Grandma Henke

Sometimes I get jealous because of all my children have now days to enhance the minds and learning of their children. The most educational toys my babies had were plastic pop beads, Fisher Price stack rings, colored building blocks, and the Tupperware Puzzle Ball. I used to play the piano for them as well as different types of music on our Reel to Reel Recorder … But I didn’t have Baby Bach and Baby Einstein cd’s and toys that play classical music when you touch them or mobiles that had twinkling lights and music as they turned above their cribs. I did have a Blue Bird toy attached to the side of the crib with a little pull handle that the babies eventually learned to make work. It was fun to hear their music start up in the middle of the night … especially when they put themselves back to sleep.

My grandchildren show me how to work the computer all the time … the little tiny ones do too. I used to think my grandmother was one of the smartest women on earth … my grandchildren might have felt that way before they learned the computer (which is generally before age two). When I can’t figure out how to turn on the TV any one of them could probably give me lessons. I would have loved all of these creative teaching games when they were little. It was Mr. Rogers who taught my children … and they learned their alphabet and numbers to Sesame Street puppets. They had to watch it when it came on each day because there was no copying the show and watching it at a more convenient time. There was no favorites that would be played over and over and over until the children had every word memorized.

My children didn’t get to work on research papers from the comfort of their own home, printing out beautiful pictures and finding more information in an hour than we could find after three trips to the library.

But … then I think of the open fields across the street where they played softball and dug forts, the caves they explored and camped near, the sand dunes just up the road in Snow Canyon. Many of the places we took our children were free … camping on the shores of Lake Meade or Lake Powell … camping in the mountains and playing in the streams. I loved the safety of our little town and the freedom they had to explore … the neighborhood football games in the middle of the road in front of our house (not as easy on the knees as grass).

I guess each generation has its own good and its own challenge in raising children. My parents felt they grew up in the best of times. I feel like I grew up in the best of times. I hope my children feel the same. Our grandchildren are now in their “good old days” … their best of times.

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