! (I have to say, I felt the threat to the woman's life was quite real!). Mom loved costumes and sewed them by the basketful! The whole family jumped whole-heartedly into any opportunity to dress up and act in a play.
And she made beautiful jewelry and homemade gifts like those acrylic clackers on strings. Boy, our school friends were so envious of our clackers! We had some made of some kind of glass stuff that didn't break easily. We often sold the jewelry to friends, taking orders to bring home to her. She taught me how to crochet, and make beaded crocheted necklaces, how to embroider, and cross-stitch. She also painted very well and she sang almost in an 'operatic' style. I always wished I'd had her voice...ah well...we can't have it all--Ha!
Our family loved books..especially old ones. I read absolutely everything I could get my hands on! Dad poured casts of Paris of Plaster for his statues and I was fascinated to watch the process. Mom made candles and cooked yummy concoctions which she often made up herself. Some good...some required a timer..not so good..Ha! Dad and Mom both loved to garden and grew amazing things. Dad taught himself to make leather. Mom did macrame and taught me too. We had long chess tournaments in the evenings which I reveled in. Art was the atmosphere that we breathed. Creating was as daily an activity as eating, cleaning, playing and sleeping.
Mom was our biggest cheerleader...always encouraging us in the pursuit of our dreams. So of course, I do the same thing in my home. When I learn how to do something new, so do the kids. When the kids want to learn how to do something that I or Tim don't know how to ...we all learn together. Tim, my husband, also comes from a family of 'artists'. His father was a painter and a pilot. And his mother played the harp..concert level playing. She had a beautiful harp that her parents gave her. Regrettably, they live in Washington, D.C., so we didn't get to hear her play before they had to sell it--the result of an economic depression in their area. Tim grew up playing piano as I did, and taking tons of photographs. I would say that all the kids and Tim are great photographers. For some reason, I just don't have the eye that they do. But I sure admire their ability.
This is one of my entries for this year's art show...The Colorado Rockies.
Thanks to Tim, the connoisseur of classical music--we all have learned a lot about the different composers. Thanks to me and my love of art, we know about my favorite painters at least. While I was reading Dickens (everything...he wrote several times over) in the evenings (the kids were weaned on Dickens' exercpts), Tim was listening to WRR in Dallas and memorizing every musician, his style, his era..etc. He's a walking encylopedia and definitely an auditory learner. :o). My greatest thrill was to give him a cello for Christmas this year. (He's always wanted to learn to play the cello.)And five months of lessons! I saved up money from my craft sale and the sell of a piece of fabric art, plus other sewing jobs. I wish I hadn't lost my camera at the hospital caring for Dad in January, so I could show you the priceless look on his face when I gave it to him! 
Thanks to all of our various pursuits, we have taught the kids pretty much everything we know. And they've picked up a bunch of learning that we didn't...like flying soar planes! (engine-less airplanes). All of the kids are very talented photographers, in fact I think everyone but Jacob has a photo blog. Jacob is a gifted writer who inherited my gift of gab..(poor thing)..but he puts it to good use going straight to the out-rounds (quarter, semi-'s and finals in speech and debate competitions. He is the dramatist in our family. He loves making silent movies and is very good according to one movie production teacher that we know. Rebekah sews better than I ever did..and now designs her own clothes..at 19. All five kids play guitar and three play piano..and Christian and Matthew compose. They all write poetry.
The crazy thing is that I did so little actual teaching!! But I think between our 'modeling' and the fact that the kids never got to see 'real' tv except at Grandma's, the creative activity was the natural result. The computer and movie time were heavily budgeted and we never had any hand held electronic games. Now that everyone is an older teen..that is somewhat different--but we still keep a wary eye on everyone. Thank goodness, they were raised on creativity..and they get tired of the electronic variety of entertainment pretty quickly.
To me, the home is the perfect place to foster the creative arts. That is why I wanted to write this post-- to encourage you in how and why we should be helping our kids (or hubby's) find what it is that they are 'good at' and then providing the supplies, workspace, and opportunities to pursue those things. We have an activity room and we make sure that it is 'easy' to create. From their earliest days, there was plenty of paper, paint, and clay. Art is on the wall, classical music was played from their toddlerhood, and art was a required part of every home school subject--as critical as writing or reading and integral to the expression of what they learned in science and history.
If you would like to get more ideas on how to encourage creativity in your home, I would really encourage you to check out Shona Cole's book, the Artistic Mother, because, she does the same thing that I've just described. And she will literally hold your hand and show you what to do to get started step by step. She will also help you start developing some artistic ability if you are new to this and don't feel you are 'artistic'.
This won the Route 66 Challenge contest. It's the first completely original quilt I ever designed. All done by hand but the piecing.
For me at least, I've discovered that if I will buy the supplies, and make a place to leave it all out handy, I'll eventually start working on something. It's kind of like advertising to yourself. It will draw you to the table..in spite of any tiredness you might feel. And the best thing about creating something is that it really re-energizes you, rather than sapping you the way too much electronic entertainment does. I'll talk later about how to really make space for this. But my two secrets to working art into your life and the life of your family are time (less electronic) and space...you don't need two living areas! Make an activity room instead...where spills are OK and mess is allowed and supplies are easily available.
Shower cake I made for daughter-in-law's shower--I was in a hurry that day.
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The family togetherness and unity...even the couple togetherness will be so encouraged if you are all hanging out together making something new and fun. A half an hour or hour a day goes a long ways to learning or making new things.
This baby quilt, I designed for my granddaughter, Lena, all made from scraps in my stash.I worked on the hand applique during Christian's 30 minute trumpet lessons. By the end of the summer, it was ready to quilt. I quilted it while hanging out with hubby and the SEG Oil Convention. By the time the art show rolled around, it was ready to enter. Use bits of time!
PS. Thanks Lorraine for mentioning that you had seen artists on the blogroll. It got me to thinking, that it would be good to talk about my vision for art in the home! You are an inspiration!
Happy Homemaking!
I'm so shy about my mediocre singing that I don't really like sharing my music publicly, but this song is my very favorite one. It's called, "Let Your Children Dream.." about encouraging and mentoring our kids. Sorry about the 'unprofessional' recording..my son Christian was videoing me. He kept making me giggle... I do have a good recording on my music blog that was done professionally if you are interested.
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