By Jill Kolongowski
In what feels like the perfect anecdote for a blog about springtime, I’d intended to write this blog post ahead of time for Easter. But, as you all know with a kid, my time is not my own and large swaths of it seem to escape, and I look up, and wonder what day it is. Easter is tomorrow, and now I’m writing this blog. (But I did find these easy, fun activities for easter eggs—which my toddler LOVES—that you can do year-round.)
As the pandemic (hopefully?) seems to be easing, the world feels like it’s speeding up again. Calendars are filling up with summer plans long postponed, and for those of us in the Wednesday Ones class, our babies are now toddlers, and questions about preschool and work-life balance are always at the top of our minds. Springtime is traditionally a time for cleaning out the old, for starting over, for a feeling of newness. All of those things can feel like an opportunity to press the metaphorical gas pedal—hurry, hurry, time to get going—it’s spring!
Instead, though, I’m taking this spring (perhaps the last one where I have a good amount of down time with my daughter before she’s in school more and more hours) as a chance to not speed up toward a new season, but instead slow down. I was inspired on a walk with her, when I had groceries in the stroller, and we needed to get home and get them put away, and get on to lunch, and the next thing. But she wanted to get out of the stroller and walk. I decided to let her, just to let her run out some energy. Instead of running, though, she decided to walk slowly, stopping at every single tree on the block, and kissing it.
The easier choice, of course, was to insist she stay in the stroller to get home. And of course, sometimes we have to do the un-fun hurrying—eventually, we have to get where we’re going. But my toddler is teaching me to be patient and to slow down. Not only did we find a ladybug on tree bark, but we found new buds growing on formerly bare trees, worms in the dirt, and new flowers. To help us learn about spring, we loved reading Busy Spring: Nature Wakes Up by Sean Taylor and Alex Morss—this book is about a father and daughter learning about spring in their own backyard (and in this book, spring is busiest for the creatures, while father and daughter slow down to watch). The world is so new for our kids, and slowing down allows us to see it. And as we get some rare rain, we loved slowing down inside, too, to read Hello Rain by Kyo Maclear and Watersong (a fun book about all the sounds water can make) by Tim McKanna.
A spring slow-down is not just about stopping to literally smell the flowers, but instead about the choice that you can make in how you spend your time. There are so many wonderful options for things to do with your child—music class! gymnastics! hiking class! daycare and/or Little Wonders!—but I was beginning to feel like we were already overscheduled, and my daughter is not even two yet. So, as a part of our spring slow-down, I decided to cut back on our scheduled activities for the fall. With our new schedule (even with me going back to working more hours), we have one weekday with no obligations. We can stay inside and listen to the rain, or go to the playground, or play in the backyard, or take a long time listening to music and playing at breakfast. No one is asking us to be anywhere, and our time is our own (well—our time is our toddler’s).
Whether spring has you feeling renewed energy or like maybe there is too much energy to hold, I hope you’re able to find time for slowness, too.