children

Missy could fall down and hurt herself, even if I'm walking right there beside her. That doesn't mean that I allowed it to happen. She knows, as far as unconditional love, I'll pick her up and I'll carry her. I'll try to heal her. I'll cry when she cries. And I'll rejoice when she is well. In all the moments of my life, God has been right there beside me. The truth of God's love is not that He allows bad things to happen. It's His promise that He'll be there with us when they do.

Only to the degree that people have what they need, that they are healthy and unafraid, that their lives are varied, interesting, meaningful, productive, joyous, can we begin to judge, or even guess, their nature. Few people, adults or children, now live such lives.

Children are the closest we have to wisdom, and they become adults the moment that final drop of everything mysterious is strained from them.

I wrote "David" because it seemed to me that children, who can love a book more passionately than any grown person, got such a lot of harmless entertainment and not enough real, valuable literature.

A first child is your own best foot forward, and how you do cheer those little feet as they strike out. You examine every turn of flesh for precocity, and crow it to the world. But the last one: the baby who trails her scent like a flag of surrender through your life when there will be no more coming after--oh, that' s love by a different name.

They__e close. Voices loud and fierce, Slapping faces with words. A scream _ A cry _ They__e getting closer.Did I lock the door? It__ too late to check. They__e coming. I barely move, barely breathe. Perhaps they__l go away. But they__e getting closer.The door slams against the wall. My eyes squeeze shut. This curtain is not a shield. They__e here. They__e come for me. I freeze.Metal rings clank together. My barrier is cast aside. Wearily, I look. Reddened eyes glower at one another _ But not at me. I wonder.A moment of silence _ Water streams down my face. Steam rolls around my flesh. I glare at the intruders And slide the curtain between us. I wait.He shrieks, __he took my glow stick!_ She howls, __o, I didn__!_ I scowl. __o tell your father about it.__hey leave. I inhale the lavender mist. Slather bubbles over my skin. Five more minutes _ And, next time, I shall lock the door.

Have faith that your child's brain is an evolving planet that rotates at its own speed. It will naturally be attracted to or repel certain subjects.

He switched off the light, came back and sat in the chair. In the darkness, Liesel kept her eyes open. She was watching the words.

Have you noticed how children never bypass a puddle of water, but jump, splash, and slosh right through it? _That's because they know an important truth: Life was meant to be lived; puddles were meant to be experienced.

Adults, in their dealing with children, are insane," he [Ed Ricketts] said. "And children know it too. Adults lay down rules they would not think of following, speak truths they do not believe. And yet they expect children to obey the rules, believe the truths, and admire and respect their parents for this nonsense. Children must be very wise and secret to tolerate adults at all. And the greatest nonsense of all that adults expect children to believe is that people learn by experience. No greater lie was ever revered. And its falseness is immediately discerned by children since their parents obviously have not learned anything by experience. Far from learning, adults simply become set in a maze of prejudices and dreams and sets of rules whose origins they do not know and would not dare inspect for fear the whole structure might topple over on them. I think children instinctively know this," Ed said. "Intelligent children learn to conceal their knowledge and keep free of this howling mania.

The best way to get kids to read a book is to say: 'This book is not appropriate for your age, and it has all sorts of horrible things in it like sex and death and some really big and complicated ideas, and you__e better off not touching it until you__e all grown up. I__ going to put it on this shelf and leave the room for a while. Don__ open it.

If we can keep ourselves from interfering with the natural laws of life, mistakes can be our child's finest teachers.

Wisdom is justified by all her children.Luke 7:35

The very old and the very young have something in common that makes it right that they should be left alone together. Dawn and sunset see stars shining in a blue sky; but morning and midday and afternoon do not, poor things.

I've been the oldest child since before you were born

Upon the lips of babes asleep I saw light embracing light and so allowed my syllables to rest there as a prayer they might sing in their dreams...

I__ convinced that one of the most powerful forces on earth is the prayer of a child.

That's the nature of being a parent, Sabine has discovered. You'll love your children far more than you ever loved your parents, and -- in the recognition that your own children cannot fathom the depth of your love -- you come to understand the tragic, unrequited love of your own parents.