Oh, friends, it has been awhile and we are long overdue for recess… Do you remember watching the clock during your own elementary school days, waiting for playtime? Some days the minute hand seemed to be ticking backwards and I couldn’t help but fidget in my seat. Life has felt a little like that recently, so I’m grateful for my friend Sara urging us back out to play, to enjoy the time to stretch and run free and just go for it. Our simple creative efforts come from the heart, after all. Let’s spread some love and joy!
re:create recess #6: Sara Pantazes
I never thought of myself as a creative person. I was the kid who always colored within the lines rather than one who relished the completely empty pages of a sketchbook. As an adult, I continue to struggle to be creative when my kids want to “play” (a problem my children never seem to have!). But when I read the prompt for this blog series, I realized there are two activities I periodically make time for which challenge me to be creative, and that these activities have become my grown-up play times.
The first creative activity I got into as an adult was scrapbooking. I fell into this hobby somewhat begrudgingly: it is a project that is never completed and is super hard to do with young kids around. But it is those young ones who make this creative activity so worthwhile, because my sons love looking at our family scrapbooks.
My creative process involves ordering tons of pictures, laying them out along with the cards or ticket stubs or whatever else I saved that go along with the pictures’ events, and deciding how much can fit on each 12X12 page. Then I pick out the background paper and embellishments and decide what words to write on the page.
The scrapbooks have become the stories of our family, which my kids “read” and enjoy. They “remember” things their brains were not developed enough to have formed memories of, but they have looked at the pictures and heard the stories retold often enough that they know their family history. My creative play has resulted in tangible objects that help my children know themselves, those who love them, and the seasons of their lives.
The second creative activity I discovered in more recent years is making cards. I freely admit that I struggle with how homemade my cards look and that they lack the eloquent sentiments of Hallmark cards. Yet I enjoy the process of creating them enough to continue doing so. I enjoy looking through Pinterest for ideas and then interpreting those designs to make them work within the boundaries of my own supplies.
I tend to create simple designs but I am okay with that because simple is an expression of me. I hope that the family and friends who receive my cards see them as the expression of love that I intend them to be. I also appreciate all the blank space inside the cards. It challenges me to write words that matter to the recipient and gives my children space to make their own 6- and 4-year-old marks on whatever occasion we are recognizing.
Scrapbooking and card making play a back seat to nearly everything else in my life; I don’t get to “play” with them often. When I do have time, I still find that being artistic and creative does not come easily to me. Yet I have learned to appreciate the challenge these creative play activities present and how it refreshes my brain to engage in something so different from my norm, something so creative. The blank pages still unnerve me, but I no longer avoid them. Bring on the card stock, stamps and inkpads, fancy scissors and washi tape—I have some playing to do!
Sara is wife of Tom and mom of Ben and Matt. Their family life started in Williamsburg, VA but they now live in a beautiful rural-suburban corner of southeast Pennsylvania. When she is not having all kinds of mom fun, Sara is working to earn a Master of Arts in Christian Education.
