Must confess that I am one of those moms who have saved way too many of her kid’s artwork projects over the years… Two daughters, and an entire closet, almost floor to ceiling filled with boxes, labeled carefully with name, age, location, and year… I know, a bit much… But I can get away with it at our house because I have a husband who has a rather large collection of boxes in our attic filled with college notes and beyond… Why? Just in case he needs to refer back to them. I somehow knew that my daughters and I would one day need to refer back to their special childhood mementoes…
But back to my closet filled with the kid’s artwork…
Now that the girls are grown, the eldest, with a preschooler, I find myself occasionally hearing her family woes about what to do with all the “very special” artwork that the child brings home from school or does in the home! There isn’t enough wall space to display everything! And to a busy and excited young child EVERY creation is important and must be saved forever! Yep, heard that loud and clear long ago in my household!
So I told my daughter how my artwork management system developed. First we hung what we could where there was space in the house. The refrigerator was always covered. Then there was a rotation process that got rather complicated after awhile. And finally I picked up a nice sturdy brown box that was perfect for papers. Maybe it was two inches deep. That became what we called the special “treasure chest” for her papers. When something was deemed very important yet had to come down from the wall or fridge to make way for something new, it was lovingly placed in the “treasure chest.” In a few months we filled the first box. I found another. It was four inches deep. That one lasted about a year. Every year another box or two was added to the collection. I have enough boxes for both daughters all the way through college!
As the girls got older there were fewer art projects, more papers, report cards, awards, newspaper clippings, photos, silly notes we wrote each other, prom napkins, and concert or play, or dance recital programs. Graduation announcements, too!
My daughter and her family were visiting a few weeks ago and I decided it was time to start going through some of those boxes and turning those treasures over to her. We made it through only one box that parallels the age of my granddaughter. I plan to take two more along to share during our next visit. Looking through these treasures was not only was special to me and my daughter, but young granddaughter was quite impressed with how many nice things her mom had made when she was 3! I think those quiet moments we shared added a magical dimension to their sweet mother-daughter relationship… So, I conclude it was definitely worth saving those papers and boxes all these years, moving them from one home to another several times! Sharing them in the months and years ahead will bring us much delight and allow our family to reflect on and share so many memories!
In the very first box that my daughter and I went though I was surprised to discover a college paper I had written during that year my daughter was 2-3 asking me to talk about my home management systems, and how they did or did not work. It was a Home Economics class and the paper was tied to a unit on household management, assessing values, goals, and priorities, and applying that to my environment. I laugh reading it as so much has changed, yet so many things have not!
So, in my next post I will flash back some 29 years and share with you some of what I wrote in that paper! Stay tuned…