I love to be outside, just being. Abigail likes to be outside to play or to ride a bike or to do something that requires being outside. It is just a difference in our personalities. I want to nurture her desire to be out-of-doors to be out-of-doors, to see the Creator in His creation, one of the ways He reveals Himself to us. But how?
So I started reading, Charlotte Mason (who I wish I was) advocates hours outside, just being outside. (She also advocates lots of unstructured time without Mother participating in the activities of her children but being mindful of them.) Now I can't quite manage that, though I am trying to work toward it, but even then on the days we spend outside Abigail will tromp by a flower, walk over the ants and completely miss the changing leaves and sky without some kind of guidance. For some exposure isn't enough to draw them in.
So then I started reading about nature tables and other ways to mark time with nature, and hit upon something I could use. Now we go for a walk or to work in the garden and I give the girl a purpose: find something. It requires her to see the world around her, to think about and interact with this thing we call Creation and to think about the One whose work it is.
Our nature table is the top of a dresser filled with art supplies. Somehow it just feels right that we place the work of the Master Artist atop the tools of our works of creation. We fill baby food jars with seeds and leaves and dirt. We put leaves and plants and figurines in pie plates cracked from the dishwasher (who would have thought they weren't dishwasher safe). We stack gourds in pottery class creations and walnuts shedding hulls in fine china found many years ago at an auction.
Perhaps in Simon I will find one who easily sees the Creator and is satisfied to watch His work without needing a purpose of his own to fulfill in order to venture outside, but for Abigail right now this works. This marking time in collecting His work.
Do you have a way of getting your children to engage outside? Do you have a way of keeping their collections?
I find it ironic how my children are. I wouldn't consider myself an "outside" kind of girl...before I met my husband. However, thinking back I was always outside. Feeding chickens, playing baseball with my brother, burying cars in the dirt, taking walks to get to the pond to catch newts, etc.
ReplyDeleteI am NOW an "outside" girl. I have two gardens...food and flower. I love just being outside and watching bats, birds, pretty much anything that does not have 8 legs.
My husband LOVES being outside. I think he would live outside if he could. We love to camp, have fires in our backyard.
Saying all of that... to say ...
My kids have gotten my husband's love of the outdoors and my later love of the outdoors from birth. Brenna will be the first to say "Mommy look at the new flower that came up in your garden!?"
They love talking about how God made all of this stuff and that all of the stuff on the earth is what He gave us to make all of the stuff that is bought in the stores! So I guess that is what we talk about to make that "nature" , "outside" connection!
Thank you Sarah for the great ideas for bringing the outdoors in without much mess!