On Saturday, I brought my oldest son into the doctors b/c he banged up his toe a few days prior. How?, you ask? He was running UP the slide barefoot and banged it going up. Yes, I did tell him to put on shoes. Yes, I did remind him to put on shoes and keep his shoes on. Along with all the other kidos. Oh well, the poor kid had to learn the hard way. It really is not that bad, though. He got some x-rays to make sure the break was not in a bad place and it wasn't. So, the doctor sent us on our way with the orders of no running, no biking, no hopping, no roughing it for 2-3 weeks and taped up his toe. Ok. A 9 year old boy who is not allowed to run or bike? His 2 favorite things to do and that keep both him and me sane? Are you kidding me? Yikes.
That led us to the library to stock up on books to keep his mind busy, even if his body can't be! The librarian checked us out our usual boat load of books and asked if one of my girls took ballet, since there were quite a few books on ballet in the pile. I replied she enjoys it immensely but she is not in a class right now. She agreed that her daughter who is in the second grade has friends who are doing so many activities and sports and groups etc... that she is missing some simply b/c she is so tired, literally. She wondered why so many parents do not simply tell their children to go play outside or rather push them out the door and tell them to play outside, like we were pushed out the door. We were told to get out there and figure out something to do and play with. And we did. We had a nice little conversation about that.
That got me thinking later on about how the world is tempting us to put our children in so many sports and 'fun' activities fulfill their interests and keep them busy. And forgetting that these little minds have the best imaginations ever! They do not need a lot to be creative and be playful and simply be children. Instead, parents are not giving them the opportunity to enjoy the simple life. They are crowding them with gadgets and gizmos and noise. They get used to that so much so that when they may have that rare opportunity to be outside, for example, they don't even know what to do and dare say those words..."I'm bored."
I am so very grateful to God for my children, their innocence, and their playfulness. Many times these past few days, I would stop and glance for a good while at my children and sigh. Yes, just about the entire contents of our playroom were outside but it didn't bother me a bit. Yes, they had mismatched clothes, and no bother there either. Yes, they used the yellow/orange extension cord to make some type of real life size spider web, but I didn't care. Yes, they were running around in their slippers at times, but hey -they sorta had shoes on. Yes, they got dirt under their nails and dirt smudges all over their clothes, so what.
Happy. Content. Creative.
No TV. No Internet. No Nintendo. No IPhone. No IPod.
Just being children. And I loved every minute of it. Thank you, God.
God bless,
Mary
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