And A Child Shall Lead Them

One of my favorite things in the world is seeing what kids do with the world, from their limited base of knowledge and experience.

For this reason, I try very hard to allow my kids to come to conclusions about certain things on their own. It's incredibly interesting to me, to see their instinctive reactions when they haven't been given someone else's point of view.

An example of this is skin color. Eric and I have never talked about skin color in any capacity in front of the kids. We never really talked about NOT talking about it, it just ended up that way. So we've always been curious when the kids would notice that on their own, and how they would express it.

The other day, Ava was sitting at the kitchen table coloring. She had drawn a picture of 2 girls holding hands.

Me: "What are you drawing?"

Ava: "It's two girls, one has white skin, and one has brown skin.....but they can still be friends!"

(I wondered at this point if she was saying something she had heard on TV, or if it was her own conclusion)

Me: "Where did you hear about brown skinned people?"

Ava: "When I was at Luke's birthday party, at McDonald's, I saw a girl who had brown skin, and we played together and were friends anyway!"



Quite different from Cole's first observation of racial difference....when he was 3, he saw a black man walk past with a really full afro. Cole says "Mom, that man looks like he's from the jungle!"


I wonder what Zachary's first comment on racial differences will be........I can't wait, it's sure to be a doozy!




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