The Way They Should Go

I love the different personalities between my children.

Georgie just came in to show me a bow an arrow she'd fashioned. The bow was a toy violin bow. The arrow was a toy broom handle attached to a toy mouthpiece (to a toy wind instrument).

Lily, on the other hand, is at the table "reading" Magic Tree House to a family of Legos.

You see, if you give my girls any select items, Lily will make a family out of them, and Georgie will begin assembling them into some kind of invention.  I adore watching the differences in how their little minds work.

And that's what my job is--to figure out their personalities, learning styles, interests, and passions, and train them in the way they should go.  Listen to their plays. Watch their puppet shows. Help them with the masks, costumes, and sets that go with the plays and, yes, pretend battles (to which I've just now been invited). 

Yes, my job is to fill them with information through books, etc, but also to stand back and let them grow into what they're supposed to be. I didn't teach Lily to make a baby doll out of everything from a banana peel to a rolling pin; she does it because that's what Lily does. I certainly didn't teach Georgie to make that bow and arrow or any of her dozens (or hundreds) of other inventions that she's crafted since she could crawl.

But, what touches me the most is that, even though it helps to have construction paper, blocks, and various other toys at hand, I know that these little ladies would follow in these bends if we lived in a one-room shack with no electricity.

The point is--they're free. Free to be who they are without conforming to any standards other than those set by God, us, and themselves.  And when they are old, let's just see what kind of lives they'll have to look back on.