The conception of Once There Was A Story

Several years back, we found our children were having troubled sleep, they were tossing and turning, having nightmares & finding it difficult to drift off to peaceful sleep.

Emma pampering Lesley
with Pink Clay hand masks

We began doing visualisations every night with them and the results were dramatic:

• They drifted off easily to sleep
• They were happy to let us leave their room once done so they may complete their visualisations
• In the morning they were excited to share the things they had 'seen'
• They slept deeply & more peacefully
• Problems that were difficult to talk about we brought up in visualisations & allowed them to 'stick on their worry tree'
• They began sharing their concerns with us
• Many negative behaviours disappeared

After this, we would often be in the garden working and they would become side tracked or bored, we began telling them the names of every creature that lived in the garden and what they had been up to (yes, it took some pretty quick thinking some times).

They came to love the fables that lived in our garden & the magic that filled their lives.

All creatures are now well known by their names and discussed with any visitors as if it is completely general knowledge about the 'three wise men that live under the grass smoking their pipes'.
Any newcomer is promptly names and a story about his life made up, not only by us anymore.

We have been taken on fantastic journeys of the imagination & delight in the sense of belonging everywhere we travel - linked by fables and stories. Life is richer, fuller and more fun. Everyday problems are put into perspective and the stories have got us through many troublesome times.

Bedtimes stories are now often replaced by "please put the book away mummy and tell us one of 'our' stories".

Gabe + Mollie the guinea pig

Our son Gabe has begun his own fanciful stories & is inspired from history of stories through the ages (his take on life delves into the mysteries of the world and the depths of humans & their psyche)

Our daughter Emma, loves art and creating in all forms, inspired she began paintings & drawings of her favourite stories.

For about 2 years now she has begged me to write a book to share these stories with other children and illustrate them with her art.

We finally decided (after a computer crash lost all our stories) to start again and blog about them.

We hope you may print them out and take them to your children as bedtime stories. We would love to hear of how the bedtime visualisations worked for you and your children and the changes that take place for them.

We have set ourselves a goal of 50 stories within the year.

We look forward to sharing them with you & hope they enrich your childrens lives.............

http://www.renascentcollege.com/