What do you do with your little darlings’ bits of art? You know the endless bits of paper and card that have been marked by your offspring. Which ones do you deem to be ‘special’ and worthy of putting aside to get out again when they’ve grown up and left home? And which ones can you with a clear conscience throw away?

Like art itself it is, of course, subjective. What speaks so clearly to you as the work of a potential genius might just look like some smudges to other people. And of course your child might attach a special meaning to a certain piece that you know you just have to hang on to. But what if you seem to create more than you are willing to keep hold of?

Every few months someone who worked at my son’s nursery would excitedly (gratefully) hand over another massive sheaf of coloured papers (shedding glitter and bits of dried macaroni all over the place) to me, knowing I would be just so happy to receive them. And I am, for all of the 15minutes it takes to go through them exclaiming over the artistic merit, before I wonder what on earth I am going to do with them all.

All over my son’s bedroom we have little paper sculptures, potato prints and corrugated cardboard collages stashed away. Some are stuck to the wall, some have accidently gone down the back of the wardrobe never to be seen again, some have found their way into the bin… oh don’t look at me like that! I can’t bear the guilt. I feel terrible but sometimes there are just too many examples of my child’s burgeoning creativity, I can barely see some surfaces in my house so covered are they with artwork.

Until my son started school this month we went weekly to a kiddy art class in Hove called Red Jelly. It is a chance to get completely messy for an hour (smocks are provided) and not have to clean it up (everyone knows the hazards of opening up a tub of glitter in your own home). It’s loud, exciting, creative mayhem for little ones with a different, fun theme each week and led by the most patient and wonderful lady who my son has declared love for on many occasions. 

You also get to see the toddler who paints the whole lower half of their face with red paint and then stumbles around looking like a baby zombie, oh and the competitive parents who surreptitiously correct their child’s eggbox crocodile while their youngsters splash around in tubs of coloured water. But, it does mean you end up with even more things to take home with you, things to treasure and keep forever of course.

I agonise what to do with it all. So now and again I ceremoniously hand out ‘special drawings done especially for you’ to friends and family with a look that was meant to convey just how precious these bits of paper are. Bits of paper a few hours earlier had been hovering over the bin.

But of course I keep hold of as much as I can because you know, what if he is a future Picasso?

Red Jelly runs most weekdays during term times in Hove, see redjellykids.co.uk for more information