It has happened.
I took my kids to the museum over and over again and now they love going to the museum. The grown up museum. The one with the real art and the expansive botanical gardens. The ones where you can’t touch anything but should really walk with your six-year-old hands in your pockets.
The one with the large gallery of portraits, air-conditioned in the late spring with the puffy benches in the middle of the room.
They ask,
When can we go again? And can we go to the children’s garden? And why didn’t we get to see the rest of the art upstairs? I missed the stained glass window; can we go back to take a peek? The new Japanese garden is open; can we sit by the rock river there?
All this because we decided we would try to expose our girls to something designed for adults, designed for art lovers and gazers, designed for rose-garden-wanderers and dreamers. All because WE wanted to go there and thought we should push strollers down pebbled pathways and show toddlers the Audubon book in the rare book section.
Now they love it on their own.
Something succeeded along the way. Something clicked in little minds and in little hearts. “I want to watch TV” has turned into “I belong in nature, Mama” and it makes me proud.
I hope we had something to do with it, but mostly I expect that the art and dream already buried deep in their girl hearts has just been facilitated to seed and blossom. What was already there is now felt in a full fledged love.
So maybe it’s a little of both: me walking in halls of beauty holding little hands and little feet walking those same halls discovering beauty on their own.
I even think it goes a step beyond either. I can bring my daughters to the beauty, I can help facilitate the love in their little hearts and I can even tell them with words (as powerful as they are) that they should love art and beauty and and music and humor and nature because it is good to do so. And that they should love God because He is big and true and He has saved them.
But I think that the real effect happens when one lives a life that shows those things and when one lives a life with a heart shifted toward the good and the pure and the perfect. That will be an example to my daughters that the good and the pure and the perfect are what we should turn our faces toward.
When I breathe in and taste summer on the wind and I lean back and rest in the grass and count clouds that that will be a divine example of peace and respite for my children. When my eyes tear at the song that tears my heart, I hope that it will show them that there sometimes is a beauty that sings above normal words. And that when my heart turns to Jesus in the day and in the night that my girls will understand that God is in everything and that his fingerprints are on all pieces of life. They might understand that shifting our ever-wandering hearts in the direction of Him is the only thing that matters.
All of life seems like it is designed for adults and that children are the afterthought. So let us not be afraid to show them the art museum, the good music and the decidedly adult ways of worship, so that perhaps by that, we show them that full living is beautiful living.
Maybe they learn when we say things like, “I love art. You should love art.” Or maybe they learn better when we walk, hand in six-year-old hand, through the gallery, loving the art as we journey, and show them with our lives what it is to love it.
All photos taken here.
Love this post, and completely agree. Trying hard to show my kids with my life. Great reminder. Might need to do an art museum visit!
thank you rebecca!! =)
How exciting! I’m glad that you felt free to “brag” about your kids in this way. To inspire those of us with kids who are younger that this could be in the future for us.
I am consistently amazed at how perceptive my kids can be. I do think there is something innate in the human heart that seeks beauty, emotion, and fullness of living. The more we can expose them to it, the better. It is a wonderful legacy to give.
Love this. “All of life seems like it is designed for adults and that children are the afterthought. So let us not be afraid to show them the art museum, the good music and the decidedly adult ways of worship, so that perhaps by that, we show them that full living is beautiful living.” Amen!
oh gosh. i hope it didn’t seem like it was bragging. i have so far to go with mothering (basically feeling like a failure on a daily basis).
Oh, I think that came off wrong. My quotes were neant to use the word braghing in jest. I meant it positively. Too often we don’t speak of the positive things for fear that it sounds like bragging. But that’s too bad, because it can sometimes be a great encouragement to others, like this post is.
thanks Stephanie! =) i always appreciate your comments.
I have always thought perhaps young children have certain passions for life born into them and that we, as parents, can sometimes notice or look for at an early age. Some tendency, a natural gravitation toward something. No biblical basis for this, I don’t think, just my opinion. For my son, it was easy — music. He would play our piano on my lap, later on I took him to Kindermusik, now he has gone through 12 solid years of piano lessons, always practicing because HE wanted to. Now here’s the funny part, my daughter proved to be a bit trickier. I took her to music activities and she would cry and put her hands over her ears. She loved climbing trees so I tried gymnastics for her. She was frustrated by it. One day we were watercoloring, and I asked my little 4 year old daughter, “If you could do anything you wanted to do every single day, what would that one thing be?” She looked up at me with such a surprised look! (I can still see her face) She answered, “Mommy! What we always do! Paint!” There you have it folks! It was right in front of my eyes for two years and I didn’t SEE it. hahaha! And yes, she has taken 10 years of art lessons and has never wanted to stop. I think they found what fed their souls, praise be to God!!
i love that! that’s beautiful Suzanne!
This reminded me about something I think of often about how we do church…with kids always separate and while I understand the age appropriate storytelling, I think kids need to serve and worship together with the family. They need to know that church isn’t just a “grown up” thing…
And I love exposing the girls to the beauty of art and community in general…I’ve worked in museums and we are all at home there…whether it’s bringing out the colored pencils at the arboretum or venturing to the Getty…God created us to be creative in our gifts and it’s a joy to see them unfold in our children. Recently we went out and one of our friends made a comment about the girls knitting and reading a book while waiting for dinner…he was so used to seeing kids with a digital device and it encouraged me to keep cultivating the gifts God has placed in the hearts of my girls and how much they miss out when I try to occupy them only with video games. (And how much I miss out when I’m tethered to my computer…which is more often than not!)
P.S. Speaking of Huntington…I have been trying to get free tickets for like over a year and every time I call they have sold out! Grrrr!!!! Will have to suck it up and pay to go!
P.P.S. Annnnd – since I haven’t visited here in a long time, I TOTALLY just gave myself permission to write a novel for my comment.
so true melissa!! i’m so glad you commented. i love your perspective.
and the huntington, keep trying. Its so worth it!!