Through a Child's Eyes....

Please note: If this is your first time visiting our blog, please click here to hear the premise of Pass It On, Baby! and how it all began.... Pass It On, Baby!

I love children…I learn so much from them everyday. I love how they see the world and I think there are so many important lessons to be learned on how to live a good life from them. This is no real revelation, the Bible has plenty of quotes on how you must become like children to reach God. But take a moment and think of the lessons that us parents impart on children that somehow as we become adults, we run the risk of losing sight of. Sharing, being kind, using nice words, helping a friend….

I was at the pool today with my little ones. We had brought several kiddie toys with us to play with. Once we set them in the baby pool, there were several little children who came over to check out the new toys and naturally, they started to pick them up and play with them. My three year old started to protest, but I calmly explained that the toys were for all the kids to share. Another mother came up and explained that her kiddos would be sharing their toys too. And so the kids went on, sharing their toys, playing together – happily.

Before we went to the pool, I picked up my three year old (Riley) from preschool orientation. My one year old daughter and my six year old son were with me, waiting for Riley’s class to be dismissed. Another little girl was also waiting for her brother outside the classroom and she was eating goldfish crackers. She came up to my children and offered them both some. It was so cute…and I smiled at how much I learn from children, and how much we all could learn from children everyday.

Children are pure. They believe in kindness, they forgive instantly. They smile often, laugh unrestrained and consider life an adventure. Somewhere along the lines, we get a little mixed up. And for today, my goal is to remember how I was as a child and to make sure to see the world in just that way….if only in fleeting glances.

When I was younger, and even more of an idealist that I currently am, I had a huge poster on the back of my door with a beautiful poem reminding me all the things that you learn when you are a child. Thank you, Robert Fulghum for being such a beautiful observer.

Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten

Most of what I really need to know about how to live and what to do, and how to be, I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there in the sandbox at nursery school.

These are the things I learned:

Share everything.

Play fair.

Don't hit people.

Put things back where you found them.

Clean up your own mess.

Don't take things that aren't yours.

Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody.

Wash your hands before you eat.

Flush.

Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.

Live a balanced life.

Learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.

Take a nap every afternoon.

When you go out into the world, watch for traffic, hold hands and stick together.

Be aware of wonder.

Remember the little seed in the plastic cup? The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that. Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the plastic cup -- they all die. So do we.

And then remember the book about Dick and Jane and the first word you learned, the biggest word of all: look.

Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation. Ecology and politics and sane living.

Think what a better world it would be if we all -- the whole world -- had cookies and milk about 3 o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankets for a nap. Or if we had a basic policy in our nation and other nations to always put things back where we found them and cleaned up our own messes.

And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together.

Have a beautiful day, friends, and be kind. Take these lessons and share some, smile some, comfort some, help some and just enjoy some.

In love and kindness,


Email Elizabeth & Heather