At 21 months old, Caleb can spell his name. Not just his first name. He can spell his first, middle, and last name. He can almost count to 100 with a little help along the way sometimes. Actually, today he counted past one hundred. He talks in complete sentences (when he wants to...). He reads books all by himself. He knows how to read so many words, I can't keep up anymore. He knows the names of those closest to him...and how to spell them. He knows all of his colors and shapes and how to spell them. He can spell some numbers also. His favorite things to do include coloring and looking up at the moon and stars. No high tech toys needed folks. Our battery expense is pretty low because Caleb enjoys hands-on activities. This brings me to the real topic of this blog post.
A few days ago, I took Caleb to the Discovery Center here in Murfreesboro. It's a wonderful place (that we now have a membership to) that is full of hands-on things for kids to play with and explore. They have everything from live turtles, to running model trains, to a huge water table and Caleb's favorite, the rock bin. When we go there, Caleb runs to the rock bin, grabs a little play shovel and digs in the rocks. Not lying, we played in the rocks for almost an hour last time. As I was sitting in the midst of the rock bin with Caleb with my own shovel, my mom told me to look around at the other moms. They all had one thing in common. While all of their children where playing, they were on their smartphones. Here I was in the middle of a rock bin with rocks in my shoes and pockets and God knows where else, and these other moms were chatting online, checking emails, posting a new status or tweet, and reading their favorite blogs.
How sad. Folks, I'm sorry, but I think things have to change. We've become a people so interested in other peoples lives that we've lost track of our own. We rely on other people to teach our kids about everything instead of taking on the responsibilities of parenting. Wake up parents.
I'm not saying I don't blog, Facebook, watch TV, or check emails. I do. However, I try my very hardest to do all of those things when Caleb is asleep so that while he's awake he has my attention. Going back to my first couple of paragraphs, Caleb didn't become intelligent all by himself. It took time. It took attention. It took me and others putting him first before the distractions this world offers.
This morning, Caleb looked at me and said, "Love you, Mommy." He tells me this all the time. My heart melts when I hear those words. There isn't a tweet, an email, a status, an online chat, a TV show, a phone call, or a text that can EVER bring me the joy that those words do.
R
