Day 1 - How did you Express your Creativity as a Child?

As a child, I grew up in a fairly creative household, so I never really realized until friends came over and were surprised about how much my family crafted, cooked and read together that we were doing anything really out of the ordinary. My mom and my grandma (who lived next-door) were always knitting, and my mom also sewed us clothes, made us quilts and knitted us hats and scarves and mittens for winter.

The first thing Mom ever quilted is my baby quilt, which I still have (though it's been repaired a bunch of times) and cuddle under while I sit on the couch. 

I can't find some of the other photos where I know for sure that Mom sewed the clothes, so I'm going to make an educated guess that this is one of the Easter dresses she made for me:

Please note how while Mom was able to sew things beautifully, whatever it is she did/allowed me in my innocence to do to my hair is sacriligeous. ( I hope all of you  at least get a chuckle from my terrible hair)


My mom also got us interested in cording (using the Knitting Nancy--this is the same one I had pictured below) after telling us stories of how her and her brother had battles as kids to see who could make the longest cord the fastest. I think I ended up making little rugs and baskets out of the cording, as well as stylish jewelry and headbands.

Source

I was probably one of the few 4th graders sitting around and knitting simple square blankets (went through a period where every teacher was having a baby--Catholic School) and the blankets made great gifts :) I also did cross stitch, and made gimp bracelets, and we made houses for our My Little Ponies out of orange crates, and sewed clothes for our Barbies...........and well, let's just say, though the crafts may have changed a bit, I have always been trying to do all of them. Sometimes all at once.

Even my Dad was fairly crafty and DIY back then. I have a toy bed he made for my Cabbage Patch Chuckie (short for Charles Anatole, my Cabbage Patch was mad Italian, apparently) in storage at my parent's house, and he made my sister and I cradles for our baby dolls to go in our playhouse in the yard that had a real roof, and swinging farm door. We LOVED that playhouse, and played in it until we couldn't stand up straight in it anymore. It was a sad day when it came down to make way for a new garden shed.

Also, apparently I loved to draw, or so my Junior Kindergarden painting attest. What they also show is that I was CRAZY about horses. Particularly horses with nurses hats (don't ask me....)

 

I also enjoy this story I wrote when I was a little bit older ( I think the plot had something to do with Christmas and it being a super happy day)  mostly for the illustration of the horse in a crib. The child logic is amusing : the horse was a baby, babies sleep in cribs, so clearly this is how a baby horse would sleep in a crib, lying on their back with their hooves stuck straight up in the air.

I'm guessing the horse was not very comfortable, but I guess my seven year old self wasn't quite thinking of the big picture yet. Please also note my awesome attempts at writing...my penmanship has gotten marginally better since then. A prize to anyone who can figure out what that says!

I was definitley more into writing stories as a kid, producing other such terrible works as Earth Day at Acme Acres, The Night Santa couldn't Deliver the Presents and a terrible play about a married couple called Mr. and Mrs. June, who never really seemed to do anything, aside from address each other as "Mr. June" and "Mrs. June" respectively, and enquire after the other if they would quite like to take a nap or have some tea. My parents are still killing themselves laughing over this years later, and swear they have a copy somewhere that they shall read from if I ever get married/famous. Fingers crossed that this is a dirty bold-faced lie :P

♥ Craftzilla