My 7-year-old daughter is very creative, which is starting to worry me a bit. She gets inspired and launches these projects that she just “has to do,” often without running it by me first. I'm beginning to think I may need to give her creativity a specific, parent-approved outlet... if only for my own sanity.

The other day, for example, she and her little brother were carrying the step ladder through the hall. Why? To tape room numbers at the tops of the bedroom doors so that we can have our own in-home mail system. So now our rooms are numbered 200, 201, and 202. As far as I know, no mail has been sent or received yet.

Yesterday, I walked down the hall to find an old diaper box (she had found in the garage) taped (with lots of tape) to the wall outside my daughter's room. The box was filled with red artificial flowers... a flower box, of course. She did not appreciate my explanation that we don't tape things on the walls without permission. She already has white plastic urn things on each side of her door for decoration (don't ask).

Her latest idea was to make hair bows out of aluminum foil and bobby pins. She's still working on that, although she did manage to leave permanent marker marks on her place mat as she colored the aluminum foil. At least it wasn't on the table.

So I'm thinking I should try to direct all this creativity in positive ways before my girl does some real, though innocent, damage... or just redecorates my entire home while I'm outside sweeping! Maybe if I get some really large paper for her to make a “mural” and then put it up in her room... That should keep her busy for a while!