If in doubt... add glitter

This morning my friend Donna came round with her two boys Charlie and Jack who are 7 and 6 and her niece Noami with her friend Julie (17) who are visiting from France.

Having been pondering about planning following my last blog, I decided that one good way I could practice being less of a control freak would be to allow children to play with my craft supplies! Now this may sound like a pretty insignificant event to many. Why wouldn’t you share your glitter and glue with children, after all that’s who it’s for really isn’t it? Let me fill you in on my crafting habit… I have been building my collection for the last 20 years, I have punches and stamps and pens, pencils, paints, papers of different textures and colours, glues for every eventuality and a selection of double sided tapes to rival any good stationer. When I’m making cards and stuff I use one thing at a time, clean and replace it before moving on. I keep things like pens and pencils in the boxes or tins they came in and they are arranged in order of the colours of the rainbow, I have a box for the stamps and ink pads, another for the punches, scissors for tape, scissors for fabric, scissors to cut decorative edges… I think you get the idea 😉

So, this morning I began by explaining (without touching!) what the different boxes contained and the basic approach to making a card and let them get on with it! I was on hand to supervise and show how to collect the excess glitter (and put it back into the pot without mixing them up – I was trying!) but generally, I let them get on with it. I did ask Jack what he was creating at one point and he said ‘I’m just being random’. I started to explain that we should be creating something for a purpose and then realised that it really didn’t matter; it’s all part of discovering new techniques and skills and just being creative – especially if you’re 6 or 7!

We all made at least one beautiful card and had a lovely time in the process and I learned that the most precious thing about my craft stuff is the fun that we have with it, not the fact that we have it.