Thursday, September 15, 2011

Teaching Pagan Children

I've been reading Pagan Blog Prompts for a while now, but I'm not sure I've ever actually blogged one of them....but I think I'd like to change that, and try to hit their topics more often.

One of this month's prompts is titled Teaching Your Children - We're asked,

What do you teach your children regarding your beliefs?

Do you chose to home-school your children? Why? How do you think this will affect them as they grow up?

Right now, Acorn is small. Teaching is simple - we thank the sun for his light, the sky for being so blue or bringing us rain, the trees for giving us shade. Acorn has decided to hug and pat trees - interesting, since our maple trees are fairly rough, and textures are usually a challenge for him. He likes to sit outside and watch nature, soaking it up.

Leaf is even smaller. I sing Pagan chants along with Baa Baa Black Sheep in the evenings. She's never been out of her little room at the hospital, and there will be a whole world to explore once she comes home.

I've started trying to get Acorn to help with my altar each full moon, but he's really more interested in throwing the crystals to see if they bounce like his various balls. Depending on the things on the altar, he likes to rearrange them for me from time to time.

I do energy work on/with both children. I started that before either of them were born.

I'm sure we'll do more when they're older, but right now, everything is pretty magical from their perspective, you know?


Neither of my children is old enough for "real" school. At this time, the plan is to go to public school....but both my husband and I had some less than stellar experiences in school, and we'll be monitoring situations closely. If things are not working, we will find some other option. We know that any schooling option will require us to be very actively involved for it to work in the long run, and we're prepared to do that. I suspect the fact that education is important to us is far more of an impact on our kids than where or how they're schooled.

Monday, September 12, 2011

Monday, September 5, 2011

Rites of Passage

I've been thinking today that part of the general discontent that has come with Acorn having no trach is that it was so darn anti-climactic. Nothing in this parenting journey of ours has been all that typical, and this entry into "normal" life should have come with a more defined transistion.

Normal people have a full term pregnancy that goes through certain phases, they have their baby and come home, and life goes on - though obviously, there's a tranistion to be made, it's a socially expected transition, one that everyone knows to expect. Kids have birthdays, they start school, everyone celebrates these things.

We had Acorn (and Leaf) before many people realized I was pregnant. Instead of coming home with him, he stayed in the hospital, and I went back to work. We didn't have a baby shower; our "welcome home" party was his first birthday (and it was not all that enjoyable, really). We've counted up hundreds of inchstones, and a few big milestones, but no one really celebrates them but us. Big changes, all around, rolled up into this one gateway event, but no real celebration of it.

I think what we need is some sort of rite of passage ceremony. I'm not sure what, yet - the various texts I have obviously don't talk about a decannulation ceremony. In fact, most of them don't talk about anything other than the typical birth, coming of age, marriage, and death ceremonies, so I guess some creativity is in order.

Thursday, September 1, 2011

And We Spiral Back Around Again

This blog is not quite 2 years old - September 23 2009 was my first post. The very next day, I posted about bedtime routines and wanting to bring more Pagan influences into Acorn's life...and here we are, 2 years later, and I'm still thinking about the same things, and not making a lot of progress

Bedtime has always been a bit chaotic. We've got something of a routine down, but the past few months everything's been in turmoil, and it's gotten a bit more chaotic. I'm hoping now that we don't have nurses to make it a little more standardized and to include prayers.

Acorn likes sitting outside and just watching things. When he and I are out, we talk (well, I talk, he listens) about thanking the trees for having so many nice leaves to give us shade, and thanking the sun for its warm light, and the clouds for rain, and the grass for being soft under our feet. He's interested in trees, and pats them gently, which is terribly cute, given his limited "pretend play" skills and his issues with textures.

The texture thing must be getting better though - he went barefoot in the grass this week, all the way from the front of the house, and around to his swingset in the back.

There are no Pagan parenting groups here locally. Few people to bounce ideas off of in person, few other kids for him to hang out with who even come close to sharing our faith - most of the Pagan parents I know are online. It's one of the few situations where I really wish there was a community here that we were comfortable being a part of.