Picture Of The Day

When I saw this I was instantly catapulted back to my childhood, to where my love of story-telling began. 

My Grandparents lived in a small caretaker's cottage on a farm and I would go and stay with them from time to time.  Like any child does, I loved the individual attention that afforded me and was captivated as Grandma sat and told me stories.  Always ones she made up of course. 

One of my favourites was her tale of how the kitchen came to life while we slept, and she always included me in the story making process.  We'd brainstorm ideas of what they got up to, and how, if we crept down quietly enough, we'd witness another world, right there in that very cottage (is it any wonder brainstorming has become such a part of who I am!). 

I was 3.  Highly impressionable, with a mind so fertile and ready, that I revelled in those moments.  Grandma tended to my creativity like it was the Queen's garden, she and I were one and the same, we still are.  It is only with hind-sight that I see who and what has shaped me to become who I am today.  I was very blessed to be surrounded by creative souls all my life, to feel the freedom to imagine, without limits, and to see others do the same.  In that regard it has always come as second nature to me, like breathing.

The biggest thing I learnt from my own experience is how important it is to give children a safe, free and loving environment for their own creativity to grow.  How asking questions and encouraging their imagination will expand their world.  It upsets me to see adults squashing a child's ideas, however nonsensical they may be.  Or telling them 'the truth' instead of allowing them to believe, even for a short time, that their imaginary world is as real as they want it to be.

I often wonder how different I would be if those around me had berated me for 'daydreaming' or told me the harsh reality when I said I could see little 'fairy laterns' on the carpet at night.

Childhood, in my opinion, doesn't last long enough.  Allow the children in your life to be just that.  Give them freedom of mind.  Allow them to play, and watch as they create.  If you have the opportunity to nurture their minds, do, but please, remember how impressionable they are and that any negative comments will perhaps stop their imagination dead in it's tracks. 

Above all, keep that child within you alive.  My Grandma is a great writer.  I hope I grow up to be just like her!  God bless you Grandma, and thank you xx

Happy writing ;)
Emma