Bethany’s recent post on fostering an environment of imaginative learning really convicted me in the area of letting my kids create a mess. I crave order, and I’m not naturally artistic, so I tend to limit “art time” to crayons as much as possible despite my kids’ love for markers, paint, and cutting paper into little tiny pieces. But for my kids to do good, creative play, sometimes a mess is the way to go!
Yesterday the kids got into the art box and covered themselves with stickers and nonwashable markers by 8:30 am, so the first part of the morning was spent with scientific experimentation. What is the best method for removing marker from a toddler cheek? Turns out oil-free makeup remover, while not completely successful, has better results than plain soap and water or Pampers Unscented Wipes.
Then I decided to embrace the mess and set up a play grocery store in the living/dining room. After we got out every single piece of play food and sorted it into “aisles”, we got to the ottoman checkout and realized we had no play money. I think I get serious mom points for letting Tommy get back out the messy markers to make money while I dealt with his sleep-deprived sister.
Then they wanted to color, so we started a scratch art project I’ve been putting off for a while because it involves paint. Black paint. (My worst days of being an art teacher were always those than involved paint…20 minutes of prep and 30 minutes of clean-up for 10 minutes of painting…ugh!) We held off on the paint until Miss Uncongeniality went down for a nap, then Tommy and I realized that the only paint brushes in the house are the huge ones for painting walls or the tiny watercolor kind. The latter worked okay, but I’ll have to pick up some appropriate foam ones for next time. After Tommy managed to get black paint all over both sleeves of his sweatshirt and dumped the bowl out on the dining room floor, where it splattered everywhere, I called it quits and finished the painting myself while he went up for quiet rest time. I think that lost me the mom points from earlier in the day. You know, when we’re living in CA, we’ll be able to do this sort of thing outside and therefore will paint much more frequently, right? Right?
The rest of the day was spent with a sobbing girl on my lap for most of the post-nap/pre-bedtime period (clearly 3 hours of wakefulness in the middle of the night disagrees with her as much as me). Overturned toddler chairs, a shopping cart full of random food, and countless cars, blocks, and crayons were spread everywhere you looked. Fortunately, my hero of a husband brought home Chick-Fil-A and got most of the rest of the marker off the kids in the bathtub while I watched Colin Firth’s Oscar acceptance speech on youtube.
Did we learn more yesterday in our perma-mess? Did the kids even have more fun than on a day where I limit toy usage, do orderly memorization-based “preschool” with Tommy, and just read books all afternoon? Not sure. I think I’ll redo the experiment on a day when we’re all a little better rested. In the meantime, the art box is hiding in the laundry room for a little while…
I’m with you on the “orderly” play. I’m not sure it makes that much difference to the “fun” factor, but maybe that is my self-justifying. That said, we used to do the “scratch art project” with just crayons (and colored pencils if you want). We colored blocks of color with crayons or pencils (ours were always orderly lines), then colored over the whole thing with blcak crayon. It creates a little mess with the crayon specks, but doesn’t involve paint.
Congratulations to both of you on the new job and city. Will be praying the move goes smoothly and the adjustment. Satisfaction in one’s job is very important, and I’m sure Derek’s happiness will infect the whole family.
Wow Emily! I definitely need to work on accepting a mess (mainly when it comes to arts and crafts).
I feel like my boys act a little more “chaotic” when the environment in our home is out of order. When Liam is throwing books off of the bookshelf in a frenzy and Aidan has pulled out a zillion school books, his costumes, puzzle pieces, his ColorWonder paint set, stickers, and letter magnets EVERYWHERE, it makes for a crazy time in our house. I would much rather have organization. Plus, I am getting so huge, I can barely handle bending over a million times to pick up messes! 🙂
Haha, Leslie, I’m with you on the being too huge to bend much! =)
🙂 I wish we were close enough to take belly pictures! I want our babies to meet!
When it comes to crafty messes, I am much more tolerant of paint, glitter, and glue!
Glitter….sigh….I don’t know when I’ll get there! =)