I would like to admit that I have a problem. I am not a big fan of messes. I know I know, as a Montessorian I should follow the child and normalize making mistakes along with making messes. But it’s so hard for me to deal with what appears to be chaos, which is why I keep most of my art supplies in a closet. A closet tucked away and out of sight from my current toddler. But as I went through old photos on my phone I came across this video of my then toddler (she’s now almost 5) and she is playing with modeling dough. I had the modeling dough on the shelves and she could use it whenever she wanted.

 So now I feel guilty because the art supplies is hidden, part of the reason is because I’ve changed the setup of our home and I no longer have a room dedicated to Montessori work. Now that we finally have some furniture (a story for another day) I needed to move our white shelves to the basement and decide what materials were most important to have in the living room on a rotating basis. But there is room for modeling clay upstairs, in fact there is an entire kitchen cabinet shelf awaiting Montessori work, but I’ve been stalling. Maybe this video will give me a change of heart, just maybe the new toddler will get a chance to play with modeling dough too.

-Happy Montessori