We are entering the half of the summer that is open. Wide open. The first half had traveling, dates booked on the calendar, hurrying to and from and being elsewhere. This second half, we are home. I'm enjoying iced tea in blue mason jars, and getting a few projects done that I haven't had open days for. I'm creating right and left, and am full of a drive for making and doing and being. Perhaps the reason is that school is out and the creative space in my brain I use for lesson planning and teaching is on holiday and there is room for my projects.
It's shocking to me how much space homeschooling takes up in my brain. We are not that structured {or disciplined, to be honest...} and I pretty much follow my kids cues and answer their questions with learning opportunities and fill in with the basics. But it all takes up space in my head. Learning at home means literally learning at every corner and using every inch of the day because it is our lifestyle. And I love it. The kids love it.
However, it takes summer to make me realize how much work it is. And with space and a bit of distance from the lesson planner, I realize there has always been a part of my brain that says I have all this time, I should be doing something else. When really? Homeschooling, in this season, is it. Writing here is enough. To be creative, to live a creative life, means so many different things for different people. Creating our days is using a creative part of the mind. Knitting is creative. Sewing projects are creative.
I had been holding onto writing as my creative endeavor. Then I realized I didn't like writing what I thought I would want to write, and it opened my eyes to the fact that maybe writing isn't the THING I do. Maybe the thing I do is simply living creatively, bringing creativity into every ounce of my day. Teaching it to my kids. Living it in my choice of mason jar cups and taking it with me to a yarn shop when choosing colors and textures.
And so I feel a shift coming, thanks to the openness that summer allows. A shift towards the open creative life. Maybe I've been here all along... and it's time to own it, and live in the creative openness.
