Karen Stokes

The little joys of making.

When I was a kid, nothing excited me more than stationery ... and lollies. Lets be real here, we are talking about a child who used to eat sugar cubes from the cupboard when mum wasn't looking. And yes, they were so bad for my teeth, but they were so delicious! Sometimes, on the way home from a family outing, my mum would have to stop to buy milk and bread at the local corner store. She would let my sister and I go with her, and to my delight she would let us buy some of the sweets in the glass cabinet filled with tubs of lollies of every description. One by one we chose lollies until our little white paper bag was full. We felt like we were in Willy Wonka's chocolate factory, if it were run by a overweight greek man, and his wife. These were some of the best days of my childhood. Okay, I'm sorry, I have digressed. Let me tell you about when my love story with arts and crafts began and in order to do this, I take you back to the beginning.