Imagine the sweet scent of home baked sugar cookies moving through a sea of floating bubbles and you'll understand the essence of Rae Grant's newest book... handcrafted love with a dash of magic.
In Homemade Fun: 101 Crafts to do with Kids, Grant pulls from her expansive arsenal of creative know-how to share over 100 sewing projects, games, activities and baking adventures for children and their families.
We just love the feel of the retro illustrations that accompany the activities, and couldn't help ourselves when it came time for blowing bubbles (we'll have some fun to share with that tomorrow!). In short, Grant's books demonstrate that simple is often best, and we couldn't agree more...
Here is our chat with the lovely author Rae Grant followed by a chance to win all three of her books!!:
What led you to write these books?
These books Cooking Fun, Crafting Fun and Homemade Fun all have been inspired by my own passionate love of childhood fun. To the credit of my mom and grandparents I had a happy and free childhood for many years. My childhood involved playing outside with my brothers and sisters, making and inventing games and toys at home, and eating good simple food from our family garden. There is a joie de vivre, a joy to living, which is important to experience, remember, and pass along. Looking back I think this is one of my main motivations for making these books; to both remember the joy of living that I knew and offer it to my family and the world in the form of children’s books.
What does going back to the basics teach kids today?
This joy to living that I mentioned ties in with my questioning whether
children in the modern world might actually be getting cheated of that
simple joy of doing and experimenting that can be a rich and formative
part of childhood. I’ve been concerned that our modern living has been a
little too quick to replace these age-old values with the “fast food”
version of life. As we cook well and make things creatively at home, it
became clear to me that this act of simple living really offers richness
to life and to the days of family hood.
What has the simplified kind of lifestyle you write about done for
you and your family?
I’ve come to understand that simple living is as much a
practice as a value, and people can live this value in varying degrees
depending on personal choice, and circumstance. It’s an exciting era for
modern families!
For our family, living more simply has been about reinforcing values and
choices that were already present. My grandparents and my mother are
from the era in American culture that cultivated a family life in a
simple homemade way. It was the lifestyle. Backyard gardens, mending
clothes, taking care of what you own, not polluting your water source,
respecting nature as a real living entity was part of the family value.
As I grow older and look back, I feel very fortunate to have been
influenced by these types of people.
Ironically, I ended up living in an urban environment, which is probably
one of the more challenging lifestyles in which to live simply.
Surprisingly it can be done because there are networks of people and
community that care about this and believe in bringing quality to the
city. Maybe I wrote these books in reaction to living far from the days
of my own childhood. I really dislike losing things that I love. In any
case, these values are living with our family now and we like it!
What is "childhood" for you?
Having been in parenting mode, aunt mode, and writer of children’s book
mode all at the same time, I’ve come to understand childhood to be a
great time of wonder and learning. If we can offer children a way to
wonder about the great wide world and let the wonder sink into their
bones and hearts, then they will be the next generation to pass along
this same value. It seems so important to offer kids today a reference
point from the past and I hope my books do just that- as well as offer a
plain old good time!
Thanks Sarah for inviting me to Imagine Childhood. No doubt I am a big
fan of your life work too!
Thank you so much Rae for sharing a little of your process with us today it has been a pleasure to have you here! And now for the Giveaway:
For a chance to win a copy of all three of Rae Grant's books, simply leave a comment on this post. The winner will be chosen by random number and announced next Friday July 16th.
Good Luck!
*Last time in Book Reviews: Zeke, Ky and the Leeches
