It's been a tough term and school holidays are almost here/looming (depending on your perspective).
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However you feel about the approaching break, for most of us it won't involve much in the way of beach holidays or family gatherings.
So how will you keep the kids busy?
Enter Southern Tablelands Arts (STA), who have been carefully curating a gallery that could save your sanity, as well as help your child's creativity to blossom this spring.
It's not a gallery of static artworks, but one full of videos made by artists and practitioners, showing a number of self-led activities that will challenge and delight children in the holidays, or anytime.
"Our goal (with STA Kids) is that children have fun and have things to do - there are so many cool things to do there," said STA executive director Rose Marin.
"It's an amazing resource for families."
Previously the children's curator at the National Gallery of Australia, Ms Marin started with STA in March 2020 and instantly saw the potential to develop activities for children, tapping into the huge range of skilled artists in the region.
"We had the capacity, the space and gorgeous practitioners, and there's nothing revolutionary in knowing that children's activities would always be gratefully received," Ms Marin said.
"And as we are all in a much deeper digital space that we ever thought possible, the planets all aligned, and we got some stimulus money through Create NSW, which enabled us to kickstart and get a whole lot of videos up."
The sculptors, weavers, poets and musicians (among others) are all paid for their contributions, and the videos all align with a philosophy of using objects that are already in the home or backyard, as well as the concept of letting children run with their own ideas, rather than constrain them to structured outcomes.
"We have a very strong philosophy of sustainable practices, what I call a 'third drawer down' mentality - upi don't have to spend a lot of money, and a lot of things you have in your own home or backyard are what you need," Ms Marin said.
"And nothing is offered with preconcieved outcomes - they are all scaffolded sysytems that have lots of choice and decision-making processes for the children.
"I always say that if the way the children respond to the activity doesn't surprise and delight you, the activity is too cooked. You need to loosen it up a bit."
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