The things we pass on
26/06/14 07:23
Our daughter-in-law operates a licensed home day care. The day care is taking a summer break this year with the new baby in the house. They will resume caring for other children in their home in September. Their life is busy, with dad working full time. One day a week he commutes to the corporate offices in Renton. The other days he has an office just a few blocks from home from which he works. Depending on meetings and other activities, he is often able to come home for lunch, or take a break to help with appointments or other home events. In addition to the home day care, mom continues her private practice as a marriage and family counselor, seeing her clients on Saturdays. The house is a very small three bedroom house, so there isn’t a lot of space.
It is, however, a rich learning environment for children. The house is filled with learning toys and books, all neatly arranged and handy for play. The living room is the main play space. There is enough wooden railroad track to make a very big layout and train layouts have to be put away after play, so making the track layouts is part of the game. There is also ramp for playing with hot wheels cars, though the small cars are stored during day care and not out for general use with the visiting children. There are stacking toys and balls for indoor use. The back yard is fenced and has a sandbox as well as a small cement area for playing with larger toys.
Each child has a bedroom equipped with their own clothes and toys. The rooms have been lovingly painted and decorated with cheerful themes. Elliot has a train on one wall of his room and his bed is a race car. He has a small desk and a set of bookshelves. Emmala has a mural with animals.
It is a wonderful place for grandparents to visit. There are plenty of toys to play with the children. There are lots of stories to read. There is indoor and outdoor space to explore and the children are at home and secure in their world.
A regular part of their lives, however, are adventures away from home. The day care is kept to just a few additional children, so that all can be loaded into car seats and transported in a single vehicle. They take short outings to area parks, the children’s museum, the library, and other nearby locations. Even the presence of a new baby hasn’t kept the family at home. During our visit, we have been to three different park playgrounds, made a visit to the farmers market and a local fresh fish market. Elliot has had a sleep-over at our camper, and the whole family came out for a hay ride and supper at the campground.
When I was a child, I remember thinking that we had a really big house. We had lots of children in our family, so a big house seemed in order. We had lots of toys and books as well. In reality, the house in which I grew up was about the same size as the house where just two of us live these days. We always shared rooms with siblings in that house and I guess we were a bit more crowded than it seemed to me at the time. For most of my growing up years, we had a train board, where we played with our building toys and trains that sat just above our beds during the day and raised up to the ceiling on a pulley system at night. Our desks were built into our clothes closets, with our clothes hanging above the place reserved for homework.
Today’s families often live with a huge luxury of space and that is nice, but I can see no problems with our son’s family living in a comparably small house. They have the things that they need and their family is comfortable. The environment is rich for the children who are growing up a delightful and wonderful young people.
The thing that we had in our space when I was growing up that is mostly missing from our son and daughter-in-law’s house, however, was the keepsake furniture that had been handed down for generations. In our house today is a cabinet that belonged to my great grandparents, clocks that are in their fourth and fifth generations, a chest of drawers and bed that has been in the homes of four generations of the family and other items. Because my mother and Susan’s father lived near us at the ends of their lives, we had some responsibility for caring for their favorite furnishings at the end of their lives. We have a storage unit filled with furniture waiting for use by a new generation.
I am even more aware of this because my sister has just moved form Portland, Oregon, where she lived most of her adult life back to our home town. The dilemma of the move was what to do with the piano that was in our grandparents house and then in our house when we were kids. It is a lovely Kimball with a burled wood cabinet that is really beautiful. It has been lovingly maintained and regularly tuned. And right now it is in a storage unit that costs $40 per month. Storage rent will exceed the cash value of the piano in less than a year. And it is in a distant city where none of us live. From a financial point of view, it makes no sense at all. From an emotional point of view, we need a few months to figure things out. “Maybe one of the grandchildren might want it one day,” we think. But I know that the piano is never going to be moved to my side of the family.
I know that some of the treasures of many generations need to have their pictures taken and then be passed on to other owners outside of the family. It is, however, a hard decision for people like us who come from many generations who passed things on.
The most important legacies we have, however, are not objects at all. The love of reading that was in my grandparents is present in our grandchildren’s home. The love that we felt growing up surrounds our grandchildren and will be around for generations. When we visit our son and daughter-in-law or our daughter and son-in-law, we are aware that the next generation is doing a good job of sifting and sorting, keeping the things that are most important and leaving behind the things that are not as important.
I find hope in the fact that they are better at it than we.
It is, however, a rich learning environment for children. The house is filled with learning toys and books, all neatly arranged and handy for play. The living room is the main play space. There is enough wooden railroad track to make a very big layout and train layouts have to be put away after play, so making the track layouts is part of the game. There is also ramp for playing with hot wheels cars, though the small cars are stored during day care and not out for general use with the visiting children. There are stacking toys and balls for indoor use. The back yard is fenced and has a sandbox as well as a small cement area for playing with larger toys.
Each child has a bedroom equipped with their own clothes and toys. The rooms have been lovingly painted and decorated with cheerful themes. Elliot has a train on one wall of his room and his bed is a race car. He has a small desk and a set of bookshelves. Emmala has a mural with animals.
It is a wonderful place for grandparents to visit. There are plenty of toys to play with the children. There are lots of stories to read. There is indoor and outdoor space to explore and the children are at home and secure in their world.
A regular part of their lives, however, are adventures away from home. The day care is kept to just a few additional children, so that all can be loaded into car seats and transported in a single vehicle. They take short outings to area parks, the children’s museum, the library, and other nearby locations. Even the presence of a new baby hasn’t kept the family at home. During our visit, we have been to three different park playgrounds, made a visit to the farmers market and a local fresh fish market. Elliot has had a sleep-over at our camper, and the whole family came out for a hay ride and supper at the campground.
When I was a child, I remember thinking that we had a really big house. We had lots of children in our family, so a big house seemed in order. We had lots of toys and books as well. In reality, the house in which I grew up was about the same size as the house where just two of us live these days. We always shared rooms with siblings in that house and I guess we were a bit more crowded than it seemed to me at the time. For most of my growing up years, we had a train board, where we played with our building toys and trains that sat just above our beds during the day and raised up to the ceiling on a pulley system at night. Our desks were built into our clothes closets, with our clothes hanging above the place reserved for homework.
Today’s families often live with a huge luxury of space and that is nice, but I can see no problems with our son’s family living in a comparably small house. They have the things that they need and their family is comfortable. The environment is rich for the children who are growing up a delightful and wonderful young people.
The thing that we had in our space when I was growing up that is mostly missing from our son and daughter-in-law’s house, however, was the keepsake furniture that had been handed down for generations. In our house today is a cabinet that belonged to my great grandparents, clocks that are in their fourth and fifth generations, a chest of drawers and bed that has been in the homes of four generations of the family and other items. Because my mother and Susan’s father lived near us at the ends of their lives, we had some responsibility for caring for their favorite furnishings at the end of their lives. We have a storage unit filled with furniture waiting for use by a new generation.
I am even more aware of this because my sister has just moved form Portland, Oregon, where she lived most of her adult life back to our home town. The dilemma of the move was what to do with the piano that was in our grandparents house and then in our house when we were kids. It is a lovely Kimball with a burled wood cabinet that is really beautiful. It has been lovingly maintained and regularly tuned. And right now it is in a storage unit that costs $40 per month. Storage rent will exceed the cash value of the piano in less than a year. And it is in a distant city where none of us live. From a financial point of view, it makes no sense at all. From an emotional point of view, we need a few months to figure things out. “Maybe one of the grandchildren might want it one day,” we think. But I know that the piano is never going to be moved to my side of the family.
I know that some of the treasures of many generations need to have their pictures taken and then be passed on to other owners outside of the family. It is, however, a hard decision for people like us who come from many generations who passed things on.
The most important legacies we have, however, are not objects at all. The love of reading that was in my grandparents is present in our grandchildren’s home. The love that we felt growing up surrounds our grandchildren and will be around for generations. When we visit our son and daughter-in-law or our daughter and son-in-law, we are aware that the next generation is doing a good job of sifting and sorting, keeping the things that are most important and leaving behind the things that are not as important.
I find hope in the fact that they are better at it than we.