Do you have memories of building couch cushion forts as a kid? I remember building tents, forts, cities and even a summer camp in our living room. Who needed fancy toys when you had building blocks as big as you were?! My brother and I would often play for hours with the simplest of items; a stick, a ball, dirt clods, a shovel. One item and a whole lot of imagination was all we needed for an afternoon of fun.
I get sad when I see so many kids today staring at a screen. No matter if it is a small one or a large one I can almost feel the brain of that child slowly melting into a puddle of dead cells.
Thankfully there is still air, sunshine, sticks, balls and dirt clods on the earth today. With my kids I will see them with my phone or watching television and after a little while I am kicking them outside. Yes they protest but after a little while their brains turn back on and they get a revelation of how fun it can be to imagine and play.
I guess in some ways I am still just a big kid because I am usually the one who wants to get outside and have my architectural design in a lot of the couch cushion forts.
Where did your imagination take you as a child? How can we get our children more creative and imaginative?
Love this post- my imaginary friend growing up was the Incredible Hulk (Not sure what that says about me!) And with our family a lot of it is about modeling (I have to try not to be a super lame grown up staring a a screen all the time!) and not having an over scheduled life -boredom is almost essential. And we fight the battle and kick them outside...and duct tape, lots of duct tape laying around...finally, we try to be comfortable with a certain amount of the mess that comes with constructing spaceships, tnt blast zones, science experiments, and wherever else their minds take them.
ReplyDeleteJaime, That is quite an imaginary friend! I think you hit the nail on the head when you talked about modeling this for our children. We not only tell them but live the example in front of them. When they see it they will become like us. This works with spiritual things, morality, discipline and many other areas. It is always a good idea to make room for the kids to be messy and invent, experiment or create!
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