Kid Proof Your Work
If you work from home and have children, or children visit you often, then you should consider yourself fortunate if you have not yet encountered the setback of little fingers. This is the event of a curious child wanting to help with a project and accidentally squashing a week's worth of working with clay into a mound more reminiscent of the mashed potato sculpture from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Or a carefully lain out beading project suddenly turned into something best picked up by a Dust Buster®.
Craft projects, such as beading or polymer clay, are not the only things that can fall victim to little fingers. Fashion designs can be 'improved' with markers, computers can be bumped off desks while playing, and collectible vintage toys can be opened for playing with.
When I decided I wanted to be a writer my mom told me of a story she had wrote years ago. A full length novel that had taken her months of work. She had gone somewhere and when she got home my siblings had been so kind as to toss out those papers they had spilled something on. My mom just sort of lost the desire to write after that.
Whatever sort of work you do, you should look at it from the perspective of a child. Is it going to be enticing enough to override you saying "Don't touch"? Could you overcome having your project played with by designating clay that kids can play with and making it clear they can not touch the clay and figures that you work on? Can you close your work into a closet or a spare bedroom? Even if the area is not only for your work, would it be reasonable to ask the children to not get into the stuff you put away in the closet in the hallway? If you sell vintage toys could you get some similar non-vintage toys that the kids can play with?
Careful steps of precaution can help you as well. Such as, don't leave your fashion designs or building plans laying on the dining room table. Tuck the laptop away in your bedroom or a drawer rather than leaving it sitting on the coffee table. Set your bead work in one of those crates that can be slid under your bed or a couch when you are not going to be sitting there working on it.
Craft projects, such as beading or polymer clay, are not the only things that can fall victim to little fingers. Fashion designs can be 'improved' with markers, computers can be bumped off desks while playing, and collectible vintage toys can be opened for playing with.
When I decided I wanted to be a writer my mom told me of a story she had wrote years ago. A full length novel that had taken her months of work. She had gone somewhere and when she got home my siblings had been so kind as to toss out those papers they had spilled something on. My mom just sort of lost the desire to write after that.
Whatever sort of work you do, you should look at it from the perspective of a child. Is it going to be enticing enough to override you saying "Don't touch"? Could you overcome having your project played with by designating clay that kids can play with and making it clear they can not touch the clay and figures that you work on? Can you close your work into a closet or a spare bedroom? Even if the area is not only for your work, would it be reasonable to ask the children to not get into the stuff you put away in the closet in the hallway? If you sell vintage toys could you get some similar non-vintage toys that the kids can play with?
Careful steps of precaution can help you as well. Such as, don't leave your fashion designs or building plans laying on the dining room table. Tuck the laptop away in your bedroom or a drawer rather than leaving it sitting on the coffee table. Set your bead work in one of those crates that can be slid under your bed or a couch when you are not going to be sitting there working on it.
Labels: work tips
posted by Sandra at 3:26 PM
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