Cheese and crackers

Pam Sorooshian, on becoming the parent you want to be:

Fix them a little tray of cheese and crackers and take it to them, wherever they are, unasked. Sit down on the floor and play with them. If nothing else, just go and give each of them a little hug and a kiss and say, "I was just thinking about how much I love you."

Just change the next interaction you have with the kids. Focus on making the next interaction another one that builds up your relationship.

—Pam Sorooshian

How and what to change
photo by Amy Milstein

"Just enough" is not enough

When Kirby was a baby, I had a rough day, home alone, and when Keith came home I cried. I said I didn't feel like I was doing a good job, and the house was a mess (and all that stuff). He said "Is the baby still alive? Then you did a good job."

It was a nice thought for that one day, but I'm glad I didn't settle for that, with three kids over the next 20+ years.

Thoughts about doing better
or
other posts about being and doing "better"
photo by Cathy Koetsier
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More positive

In a world of choices, every choice that moves one toward positivity (hope, optimism, joy, sweetness, peace) and away from negativity (cynicism, anger, disdain, dismay, pessimism) is a solid step toward "better" (IF the person wants to be more positive).

In a world of partnership, when one partner is more positive, the partnership is more positive.

In a home with a mother, when the mother is more positive, the family's life is more positive.

SandraDodd.com/choices
photo by Sandra Dodd

Overflow

Stop thinking about your own comfort for a while. If you become successful at attending to other people's comfort, their comfort will overflow all around you, and you will feel your success and that will be some of YOUR new comfort.

SandraDodd.com/change
photo (a link) by Sandra Dodd

Changing your security settings

Someone wrote that some people need to feel secure to make a change.

I responded:

Make changes, and then feel more secure. That's easier.

Little changes, like breathing and calming and smiling.
Little changes, like looking for abundance, and being grateful for little changes.


SandraDodd.com/change.html
photo by Lisa J Haugen

Starting to soften

Karen James wrote:

Being Ethan's mom changed me. I surprised myself in good ways. In learning to give to him, I grew to really like myself. The walls started coming down. I started to soften - to have compassion for myself.... I challenged myself to continue to do better, because I now knew I could. I had a found confidence in that new truth. Honesty and humility too. All good things for learning to really flourish.

As I became happier with myself and the world around me, I would say that real learning started to happen. From my experience, when trauma heals, learning begins to become more fluid again. Richer. More meaningful. More lasting.

—Karen James

More words and/or photos by Karen James
photo by Karen James

Seeing beauty

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," they say. Sometimes it's intended to be a put-down, of the thing, or of the person who said "Beautiful."

"You're looking at the world through rose-colored glasses" is another sort of light insult.

Picture anything, though—a cloud, a teacup, a puppy—and think about people who would criticize or dismiss, comparing them to someone who would quietly admire and appreciate the thing.

I like to think of parents being the way they want their children to be. I try to remember to be the way I want to be remembered. Maybe seeing beauty is one of the most beautifying things in the world.

SandraDodd.com/wonder
photo by Ester Siroky

Photos can't show it.

Sometimes clouds and mountains make dramatic art of themselves. I wish I could share it with people who live in flatlands, or where they can't see a long way. Photos never show it. Sometimes one provides a breathtaking peek, but when you see a picture of beautiful clouds on mountains, remember that the view was many miles wide and might have gone on up into the sky so high you would fall over backwards trying to see it all.

Caren Knox saved and shared this in 2014. I had posted it without a photo, and will do so again here. Caren matched it with this post, which does have an image: Simply seeing

Decisions

Think about what you think you "have to" do. Choose to do something good, for sensible reasons.

SandraDodd.com/decisions
photo by Sandra Dodd

Now and then

Today I have seen two of my grown children. Keith saw all three, but not in the same place. We have three grandchildren. I saw two, today, but not at my house.

When your children are still young and with you, once in a while I hope you will look at them all, and maybe catch a photo. If you have one child who lives at home, breathe that in and know that it might not always be so.

Moving away or traveling, going to university, getting married, having children—those things are natural and fine. Time goes forward and people spread out. Today's reality is not what your younger self could have known. More waves of future will come along.

Find peace and appreciation and share it with your children.



Thoughts on growth
photo by Lydia Koltai

Unseen future

We all are preparing for our unseen futures.


Kids love the excitement of not knowing what's around the bend. Parents prefer the illusion of planning years in advance, but we don't know what's around the bend, either.

Being as present as possible today, now, in this moment, will improve your unseen future.

---

The first line is from Art, Aging and Spirituality

The best matches for the other ideas are Moments and Big Gambles

photo by Dawn Todd
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Visible joy

Make home a place the child is always safe, secure, loved, and respected. Model empathy, kindness, and take visible joy in good things. Bring more good things into the home for the family to take joy in.

—Jessica Hughes

Building an Unschooling Nest
photo by Roya Dedeaux

Images of light

I am grateful to Lisa Jonick for letting me use photos she had taken, over the years, here. Some of my favorite posts have her photos.

I like the matching chickens contrasting beautifully with the green wall, on a snowy day best. You might like others better.

Here they are! Enjoy.

One more way to randomize Just Add Light and Stir
photo by Lisa Jonick

It's about everything.

"I wish people who think unschooling is about doing nothing could know that it's about everything."

—Stephanie LaBarge
in an online chat in June, 2010

SandraDodd.com/connections/
photo by Sarah Lawson

Avoiding problems

What else can be a problem with unschooling?
Trying to save time and money; skimping on attention.

I've done this, "Not now," or "please not today." But what do you tell yourself about that? If it's "Good, no problem," that's bad, and a problem.

Generosity begets generosity
photo by Roya Dedeaux

Who will you be?

Make the relationship between parent and child the first priority. Don’t have an image in mind of who the child should be. Begin with an image of who you want to be to your child.

—Jessica Hughes

SandraDodd.com/being
photo by Chrissy Florence
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What you do changes you

The improvement to life in a family where the mom feels like an attentive, present mom is huge. The improvement to the Mom's life when she is empowering her children rather than limiting them is big. The solid value of her own self esteem when she knows she is creating a safer more peaceful environment is priceless.



Healing
photo by Amy Milstein

Sweet and supportive

The parents' job is to create and maintain a rich environment, and to be attentive to the child, and sweet and supportive.

SandraDodd.com/nest.html
photo by Nicole Kenyon

Diligently and happily and well

By unschooling diligently and happily and well for a long time, families and people have sometimes been changed.

SandraDodd.com/change/
photo by Roya Dedeaux

Exploring

Joyce wrote:

"Our role is to walk by their sides as they explore, not let them explore on their own. At times we need to hang back and be quiet so they can have the time and freedom to explore something that fascinates them. At times we need to share their enjoyment and be with them (even if it's the umpty gajillionth rerun of Spongebob Squarepants ;-) At times we need to point things out. At times we need to share the things we love. At times we need to take them to places they wouldn't know to explore."

—Joyce Fetteroll

SandraDodd.com/joyce/products
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Seeing the world anew

Below, above; inside, outside. Objects, people and places look different, and are different, when the viewpoint changes.

Adults can never again see the world as a child does, but some can quietly watch a child see things for the first time. With practice, and with wonder, even adults can see the world anew.

SandraDodd.com/angles.html
photo by Roya Dedeaux
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Knowing peace

The more local and personal peace there is, the more peace there will be in the world.
. . . .
If we raise the level of peace our children expect, they will know what peace feels like.

Read what Esther Maria Rest wrote, at http://sandradodd.com/parentingpeacefully.html#esther.
photo by Colleen Prieto
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Choose better

Here's an idea that will work with just about every aspect of life: Every time you make a decision, wait until you've thought of two choices and choose the better one.

It seems simple, but I was surprised, when I thought of that way to ratchet the quality of life up, to find how many times I was acting without really thinking.

SandraDodd.com/choices
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Creating history

Remember you don't need a museum to find things your kids will be fascinated by and learn from. You probably have things right in your home that would not only connect to history, but it might be their history. And will be from then on, anyway. Things we have from thrift stores aren't from my family, but for my grandchildren they will be from their family.

Marta Venturini shared that in 2014, from
Your House as a Museum (chat transcript)
and facebook shared it back to both of us this week.
photo by Sandra Dodd

Be that way

Be the way you want your children to be, and they will want to be like you.
SandraDodd.com/being/
photo by Janine Davies

The sky

"Look at those sticks poking out of the sky!!" —Gail Higgins the photographer What you see is what you think.

SandraDodd.com/perspective.html
photo by Gail Higgins

Ease into change

Instead of just going from lots of control to "do whatever you want," a really sweet way to do it is quickly but gradually. Quickly in your head, but not all of a sudden in theirs. Just allow yourself to say "okay" or "sure!" anytime it's not really going to be a problem.


If something isn't going to hurt anything (going barefoot, wearing the orange jacket with the pink dress, eating a donut, not coming to dinner because it's the good part of a game/show/movie, staying up later, dancing) you can just say "Okay."

And then later instead of "aren't you glad I let you do that? Don't expect it every time," you could say something reinforcing for both of you, like "That really looked like fun," or "It felt better for me to say yes than to say no. I should say 'yes' more," or something conversational but real.

The purpose of that is to help ease them from the controlling patterns to a more moment-based and support-based decision making mindset. If they want to do something and you say yes in an unusual way (unusual to them), communication will help. That way they'll know you really meant to say yes, that it wasn't a fluke, or you just being too distracted to notice what they were doing.

SandraDodd.com/eating/control.html
photo by Julie D

Quiet depth and energy

Generally, parents and neighbors and friends tend to notice and maybe be impressed by a lot of noise and action and reaction. I'm happy to have learned, gradually, over the past 32+ years, that moving toward quiet acceptance and observation has more depth and energy and connection than a bunch of correction, direction and commentary, from parents to children.

in a discussion on Always Learning
photo by Chrissy Florence

Time out / Update

Thanks to Pam Laricchia and her son Michael, pages are all opening on my website again. I'm giddy and grateful for the code they wrote for me to add in the header of my 404 page.

My husband, Keith, survived repeated cardiac arrest and over a month of hospitalization. This week he had his last of ten outpatient physical therapy sessions. He's graduated up through wheelchair and walker, to cane, to normal locomotion. I drive him to various appointments, and am glad to be with him.

Thank you for reading, for sympathy and for support.



from April 8, about how long Keith was in the hospital, and his first day home
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a bucket and shovel, in our son Marty's back yard this week

Calm and open

Unschoolers' support of their children's interests not only creates more peace at the time, and better relationships, but it keeps the world calm and open to them, for their dabbling, curiosity, and exploration.

from a facebook discussion about learning
photo by Sandra Dodd

Charlie eats an apple

Sarah Dickinson wrote:

I was looking at the photos on my phone tonight and found this (Jack must have taken it, hence the angle). It is Charlie (3) eating an apple in front of the telly right beside of a full pot of sweets. I thought it was a rather lovely illustration of the choices kids make when they have them, and I thought of you because they never would have had that choice without all your writing.

—Sarah Dickinson

SandraDodd.com/eating/apple.html
photo by Jack Dickinson

Slower

I wrote:

Many things are made better by slowing down. Touching a child is nicer in slow motion than abruptly. Responding to a question can be improved by a pause as long as a single breath.

Lisa J Haugen wrote:

That's why I love the 'add light and stir' blog title. It's such a lovely image—add a little bit, let it swirl into your life, and incorporate. Add a little more. Gently and slowly.

I edited Lisa's a tiny bit, and it was the end of something
a bit longer here, at Radical Unschooling Info
photo by Sandra Dodd

A birthday pancake

Birthday breakfast!!! 🎉🎉🎉

"Mama! You made it a 5! AND it's a pancake?! With M&M's???! THANK YOU MAMA!!! This is the best breakfast EVER!"


Adventure! (same child, climbing)
photo by Roya Dedeaux, of Wyatt's birthday breakfast

Adventure!

The smaller the child, the bigger the small adventures seem. When the world is new, adventure is all around.

SandraDodd.com/physicality/
photo by Roya Dedeaux
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Another Mother's Day

I would never have thought, growing up, that motherhood would be a central part of my life and identity. I didn't imagine, even when I had three children, that I was heading toward so much focus on the choices and possibilities involving relationships with children. Mother's Day seems like a normal day; didn't expect that. —Sandra Dodd, 2010 (now, in 2019, a grandmother)

Disclaimer: Your Mother's Day mileage, date, traditions and experience may vary.
I know Mother's Day isn't a universal time or place.
photo by Karen James

Old and new

It's good to see old things in new ways.

There is creativity in doing something unexpected with materials already on hand.

Learning can come from novel combinations.

Aging beauty
photo by Holly Dodd (long ago; I'm using it anew)

Get up and go!

People can't get to a destination just by reading the map. They need to get on the trail themselves and start to travel. They can change their minds and not go all the way, but they can't get anywhere just by reading and asking questions.

Unschoolers need to start seeing these things work in their own families. There's more to know, and more to think about, and people who will help with ideas and links, but nobody can "teach" another person how to unschool. They can help the other person start to figure it out, though.

from a discussion on Radical Unschooling Info
photo by Heather Booth

Being calm about food

What has been "medically correct" about diet has changed over and over and over just within my lifetime—every part of a hamburger has been glorified and villified in turn. Every part of a pizza has been the best and worst part, at some point in the past 50 years. Skim milk/whole milk, margarine, artificial sweeteners, eggs, iceberg lettuce, honey, cheese, water (amounts), salt, wine, bread—terror or wonder.

SandraDodd.com/eating/defense.html

Angels and devils
photo by Amy Milstein

Cat photos

My website is sketchy, and its host company is shown as down. If it's temporary, let's not worry. If it turns permanent, I'll do some sewing!

Meanwhile, please enjoy photos of cats, on this blog. For those who aren't allergic to cats, they can be soothing, calming, and entertaining. For those who are allergic, the photos can be fun.

For those allergic to cat photos, luckily it's a big internet, and you can click away. (Weirdo. No one is allergic to cat photos.)


Most or all of the cat photos
Photos by lots of people, at the link above.
This one is our cat, Mina, a Birman, in a photo I took.

Later note, 2024—new site, not sketchy, thanks to Vlad Gurdiga for the rescue!

Protection can backfire

Something Joyce Fetteroll wrote in September 2010:

What if you live your life fearing the worst and guarding against it? Your child will grow up immersed in the idea the world is scary and stronger than he is and he needs armor (or mom) to protect him. (As much as you might try, you won't be able to hide your fears from him.) Is that what you want?


Or he'll think you're full of baloney. He'll see people doing the things you fear—like drinking soda—and they're healthy and strong. He'll then realize you don't know what you're talking about and tune you out. That won't be so good when your fears are justified (like about unprotected sex and drinking and driving.)

Those are worst case scenarios but it's likely he'll have a bit of those if you live your life protecting him from the world.

—Joyce Fetteroll

Related ideas: SandraDodd.com/trust.html
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Rationing "no"

What if each parent were issued a ration book of "NO" tickets when a child was born, and could only say "NO" two hundred times? Two hundred times in eighteen years... that's a lot of "no."

But I've seen parents say "no" five times in five minutes, to children in public places who just want to walk, or to be carried, or to touch something, or to see better, or to have a drink of water, or to have mom hold her hand, or to have one of those candy bars she's face to face with, or to stay a little longer, or to leave a little sooner, to ride in the cart or not ride in the cart. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Sometimes someone comes to one of the unschooling discussions, not knowing there are other ways, and offers the traditional "You're the boss, just say no" advice. I'm glad it has come to sound harsh and wrong. It shows me how far I've come.

SandraDodd.com/no
photo by Brie Jontry, of ice melting and refreezing,
gradually sliding off a roof
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A sense of peace

"Radical unschooling can bring about such a sense of peace with one's own self, that it can be poured into the being of another."

—Megan Valnes

SandraDodd.com/empathy.html
photo by Sam Baykus
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