Grabbing hold and changing

"When I stumbled across unschooling I grabbed hold. I read and I tried things and I moved further away from the childhood I had known to the parenthood I wanted to know."

—Schuyler Waynforth

SandraDodd.com/nest
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Better, happier, more peaceful

"Are there ways of living with people that can make life better, happier, more peaceful? Are there ways of living that can make life worse? Doesn't it make sense to choose to live together in a way that will make life better?"

—Deb Lewis

SandraDodd.com/deblewis
photo by Amber Ivey

Surprising beauty

Why travel to an art museum when a bus stop can do this?

But it won't do it all day, or every day. Light, projections, shadows, are fleeting, and people aren't always there to see them.

Art museums are good, but art is unfolding all around us.

SandraDodd.com/surprise
photo by Elaine Cambridge

Memories and peace

Sometimes a peaceful time is still confusing and noisy. Experiences and perceptions differ, and your memory might not match your child's about one thing or another. Something one found stressful might be a memory of joy for another.

Do your best to find the peace and joy.

Charlie eats an apple

A Loud Peaceful Home
photo by Sarah Dickinson

A fun, new song

The separation of learning and fun is the only thing that keeps learning from BEING fun.

Perhaps this will be seen as preaching to the choir, but I prefer to think of it as teaching a new song to an experienced, enthusiastic choir.

Living becomes learning
photo by Holly Dodd

Patterns and games

Many games involve patterns of colors or numbers. Think of that, even when you play games like Rummy or Poker. Tile games and matching games are easy to see. Many single-player games with cards or moving pieces on a grid to let all the cars move, or match-three games, are all about seeing patterns, one step at a time.

Having read that far, I hope you thought of one or all of these, too:

Music
Mathematics
Art

Patterns galore. Play with them.

Seeing patterns
photo by Sandra Dodd, of some old-style cards
in the barracks at Fort Stanton, now a museum
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The air is sweet

Sometimes the air is sweet.

A change in the temperature, time outside after much inside, being in a more rural place than usual, new rain—these things, and others, can make air seem especially rich and good.

Being open to noticing the air can make life rich and good.

SandraDodd.com/breathing
photo by Jo Isaac