As I sat on the couch Saturday afternoon, taking a brief break from my cleaning and baking frenzy, I had a magazine on my lap, but was in reality watching my girls playing around me.
At the time they were dressed in mostly homemade dress-up clothes, one in a castoff piece of white fabric that had been lovingly decorated and turned into an Indian gown and the other child in various pieces of clothing from their dress-up basket. They were pretending to be characters from one of the Kaya stories in an American Girl book.
What I marveled at was not the fact that they were getting along so well (though that is something of note), but that, at the ages of seven and nine, they could still entertain themselves so cheaply and easily. Nothing electronic or battery-powered needed…..their play was simply the product of their own imagination.
During these early years, that has been a very conscious decision on our part. While at times it would have been easier to put them in front of a television, a game system or a computer screen (and that does happen at times), we have chosen to forgo those options for the most part in favor of having them create their own play. For as long as this will last, I want to enjoy the simple pleasure and youthful innocence of this world of amusement of their own making.
This post is linked to Make Your Home Sing Monday.
Awesome post. I totally agree! We too limited the t.v. and computer when the kids were little. They got to be on the computer for 30 minutes total every other day. We felt that was enough.
They used to play "restaurant" and store and make up plays and draw and create forts and things. My husband and I wanted them to use their imaginations, just like you do.
We eventually bought them gameboys for Christmas but we also had a rule that they could only play with it in the car. We eventually let them play with it in the house because, as you said, there is a time for that.
Thanks for linking up today!