How bad is a mess?
I mean, yes, ketchup on a white carpet is terrible. Spilled milk on your couch is definitely worth crying over, I mean really, how do you get that smell out? But, a mess. Oats on the kitchen floor. Blocks scattered around the living room. EVERY stuffed animal in your house gathered in one large pile in the middle of the floor...
I poured a few cups worth of dried oats into a small Tupperware container, about the size of a shoe box. I had been toying around with the idea of a sensory box for L, but hadn't quite opted to commit without knowing if she was going to enjoy it or not. After all, she's at that age where her favorite activity seems to be to run around the house like a cyclone, and knocking any leaning tower of ANYTHING down.
But, I had some left over oats from making some granola the other day, and had came across a blogger who started her first sensory box with oats for her daughter as it was a safe option for the little fingers that still enjoyed putting things in their mouth. So, in a little box they went, along with a bottle that I had cut in half and sanded the edges down of, one side made for a scoop, the other for a funnel. I showed her how to scoop, how to pour, and how to watch it come out the mouth piece of the bottle. I then turned my back on her as I finished making some valentines day M&M Blondies.
When I turned around, this is what was waiting for me.
But then, as my daughter kicked her legs and watched the oats glide across the floor, and giggle in delight, I couldn't help but ask "Really, what is she hurting?" Nothing. Is it going to stain my floors? No. Is it going to get ground into the carpet? No. If I clean it up now, or clean it up later, will I have any more of a mess to clean up?" No.
So, why am I so quick to take her fun away? Because it's not "proper" to have a mess on the floor. Because our house should be clean. Because I'm teaching her poor behaviors.
But am I? I have a 1 year old who often times will pick up her blocks without any asking or provoking on my behalf. And if ever I start to pick up her toys, she HAPPILY joins in and helps me. By letting her make a mess, and encouraging her to help me clean it up as we go along, she has learned how to pick up after herself.
If I had gotten into a huff and scooped up all her oats, I wouldn't have given her the opportunity to help clean up. And aside from that, the chance to explore.
In letting her make a mess she got to experience several things.
Cause and effect. When she slid her legs through the puddles of oats she watched them fly across the slippery floor. In letting her pick them up by the fist full and squeeze she got to experience them sliding through her fingers. The noise they made when they hit the ground. By taking the broom off of its handle she got to try her hand at sweeping. It also reinforced that when we make a mess, we must pick it up before moving on to the next item.
She also got to see her mom be realistic...in her eyes. Any other adult would have probably sided right along with me that oats are fine to play with as long as they stay in the container. To a child, especially one of L's age, what's the difference between the container and the floor? None. And if I would have insisted that they either stay in the container or we put them away, she would have only understood that I was taking her new experience, and source of enjoyment away. Not that there won't be times in her life that she may experience that, but with something that is so harmless, why experience it with this? Instead of Mom expecting L to understand at an adult level, L understood that Mom came to her level. That I experienced the world on the same plane of simplicity that she views it as.
I'm also, with any luck, changing my mindset. By changing my mindset, I'm hoping she'll grow up to understand that messes are okay, when contained and thought through. And with any luck it'll be something she can put to practice in her parenting.
And as an unintentional added bonus, it gives me a good reason to sweep and vacuum my floors every day, sometimes several times a day, to pick up the oats in the kitchen and the handful that track through the house on her.
But if I were to wait until she were old enough to completely understand and to know better, than she probably also would be too old to really have much interest in playing with. And it's not that I NEED my child to play with oats because her childhood wouldn't be complete without it. However, there are some things, for a child, that if you aren't immersed in them from a young age, it's harder to change your views on them once you're older. There is something so magical, for a lack of a better word, to watch a child play in their own way. Unguided, without fear of the mess they make and in an environment that is safe for them, without fear of them breaking something, or eating and choking on it. To watch them learn and experience the world in their way, not ours. Who am I to deny her that?
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