Which hat?

These hats are in a museum in Pennsylvania, in a reproduction milliner's shop.

Recently Just Add Light had a quote and link to something by Pam Sorooshian about whether one should be a child's friend, or parent. Pam knows one should be both, and explained that elegantly.

I was with a group of home ed families in France, some unschoolers, others in the various stages of consideration of unschooling, and someone asked to to tell how I am as a woman. Bea Mantovani was the translator, and said the question didn't really translate. The questioner tried to clarify. She said I had spoken of my husband, and of being a mother, but how was I as a woman, separate from that?

I remember my confusion better than my response. One thing I said was that I AM a mother.

I suspected, and it was later confirmed, that it was a socio-political question, a feminist concept about identity above and beyond motherhood. But the question sets motherhood in a low position, if only the brightest and the best exist apart from and outside of that, and if to have no answer made me unaware or less whole.

For one thing, though, I was in France speaking to people because I had been invited to do so. I've written thousands of thousands of words about parenting and how children can exist in a peaceful world of easy growth in all directions.

I'm a changing-the-world woman. But even that didn't answer the question, because it still was an extension of mothering, which I had explained had involved sharing and modeling since I nursed babies at La Leche League meetings.

I would most like to be known as a woman of integrity, and for that to be true, I can't deny or reject any aspect of my being. I can't divide myself into parts and still be one integral whole. Any hat I might put on is still on my own head.

SandraDodd.com/integrity

Affection and Esteem (from this blog, June 6, 2012)
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Feel it; believe it

When you say something to your child, remember to feel it and believe it, or you'll be sending mixed messages, and the tone might be louder than the words. And with babies and toddlers, the tone might be the entirety of the communication.

The quote is from page 208 (or 241) of The Big Book of Unschooling
SandraDodd.com/tone
photo by Sarah S.

Quick! They're gone!

Older moms say "Appreciate your kids. They'll be grown before you know it."

Younger moms think it's rude, and wrong, and can hardly endure the endless days of damp, stinky babies and toddlers, and messy, destructive, needy three and four year olds, and...

Life is made of stages that can seem long. I've had young children and felt sticky and crowded and exhausted. I've had teens I started to miss before they were gone.

Wherever you are, breathe and be patient and loving.


SandraDodd.com/patience
photo by Ester Siroky

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This is a re-run from only a year ago. I usually wait longer, but I feel that this could help some parent (or many) every month. Please continue to be as kind and as appreciative as you can be, even when the world outside isn't helping. You could be the best part of someone else's day.

Special and everyday skills

Notice and appreciate what your child can do well.

Part of a longer list in a discussion of skills:

ability to apply logic and reasoning
ability to pick up language skills easily
identify plants
sense weather
finding one's way without a map
reading maps
making maps and giving directions
connecting people
hosts a good party
good at collaborating
good at directing
good with kids
good with babies
storytelling
ability to listen
remembers details
good with numbers, proportions and formulas
singing


That list was by "Tandosmama," and there are others on this page:
SandraDodd.com/skills
photo by Holly Dodd (click to enlarge)

Honoring babies

"Look for ways to connect with them. There are biological ways. Smelling their heads is amazingly connective.... Look at them. Watch them talk or move or bounce or roll or whatever it is they are doing and marvel at the fact that they are."

—Schuyler Waynforth

SandraDodd.com/bonding
an honored baby girl, in India, whose parents prefer for me not to identify her here
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States of being

Sometimes wind is blowing and sometimes it's still. Usually water is wet, but in some times and places it can be ice.

I have vivid memories of being childless. I had babies, and children, and teens (not all at the same time). Now I'm a grandmother.

May your status and your transitions be peaceful and calm, with joys to discover.

SandraDodd.com/calm
photo by Tessa Onderwater

Teenagers are...

"Teenagers are just your babies grown big." —Schuyler Waynforth March 29, 2014 Gold Coast symposium

SandraDodd.com/teens
photo by Sandra Dodd

Sit still

On bonding with babies:

"Sit still with them. And when they are still, sit still with yourself. Don't use so many moments of the day to do anything."

—Schuyler Waynforth

SandraDodd.com/bonding
photo of Sandra and Holly Dodd
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Snapshot

Things change. Babies grow. Young parents get older.

See what you have. Remember what is good, from this moment, from this time.

What is not memorably good, perhaps you can make better for the next moment.

SandraDodd.com/gratitude
photo by Lydia Koltai, a beautiful selfie
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Deeply loved

The quote is from Schuyler Waynforth. The image is by Holly Dodd.

"Look for ways to connect with them. There are biological ways. Smelling their heads is amazingly connective.

"Sometimes it's hard, just staying still, just watching, just being with babies. But it won't be long..."

—Schuyler Waynforth

SandraDodd.com/bonding
Artist trading card by Holly Dodd, October 2012

Foggy confusion

I've always been uncomfortable with the idea of "self-regulation." Regulation has to do with rules—creating and enforcing rules. I like the idea that children will find a balance. And it has helped me in moving from kneejerk what-would-my-mom-do (when my kids were babies I worked consciously to make decisions a better way) to try to avoid using phrases of children that I wouldn't use of adults. I don't say my husband self-regulates his leisure time, or that my friend self-regulates her diet or that my sister self-regulates her housekeeping.

People will come [to a discussion] and say "I've given him freedom, when will he self-regulate?" and I think (though I've never asked) they mean "When will he somehow do what I would have made him do if I were making him do things?" Some newer unschoolers are similarly waiting for their kids to ask to learn biology, or to wake up one morning eager to write a book report.

SandraDodd.com/self-regulation
photo by Karen James

News or nostalgia

Today, something different. It's an invitation to smile, and probably to laugh. I'm sharing my secret stash of favorite cheer-up videos, collected for the days I need them. Dancing babies, mysterious Japanese philosophy, auto-tuned glory, Yoda, and the words of "a desert hobo" might make you think thoughts that remind you of the first time you thought them, or might make you wish this wasn't the first time you had sung along.
SandraDodd.com/fun
Please take some time to share smiles and create memories with a loved one.

See, hear, smell, touch and taste!

When babies are carried they see more, they hear and smell more. If they are given things to touch and taste besides just a few baby toys left in the corner of a crib or playpen, they will learn by leaps and bounds. They will spend less time crying and more time being in the real world.

The parents will know the child better, and the child will know the parents better. They will be building a partnership based on trust.

SandraDodd.com/infants
photo by Roya Dedeaux
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Soft and gentle

Be soft and gentle

Helping a child learn to hold a kitten or a puppy isn't always easy, but modeling how to do it gently and softly helps. Parents can remember those factors when touching babies and children, too. Is he comfortable? Is he safe?

Someone who can gently handle a puppy, and a baby, might remember those things when dealing with another adult.


SandraDodd.com/better partner
photo by Rose Sorooshian
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Waking or sleeping

When the kids were babies they would go to sleep with us, nursing, or in dad's lap, and we'd put them in bed. That evolved into them going to sleep where they wanted to, or in a carseat, or a backpack (hiking/frame-pack) or beside us on the couch or on a blanket on the floor where one of us was doing something, and we'd put them in bed.

Getting up used to be "get up by noon," when they got old enough to want to stay up late on the computer or watching movies or playing games. Then it became "Sleep as long as you want to, but at noon others are free to make noise." We still try to keep it quiet until noon or until everyone's awake, whichever comes first.
. . . .
When Marty worked at a grocery store, he woke himself up at 5:30 to get there at 6:00. He had a very timed and regular routine for himself. The first few weeks I got up too to make sure he'd be up, but he worked there full time for over a year and was only late once.

The lack of a "regular schedule" has never kept our kids from getting where they needed or wanted to be on time without trouble. When Kirby was very young, eight or so, he used to wake up at 6:25 a.m. to record Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles at 6:30. He would pause for the commercials so they wouldn't be on the tape, and then when the show was over he would go back to bed. He has them all on tape, marked in his little-kid writing.

The account above is from 2007, and is similar to some things here: SandraDodd.com/sleep
photo by Sandra Dodd, of stained-glass light falling on a young friend's lovey.

Firsts

Sandra's writing from 1993:

People want to see the first step and hear the first words of their babies, they say, when they don't put their children in daycare. I was lucky to be able to afford to stay home with my kids and I am thrilled to be the first to see them respond to their first-whatevers.

A couple of weeks ago I got to see the look of amazement on my six-year-old's face when he colored a Mobius strip and then cut it in two (or, rather, not in two) lengthwise. When I told him he would be ten or fourteen the next time there was an inauguration, I saw Lights Come On! Walking and talking aren't everything.

SandraDodd.com/wonder.html
photo by Lydia Koltai

Quick! They're gone!

Older moms say "Appreciate your kids. They'll be grown before you know it." Younger moms think it's rude, and wrong, and can hardly endure the endless days of damp, stinky babies and toddlers, and messy, destructive, needy three and four year olds, and... Life is made of stages that can seem long. I've had young children and felt sticky and crowded and exhausted. I've had teens I started to miss before they were gone. Wherever you are, breathe and be patient and loving.

SandraDodd.com/patience
photo by Ester Siroky