Lockdown diary 23 : Learning all the time

  Whenever I sit to do some craft work with my daughter, I see a pattern emerging. She looks at craft time as Mamma Daughter time. She usually knows what she wants me to make. After a few minutes of trying, she is happy to let me continue working on the project while she either watches me or shifts her attention to something else. She does check every few minutes on what I have created so far. She is super thrilled to see the end product.
Me on the other hand gets completely involved in our creation. I get so engrossed that I don't bother much about my daughter straying away. I complete the work we started and love watching the joy on my daughter's face. This is a new pattern in my behaviour. Just today we made an origami crown. It was so much fun. She as usual stepped away midway through our activity and I completed it all by myself with 'C' stepping in to help in the last bits. This crown is her current treasure. She wore her crown and was dancing happily when I suggested that we make a star wand too. The folds were a bit complicated this time and she left me to make it by myself. On seeing the star she attempted to make the wand on which she would attach the star and this time I gave the wand the much needed reshape. We both were super happy with our creation.
Last week we had this very same experience when we made the mini book and the pencil holder. Though she has forgotten about the pencil holder which was aptly damaged by my cat, she guards the mini book as her treasure.
Sometimes, she also engages in creating something all by herself and when she does she too immerses in her creation for hours together, like when she made a 'My little Pony' with play dough and made a cardboard house for our neighborhood kittens. Two days ago, she kept a container of water, some grains and papaya seeds outside our house and waited patiently for the birds and insects to come and enjoy the feast she had laid out.

I watch her with so much love during these moments. Children are so uncomplicated. They are attuned to what they want and there is no pretense. It is we adults who add on a baggage of expectations and judgments; and children learn to pretend, make excuses and stories - wear masks. They know it when we adults do things as an obligation and not because we really want to. I have just begun to shed all the baggage I carry and have started experiencing the fruits of it...and I hope it stays that way.

Originally posted on Facebook on April 17, 2020