Reliving My Childhood

They say one the best parts of parenthood is seeing the world through a child's eyes and sharing your own childhood favorites with your little one. These are the things I've been loving sharing with Ava lately.

Mary Rice Hopkins songs. I sang these songs from Forest Home Summer Camp all growing up. My mom bought all the cassette tapes every summer and we'd sing them all year long; in the car, in the shower, dancing around the house in our socks on the slippery wood floor. My mom knew all the words and hand motions that went along with them too, what a fun mom. One I want to be like. Now Ava and I have impromptu music times just about once a day. I blast these songs and we sing and dance around the house. Ava gets a huge smile on her face every time she can tell we're about to break into song. It's our own little episode of Glee. I can't carry a tune for the life of me but the best part is that it's just me and her and she couldn't care less... yet. Did I mention that the songs are all from 1991? Heavy on the Casio keyboard synthesizer jam sessions, just the way I like it.

P.S. This song, though extremely cheesy, now makes me cry every time I hear it. Ava just looks at me like, "What mom? I thought we were having fun..." when I go from dancing around to turning into a weepy mess the moment it comes on.

The Velveteen Rabbit. My Grandpa Power used to read this book to me when I was little and gave me the copy I now read to Ava. Even though it's long on words and short on colorful pictures for her, I'm loving sharing this classic story with my daughter. There are new memories that it conjures up now as well. This passage was read at Danielle & Gabe's beautiful wedding last summer,

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but Really loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get all loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

What a beautiful description of love. This new mom can relate to drooping eyes and loose body parts and a feeling of general shabbiness. But with the love of a husband and baby like mine, it's true, it doesn't matter at all.

Swimming lessons. These are new, as in the last half an hour new. Ava had her first swimming lesson today and it was so fun to watch. She didn't love it but she didn't cry the whole time either. She's still getting used to being in the water, having it on her face, and the feeling of floating on her back. I think those twenty minutes wore her out. She nursed for a long time afterward and is now sleeping like a rock.

Sharing swimming with her is something we've very excited about. Both Mark and I are from water-loving families. I grew up spending my weekends at the beach and in the ocean in Ventura and he grew up spending his summers on the lake in Montana. Some of my favorite memories are of Power family boogie boarding sessions, playing "over or under" in the waves with my mom, and being pushed into waves on my surfboard by my dad. It's so cool to have your own family and conscioulsy decide what it will value together. Between swimming, surfing, wake boarding, kayaking, snorkeling, catching air on wave runners, speed boating, and taking the stand up paddle boards out from Grandma & Grandpa Power's dock, Ava is bound to be a water girl. Here's to many Russell family water adventures!

Ava with her swim teacher, Miss Sophia:

Little surfer girl in the making

Now I just need to get my hands on some Poky Little Puppy books and cassette tapes. This was my favorite book growing up. I must have listened to the cassettes and followed along in the book 3,149 times. I mentioned my desire to bring them back so Ava can experience them to my mom and she just rolled her eyes and mumbled that she didn't know if she could handle hearing them even once more. Ha!