Creative spaces

::  a creative space for my kids to work  ::

 I love creating cozy little spaces around our home to encourage all kinds of creativity!

 The above space is an art space for my kids, complete with cute containers of coloured pencils, felt markers, beeswax crayons, drawing papers, folded cards, note pads, blank bookmarks, pencils, erasers, scotch tape, glue sticks, and scissors.  On the top shelf I added a light and a scene of Waldorf inspired toys and pictures:  wood carved animals, needle felted root children, post cards, and crystals on a green silk.  The table I hauled up from the basement, it's basically an old desk top that I covered in kraft paper with some metal Ikea legs.  The chairs are also from Ikea.  A basket for paper recycling was a must as well  The kids have always used placemats to colour on and I discovered another fantastic use for them to keep the area visually tidy.  All unfinished drawings are simply placed underneath the placemat out of sight until the kids get back to it.  As this corner is our living room I try to keep our open shelves uncluttered and tidy as much as possible.  My mom made the quilted wall hanging and my husband painted the watercolour as a child in Waldorf School.

::  a space for creative play  ::

This corner is in their bedroom and is to stimulate their creative play.  The kitchen was a Christmas present a few years back that involved my whole family.  I designed the kitchen, my dad and I built it, my mom sewed the matching set of oven mitts and tea towels and my husband was in all fairness, really busy at work at that time so he earned the money to pay for the materials that we didn't already have on hand!  I designed it so that we could use up a bunch of wood scraps from other projects.  The sink is a food insert from a deli, the shelves in the fridge and in the oven are metal racks from a Thrift store, my dad made the taps and spout from wood and metal and cut the wood disks for the stove elements.  We decided to buy heavy duty hinges for the oven and fridge doors just so that it would stand up to the kids opening and closing them a million times!

The fridge/freezer is stocked with wood food, small wood and metal containers and mini baskets that I have picked up new or at Thrift Stores over time.  The baskets on the shelves contain small wood bowls and dishes, silver plates (aka: coasters), mini cutting board, metal tea pot (with a Gramma sewn cosy!), homemade aprons and cloth shopping bags, pots and pans, and baking pans (aka: mini loaf pans, cookie sheet and metal dessert molds).

The nice thing about open ended toys like this is that it is used for so many different forms of play!  One day it became a restaurant so I made a couple of menus on the computer and laminated them and bought one of the pads that waitresses used before computerized systems, at the Dollar store.  Another day all of the food might be set up as a grocery store so we made shopping lists (with pictures and words for when they couldn't read) and laminated them.  A small cash register with pretend money, our old credit cards and cloth bags and they were engaged in hours of creative play!

::  doll's bed and kitchen  ::

The doll's bed in the photo was won by my Grandmother years ago and was passed down to my kids after their cousin was too old for it.  It was handmade by a senior lady's woodworking class.  We were able to add some of our creativity to the set by sewing up quilts and pillows in fabric that we liked.  The drawers are filled with a mini wood hairbrush, comb and mirror set (Thrift store find!), barrettes, cloth diapers for the dolls, and handmade and knitted clothing.  For the clothes that hang I purchased some old wood coat hangers and cut them down so that the doll's clothes fit on them.  I had to be patient with that project as hangers are hard to find at our Thrift Store!  We also like to change the bedding and decorate the kitchen at Christmas to make it more festive!

 This doll's bed also sparked my daughter's interest in sewing!  On day she wanted to make some clothes for her dolls and now she is sewing herself clothes with the help of her Gramma!

I love that creativity can change forms on a daily basis or evolve into something else entirely over the years!

Do you have creative corners in your home?

~ joey ~