Just make the Dang Sourdough: How to find time for creativity as a mom
I see you there, remembering the years when you had all the time in the world to be creative. You used to journal or dance or serve in your church. Then you had babies.
Slowly and all at once, your time to be creative slipped away from you. When you have the desire to make something or even just dream something up, the impending task list of meals to be made, messes to be cleaned and diapers to be changed drowns out even the possibility of spending your time doing the creative things you used to do.
What if I told you that I bet, just maybe, you really do still have the time?
What do you really want to be doing?
I found myself pretty much paralyzed when it came to creativity a few years ago. My second daughter was born when my first girly was in the absolute throes of early toddlerhood. No one was sleeping much and I felt the farthest thing from capable. I could barely handle getting all three of us through the day while my husband was working—how was I supposed to make time for the creative things I loved?
When I spent my tiny pockets of free time numbing out by scrolling on my phone, it felt like a little vacation from the next round of mom tasks I would need to do. But when the free time ended, I was no better off than before I had had time to rest. Loading up on mindless entertainment never really fuels me in my role as a mama and wife who wants to glorify the Lord. But I felt like there truly was no time for anything more. My two-year-old stopped napping and started fighting bedtime, and it seemed like there was no quiet in the house between the hours of 6am-9pm—there was barely time for me to take a shower, never mind write a poem or work on a scrapbook.
What I learned through that season is that when our time seems to shrink away to nothing, we see what we really want to be doing.
What I really, deeply wanted in that season was to have something in my day that was just for me. Something redemptive that I could invest my energy into by my own choice.
I wanted to be creative! And if you’re reading this post, I bet you do too.
In our season of motherhood to little ones, sometimes our opportunities to be creative can be hiding in plain sight.
When you think about your favorite days that you spend with your husband or your children, what is it about those days that makes them so fun?
I bet that creativity is a part of those answers. Your creativity is what makes a day spent at the beach a good time; most likely, you, the mom, were the one creating strategies to keep everyone happy and fed. You created a sweet memory.
Your creativity is what allows you to love teaching your kids! You are creating ways to get truth into their hearts, creating ways to enter into play with them, creating an environment where they can learn.
If you're enjoying days with your kids, your creativity is probably turned on way more often than you realize. And if you’re not enjoying your days with your kids, just maybe, it’s because your creativity has gone a little dormant.
What I’m trying to say here is that you are already using your creativity! There really is time in our day where we can use our hearts, minds and hands to create, even with little ones all around us and the pressing needs we tend to all day long. We will feel the most like ourselves when we’re being creative in some way, instead of just passing through our days and consuming constantly when we get a break—because the One who created this whole entire world also created you, and He passed His life-giving, creative nature into what it means to be human.
So. If creativity is something you feel like you’re missing right now, let me share a few ideas for reconnecting with it.
1: Dream while you work.
If you have some kind of a creative project on your heart, set your mind on it when you are working with your hands, driving to an activity or rocking a sweet babe to sleep. About 80% of my writing for the Creating Joy workshop happened in time like this! Motherhood gives us the gift of a lot of time like this—time when we can process, meditate on God’s word, pray, or perhaps, plan a birthday party. Even when we don’t have time to sit down at a desk, we can be creative in the working margins of our days.
2: Learn while you work.
Whatever creative field you love, there’s probably someone with a podcast about it. Or an audiobook. Or a YouTube channel. If you give yourself the gift of fueling your creativity by learning more about your interest when you have time to listen to something (maybe just while you fold laundry or brush your teeth), I think that counts as being creative.
3: Create through serving your family.
Dream up some way to make the next day with no plans a special day! Try a new recipe together as a family, come up with a game you can all play together, or plan a little mini-excursion to somewhere beautiful near you. (Chick-Fil-A counts as a beautiful place, just saying.) Be creative by making a regular day into a fun day.
4. Communicate your need for time.
Do the people that love you know that you’re really desiring time to work on whatever it is that feels like creativity to you? After almost eight years of marriage, I am still learning that my husband cannot read my mind. When I open my mouth and ask him to help me accomplish something, he is usually so understanding and ready to help. Your creativity fuels you as a mom, and it is worth making time for.
5. Create alongside your kids.
Oh, the wonder of a baby wrap. Baby wearing is the best hack of life if you want some time to work on a hobby and your baby is a contact napper. There are lots of other ways to be creative while simultaneously caring for or entertaining your kids! If you like to bake, pretend you’re on a cooking show while you try a new recipe. Your kids will think it’s absolutely hilarious. If you want to sew, set your toddler up with little strips of fabric or embroidery thread and some pasta noodles to thread onto them while you work on your project. If your creativity looks like hosting or event planning, look at those kinds of days as enrichment for your kids—they don’t always need a child-specific activity to grow their social skills and just enjoy a day with you.
Creating Joy contains hours of content designed to help you clarify what it is that fuels you in motherhood and find pockets of time to make it happen. I would love to hang out with you there!
I think that creativity in motherhood is selfless self-care.
When we look for time for creativity from a stance of knowing we were created to be creative and that there’s a way to make it happen, without resentment for our season, it can refresh our perspective, energize us, and bring so much joy into regular days. That joy has no option but to spill over to our families and everyone else around us. Everyone wins when mom gets creative.
So—I think you should pull out the piano bench and take a seat. Who cares if the kids bang on the high notes.
Start with that phrase that’s been running around your head for the last month and mentally write the poem while you take a shower.
Set the date and invite the friend. That part only takes three minutes. The rest will come together.
Just put the baby in the wrap and make the dang sourdough. You really can’t fail, because flat sourdough makes the best breadcrumbs.
Posted by Megan
Hey there, I’m Megan! You can usually find me dreaming up a new project with my husband, trying to figure out homeschool with my two girls while my little boy explores the pots and pans cabinet, or excavating a pile of laundry with coffee in my hand. We live in New England and our dog is named Moose.
Connect: @lilac.and.sparrow
