iLander
Ideal_Rock
- Joined
- May 23, 2010
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This bubbled up in my head the other day, and I thought I'd write this up in hopes of helping other moms with creative kids.
I think I'm kind of qualified for this because DH is professional artist, DS has a degree in Fine Arts (which he doesn't actually use) , and DD is also pursuing an art degree. We are about as artsty a family as you can reasonably get.
To raise a creative kid you need two main ingredients; supplies and boredom. A bored art kid will fill their time creating things, and to do that they need supplies, lots of them. To make them bored, you limit TV, or video games, or soccer, or whatever threatens to eat up all their bored time. Make sure they are looking for stuff to do. When they whine, you shove them toward their supplies.
For supplies, by age:
2-6: Crayons! The faboo 64 pack! Every Christmas a new one!!
Love those. Giant newsprint pads, colored paper, safety scissors, tape, glitter glue, buttons, macaroni, food coloring, sketch books, old magazines, Play Dough!!, clay, etc.
6-8: Add low heat glue gun, and trash. Trash like egg cartons, lids, jars, cans, milk jugs, sponges, flowers, broken toys, parts of your old cell phone (sans battery), all kinds of things that can be randomly glued together.
8-10: Add sewing! Needles (they tend to only prick themselves once or twice before they get the handle on it), thread, fabric, felt, stuffing material.
10 and up: Add soldering! And hot glue! Sounds scary, but when they get the hang of soldering together screws and nails, and can lids, all kinds of weird stuff comes out. Paint and watercolor. Canvases, canvas boards, charcoal, grey and beige paper, white pencils, kneaded erasures, embroidery threads, pom poms. Hammers, nails, and multipacks of wood bits. Encourage the use of a small, bound sketchbook as a diary, where sketches, magazine pics, etc., can be kept. Kind of like pinterest but in real life.
Try to limit "art kits" that produce only one outcome. A "make a wallet kit" is not as creative as a bag of leather scraps and a tooling kit. But they are good Christmas gifts, so a few kits are fun to use in addition to the supplies.
Once a year, Dick Blick has a big sale of art supplies, and they have "classroom kits" of oddments (leather pieces, beads, feathers). I load up and get a lot of stuff (lots of canvases!) for about $200. I brought the stuff out of the closet as the year went on, and new goodies were created. My house is chock a block full of kid creations, but it's totally worth it.
I wrote this because when I was a kid, I only had ruled notebook paper and pencils. It was a real bummer for someone that liked to draw and would have loved to paint. But I never had the chance! DH's mom bought him a drawing table (available at Blick) and our kids had them as well. DH's mom gave him supplies, and he used them wisely.
If you know a kid, and you need to buy them a present, consider an assortment of supplies. You never know what you might start.
I think I'm kind of qualified for this because DH is professional artist, DS has a degree in Fine Arts (which he doesn't actually use) , and DD is also pursuing an art degree. We are about as artsty a family as you can reasonably get.
To raise a creative kid you need two main ingredients; supplies and boredom. A bored art kid will fill their time creating things, and to do that they need supplies, lots of them. To make them bored, you limit TV, or video games, or soccer, or whatever threatens to eat up all their bored time. Make sure they are looking for stuff to do. When they whine, you shove them toward their supplies.
For supplies, by age:
2-6: Crayons! The faboo 64 pack! Every Christmas a new one!!
Love those. Giant newsprint pads, colored paper, safety scissors, tape, glitter glue, buttons, macaroni, food coloring, sketch books, old magazines, Play Dough!!, clay, etc. 6-8: Add low heat glue gun, and trash. Trash like egg cartons, lids, jars, cans, milk jugs, sponges, flowers, broken toys, parts of your old cell phone (sans battery), all kinds of things that can be randomly glued together.
8-10: Add sewing! Needles (they tend to only prick themselves once or twice before they get the handle on it), thread, fabric, felt, stuffing material.
10 and up: Add soldering! And hot glue! Sounds scary, but when they get the hang of soldering together screws and nails, and can lids, all kinds of weird stuff comes out. Paint and watercolor. Canvases, canvas boards, charcoal, grey and beige paper, white pencils, kneaded erasures, embroidery threads, pom poms. Hammers, nails, and multipacks of wood bits. Encourage the use of a small, bound sketchbook as a diary, where sketches, magazine pics, etc., can be kept. Kind of like pinterest but in real life.
Try to limit "art kits" that produce only one outcome. A "make a wallet kit" is not as creative as a bag of leather scraps and a tooling kit. But they are good Christmas gifts, so a few kits are fun to use in addition to the supplies.
Once a year, Dick Blick has a big sale of art supplies, and they have "classroom kits" of oddments (leather pieces, beads, feathers). I load up and get a lot of stuff (lots of canvases!) for about $200. I brought the stuff out of the closet as the year went on, and new goodies were created. My house is chock a block full of kid creations, but it's totally worth it.
I wrote this because when I was a kid, I only had ruled notebook paper and pencils. It was a real bummer for someone that liked to draw and would have loved to paint. But I never had the chance! DH's mom bought him a drawing table (available at Blick) and our kids had them as well. DH's mom gave him supplies, and he used them wisely.
If you know a kid, and you need to buy them a present, consider an assortment of supplies. You never know what you might start.
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