getting here. Here to this place of sunshine, baby laughter, growing things and growing children.
I’ve taken a lot of detours on the way. It’s taken a while to realise that to raise children the way I want to I can’t outsource it, no matter how wonderful the environment I tried to outsource them to. It just didn’t work for them, and if it doesn’t work for them, then it doesn’t work for us.
Which is a shame, in a way, as I do rather miss working. I miss being able to switch my brain from humdrum thoughts of washing and shopping, miss being sarky and hyper charged on too much coffee and techie jokes. IT is a peculiar environment for a woman, particularly if you’re a developer, but it’s one I fit into pretty well, and it’s still odd to not have that to go out to.
But I’m typing this onehanded with smallest feeding, and I wouldn’t give that up for the world. Not while I don’t have to. Small got 2 years of me at home, I’d like to give Smallest at least the same, and more if I can keep on juggling money earning and child caring.
Child care. Such a frowned upon area of employment or activity, and yet such an absolute essential. I firmly believe that what happens in the first years is vital, and that very little else is as good as a home environment. Which is not to say women shouldn’t work – I’ve been there and done that, and I will probably have to again at some point. But growing up with a parent around, and their siblings, just being involved in daily life and doing what they do rather than going to some artificial environment full of babies and little children to be educated and stimulated has got to be better. It’s the way we’re set up to learn, from seeing and doing. Not from being taught. You don’t have to teach a baby to walk or talk, to eat or drink. They do it from seeing other ppl around them doing it. You help them to try and they figure it out for themselves when they are good and ready.
And other skills are much the same I’ve found. I tried to teach Big to read, and it was a painful drawn out procedure that took over 2 years. She wasn’t ready, no matter how much she wanted to do it. Small, left to his own devices with plenty of resources around, figured it out from a, b, c to cat and mat and then to fluency and Harry Potter in a matter of months. He might be taking it to extremes, but I suspect many children are actually limited by their supportive environment and the expectations of the professionals around them. What could they do if they just had access to the resources and time?
That’s another post. One that I am working on. Right now, this is about me and us.
So, we’ve come from work to home, from two cars to one, from a world of two salaries and one child where we holidayed in suites in hotels to a world of three children, one small (but hopefully growing) income and holidays in a field. Yesterday I went to look at an allotment, and last night we talked about having chickens in the garden. Smallest will grow up learning to grow her own food, as well as learning to read, write, work computers, craft, swim, ride a bike and hopefully be as happy and fulfilled as she wants to be. (The other two will no doubt get there as well, though their paths are a little more convoluted, given the early education they received.)
And hopefully, I’ll work out what I want to be when I grow up, and I’ll get to be happy and fulfilled too 🙂
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