“Virtues like flowers grow in the sunshine.”
~Karen Andreola
How peaceful and relaxing it is to paint! The girls got some new art supplies this week (thanks, Grandma Jackie!) so they were eager to get painting! As they got started, I took a few minutes to read my new encouraging book for my homeschool momma heart: The Charlotte Mason Companion by Karen Andreola. She gave me some helpful tidbits about “ideas” and the feeding
of my children’s minds. She spoke of the importance of “living books” but also about the role of parents and the environment they create in their homes. I had to write down this quote from Miss Mason that she included so I could remind myself and ponder:
“Ideas are held in that thought environment which surrounds the child as an atmosphere, in which he breathes in unconscious ideas of right living emanating from his parents. Every look of gentleness and tone of reverence, every word of kindness and act of help, passes into the thought-environment, the very atmosphere which the child breathes; he does not think of these things, may never think of them, but all his life long they excite that vague appetency [relationship] towards something out of which most of his actions spring.”
I often think of the atmosphere in my childhood home when I consider my approach toward my girls. Being a quality time girl, I keep snippets of memories from when my mom would come on field trips with me, or read me a bedtime story (I always picked the LONGEST book I could find!). I think of my dad spending hours teaching me how to create my own computer program, and the countless Bible games we played on Friday nights. I wonder which snippets my girls will keep with them as they grow. And more importantly, how all of it will affect them and their character development and the choices they make. I long to provide a positive, loving safe haven in which they might grow up with the feeling of love and acceptance, coming to love God’s way simply by seeing it and feeling it being lived each day with grace. Yet, how often I fall short in creating such an atmosphere! That “gentle look” and “reverent tone” are two things I know I could use more of in my daily mothering approach. Later in the chapter, as if she were
reading my mind, she answered my feelings of shortcoming with this much needed word of encouragement:
“Don’t be discouraged, dear parent, with the heavenly command, ‘Be ye perfect.’ We may not reach our ideals, but it is our fervent, faithful reaching towards them that matters greatly.”
Ideals they are, yet what more important work to be laboring for during these short sweet years with our little ones. Just reading those words makes me want to put more effort into being the kind of mom my children deserve. Of course, I rest thankful and grateful in God’s generous mercy. And how fortunate for them that He fills in where we fall short.
So, what kind of “thought-environment” are you contributing to in your home? Are there any elements of virtue or “right living” that you’d like to see more highly concentrated in the atmosphere around you? What are some of your parenting (or grandparenting) goals?
I don’t know about you, but I could use a few more moments with these kinds of helpful nuggets. In fact, there just might be a little extra painting going on around here!
