The Healthy Parenting Blog

Kid Ecowarriors!

I have to admit that I dance a little “proud mama” dance when I think about how much my boys have learned and taken to themselves the lessons of being a “healthy” person in today’s world.  This past weekend I was dancing a number of times.  ;) 

On a trip to Target, my 8 year old stomped on a floating in the wind McD’s bag and mashed it into the nearby garbage can.  And not without grumbling about who would do such a thing.  I didn’t have the heart to tell him that it appeared that the garbage can was overflowing and it probably hitched a ride on the wind, as it was apparent that he felt proud of himself. 

A little while later on the car ride home, my 5 year old peanut was unwrapping a piece of candy that we had secretly dropped on our doorstep the night before (a halloween neighborhood thing).  He hands me his garbage and instructs me while doing so, “Now Mom, do NOT throw that garbage out the window”.  Seems my stories of stopping my vehicle on the side of the road and forcing any passengers dumb enough to toss garbage out my car window to get out and pick up the offense, took root!

We haven’t managed to instill all the lessons of being an ecowarrior in a natural family yet but we’ll get there. I realized last night while chatting quietly with my 8 year old in his bed (part of our bedtime routine) that all these lessons will take when they are old enough to understand.  He’s had a problem the past year or so letting go of negative things that happen. Last night he GOT the releasing negative energy as we talked about creative visualization methods.  I suggested putting these negative feelings/things into the form of a helium balloon and simply cutting the string and watching them float away.  But my spirited 8 year old had a more creative way of letting go, in the form of a catapult.  I really like his way of thinking  ;)