What are your values and how do you demonstrate them to your children? Our values are clear: respect & love, be generous, listen with the heart, and everyone contributes in their own way.
This weekend was Cherry Harvest time at our house. We have found that incorporating the girls in the projects we do instills a sense of responsibility as well as a sense of accomplishment. By being active in the process, there is a greater understanding of how things take time and that it is ok. In this modern world of supermarkets and pre-made stuff, kids are missing the creation process. It saddens me when a child’s first response to where food comes from is “The Store.” By not understanding basic concepts of food growing and harvesting, children are losing touch with the world around them. How will they learn to respect their environment if they are not interacting with it?
Even with all that we do with the girls, it always amazes me when they make a connection and learn something new. Last week, Allegra and Zola dug up potatoes from the garden and were surprised that it was hard to pull them out of the ground and that they were DIRTY! After making french fries with 4 garden potatoes and 1 store bought (organic) one, they could tell which potato was from the store: It was less moist than the garden ones. When Allegra was pulling the potato out of the ground, it was as if you could see her synapses firing as she learned and exclaimed: “I didn’t know this would be hard to do!”
One of the main things that connects Alex and I is the that we both enjoy growing, harvesting, preserving our food with old family recipes. Where most couples have His/Hers coffee cups or pillow case, we have His & Hers Canning kits. Growing, Making, and Creating our own stuff is one of our unifying values that we are actively passing on to the girls. The girls are learning to think more Out-Of-the-Box and create things or ideas neither Alex nor I had thought of before. Each girl has their own interests and it is so much fun to watch!
After picking cherries Saturday, Allegra wanted to make a chocolate cherry “cake.” In our experience, what they see as a recipe is different that what we [adults] assume to be the recipe. Her “recipe” was to melt chocolate covered raisins, add fresh chopped cherries, and mix. Alex asked her where she was getting all these new creative food inspirations and she pointed at me.
Mina is more hands on tactile with her projects: she has all sorts of ideas to sew, weave or build. She recently asked if we could make wooden lounge chairs for her and the other girls with wood and supplies from the thrift store. One of her favorite stores is Home Depot and has asked me more than once for her own electric drill. When I ask her how we will make the wooden chairs, she simply says that she can draw a picture for Papa and he will be able to figure it out!
For Zola, a project needs to have more of a structure. Part of what makes a project fun for her is creating something to give to someone else. It doesn’t matter if it is cooking a chocolate cake for Papa or making herbal bath salts for her mama. Sometimes I see her try so hard to keep up with the big girls and doing a bigger project with structure and guidance, gives her a sense of accomplishment and importance within the family structure.
Coming back around to Values and Familial Relationships: a families foundation gains strength in the combination and implementation of inherent values that permeates various aspects of daily activities.
His Values + Her Values = Our girls learning self-reliance, self-esteem, confidence, and responsibility.
