Half a cup...

Half-empty cups are substantially different from half-full cups. It's not just theoretical holy water in those cups. The half-empty cups hold a concoction of frustration and need and irritation. The half-full cups contain joy and hope and gratitude.



page 185 (or 213) of The Big Book of Unschooling
photo of and by Holly Dodd
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Future grandparents

A child, no matter how young, is a potential future grandfather or grandmother. Looking back on joys and sorrows in people they actually know, perhaps parents can avoid damage they have witnessed in others or felt in themselves, and emulate the empowering and joyful things they have seen or remember.

Mommy-labs Interview, October 2012
photo by Holly Dodd

Start with them.

Schuyler Waynforth wrote:

You start by learning about your children. You start by playing with them. By hanging out and listening to them. By starting with them. The more you know about them, the more you know about what interests them, the more you see them and hang out with them, the easier it will be for you to find things that interest them. Don't start by looking at the wider world and trying to force it upon your children. Start with them.

—Schuyler Waynforth

SandraDodd.com/howto
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Clear and solid

Living mindfully and making conscious choices for clear reasons is what a solid, thoughtful life is all about.

SandraDodd.com/being
photo by Sandra Dodd
of flowers and clear, solid water in the compost pile
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Success and Joy

Little by little, years ago, I started to see that each little idea that had changed my own family had the potential, if I could explain it clearly enough, to change another family. Just a little was enough. As more and more families shared their successes and joys, the world changed.

Thank you, to those of who have shared your paths to unschooling with others so freely over the years. Thank you to those who have come and shared and gone on to do other things. Thank you to those who came years ago and are still helping others. Thank you to those who have just shown up lately, and whose enthusiastic newness inspires others to be kinder to their children.

The top paragraph is from SandraDodd.com/interviews/naturalparenting2010
photo by Julie D
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Past the horizon...

The world is changing, and anyone with a young child in 2013 should not expect it to be 2002 when that child is grown. Adults are often looking back ten or twenty years in their knowledge and expectations. It’s impossible to look forward with accuracy, but if you look around at some of the new jobs of the 21st century, you will see that there was no way to begin preparing for them in the 1980s or 1990s, except to let children play with computers as much as they wanted to.

from the Second Mommy-Labs interview
(The original said 2012, but I changed it. I can do that.)
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Newness unfolding

I can't really speak to any "end results," because they're still growing and experiencing the newness of many firsts in their lives. If there is ever an "end," the results won't matter anymore. But as long as life continues, the results unfold.

SandraDodd.com/magicwindow
photo by Marty Dodd, of himself and his girlfriend when they drove to Grants, New Mexico, on a whim to visit the Mining Museum
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