HerediTARy

My children's grandparents each have or did have their own unique creative and artistic side.  I like to think my girls have inherited a little bit from each of them!

A Grandma that wrote a poem for me when I was a little girl that I still display proudly in my room as a forty something year old woman. She not only wrote it in her beautiful calligraphy but painted flowers around the border.  It is hanging on my wall above my vanity (how fitting!)  My mom writes in poem, every card, every letter, every gift tag.  She is both a writer and an artist with her words.  She always thought she would be a weaver and that that would be her gift to share with the world.  She had found her gift years ago but didn't realize how special it was.

Her husband, the girl's Grandpa, loves photography and maps.  He has a gift of remembering every place he's ever been.  The name of the river next to the campsite we stayed at in Alaska, the small town we passed through in Colorado and every place in between.  On route he is always taking pictures.  He sometimes hides behind his camera lens at parties and has the innate ability to capture life and people and love.  

A grandfather that not only has a green thumb in the garden but knows how to capture nature's beauty through a lens as well.  These favorites are hanging in the cottage.  I have others that I switch out with the seasons at home.  I love flowers both real and photographed.  His granddaughters like to take pictures of flowers and nature too.  

My dad's wife and the girls Gammie is a quilter and she invites all the grandchildren into her quilt space to create.  They use scraps of fabric and sew or glue their creations together.  She has given them each a quilt of their own but the greatest gift she has given them is to teach them how to create something from nothing.  

Another grandfather that the girls never met but who they emulate every time they pick up a paint brush or even white board marker and let their creativity express itself.  One of his favorite subjects was birch trees.  Rod loves birch trees and they remind me of Becket so we were so pleased to find that our cottage is surrounded by them.  We brought our favorite paintings by his dad to the cottage to decorate the house with.   Funny one of his granddaughters likes birch trees in her art too.  

painting by L

And a grandmother who the girls all knew and loved and miss.  Her musical ability now pours from her youngest daughter's fingertips as she plays her piano in our front living room.  This same grandmother started taking art classes in her 50's after her husband passed away because she loved his art.  

It's never too late to get in touch with your creative side!  I'm so glad my children get to look up to grandparents who are in touch with theirs.  Each of their artistic abilities is unique and is expressed differently through art, dance, music, creativity.  They have learned that art is an expression of yourself.  And they have had wonderful teachers.