“What’s that road named after?” my older son said, pointing to the road that his elementary school is named after. He was in his “asking questions about why things are named what they are” stage.
“I don’t know,” I said. “We can look it up.”
That’s how we found out his elementary school is named after an enslaver.
Continue reading
“You aren’t supposed to lead play, just watch,” the parenting expert voice in the back of my head said. So I sat there on the living room floor and watched, keeping my mouth closed, lest I pass judgment on how my kid was playing.
Even though something felt ‘off’ about this statement, I couldn’t help but see it as the culmination of so much parenting advice – and more strikingly, parent shaming.
Continue reading
1958? Wow, I didn’t think this book was that old, I thought as I looked at the title page of the classic children’s book Beezus and Ramona. Ramona’s four year old behavior – eating one bite out of each apple in a bag, writing her name on every page of a library book – seems just as relevant 65 years later as it did then.
Continue reading
My children are dandelions. They are not sturdy, resilient standbys like tulips or delicate, like orchids.
My dandelion children are wild and bright, standing out in the manicured environments that society so often shoves us into.
Continue reading
“I’m sorry – what was your name again?” I asked the man sitting next to me at the community meeting.
“Luis,” he replied, then gestured. “Remember, I asked you about hosting the neighborhood pantry?”
“Oh, right!” I recalled. “I’m sorry – I’m really bad at both faces and names.”
I’ve had some variation on this conversation dozens, if not hundreds, of times.
Continue reading
“Nothing is wasted in nature,” I whispered to myself as I dumped moldy strawberries in our composter.
I despise wasting food. There are so many things wrapped up in the production of our food – from how farm workers are treated to the amount of fertilizer used – that throwing it away feels a bit like sacrilege. But we bought far too much for our Christmas fruit salad and the extra got shoved back in the fridge with the other holiday leftovers. So into the composter it had to go.
I at least had the solace that this food wouldn’t be wasted – it would break down into good compost to feed our garden next fall. Just like the fallen leaves in the forest feed the insects and fungus, which in turn feed the roots of the trees and other plants.
In fact, this is idea that nothing is wasted in nature is a mantra I’ve been trying to adopt in life far beyond our composter.
Continue reading
Reading the plaque on the wall at the National Children’s Museum, I raised an eyebrow. I had been looking around while my kids climbed on the huge structure rising up two stories in the middle of the museum. The sign on the wall caught my eye, so of course I read it. It had a little blurb about the skills children would learn from using said giant climbing structure – like problem solving and teamwork – and careers that used those skills. Although I was nodding along at first, I stopped and thought, “Wait a minute! Why are we so worried about them learning specific skills, much less for a career? Why can’t we just let them play?”
Continue reading
Whoooooo loves reading Mo Willems books to their kids? Props to my local library for setting up this adorable little scene behind the check-out counter!
I talked to one of the librarians and she said that it just happened to come together organically – someone left the book there after story time, someone else put the big owl there, then someone fished the glasses out of Lost and Found and put the little owl next to the big one.
It just shows that creating little bits of magic and wonder don’t have to be a big, preplanned thing. Magic and wonder will show up if you keep your eyes open for them, whether that’s my younger son playing “monster school” or pretending to shoot each other with laser beams on a spaceship.
As I pumped my legs and leaned back in the swing, I noticed my younger son swinging next to me, in parallel, our swings moving in time together.
A memory of swinging as a kid flashed across my mind – the idea that if you swing in sync with someone else, it meant you would get married. I smiled. That saying was nonsense of course, mere playground silliness. But to see this being, the child who I remember being so small, swinging on his own, next to me, reminded me of our deep connection to one another.
Continue reading
Side-by-side, my kids working together – I paused for a moment and gazed in wonder.
That afternoon, we had been preparing the garden for winter. Each fall, after we’ve pulled out all of our plants, we pile up compost, straw, and leaves to build the soil, mimicking what happens in the forest. This year, we had an addition to the process. When we ordered our seeds in the spring, my younger son spotted a plant in the catalog named for his favorite animal – elephant garlic. As we were also ordering carrots because they’re associated with my older son’s favorite animal (rabbits), we just had to get it.
So while I shoveled compost, I gave my kids the task of planting the garlic. My older son was (justifiably) complaining about the smell of the compost and loves picking things apart, so peeling the garlic was a perfect task for him. Once that was done, they needed to work together to plant it. I pointed out that it might be best for my older son to measure out where to put the cloves – elephant garlic needs a ton of space – as he has experience from math class at measuring things. Then my younger son could dig the holes, drop in the cloves, and cover them up.
Continue reading