Shared Memories of Singing

In my last post I said starting this project has reconnected me with many old friends, and made new ones. This week I was reconnecting with an old friend who is a grandmother of young children as I am, and she said,"That's right.. we sang a lot to our children... and I don't hear my children singing to theirs..." She only realized that as we were talking. Times change, and culture changes, and that's to be expected. But here's what wrong with losing our songs, and in fact, our very voices.

For hundreds of years, familiar rhymes and songs have led children into the wonderful world that is language. They have all the necessary ingredients to take children from having no language, to having oral and then written language with their familiar and endearing characters and stories. But in the last few years, even as I have been giving music workshops to teachers who signed up for a music workshop, there are the inevitable comments like, "We're not going to have to sing, are we?" As a culture we have become so uncomfortable singing, that it's as if we have forgotten just how good it feels to sing! I don't want any parent to miss out on the connection that is made when singing a simple song with your child, and I don't want a single child to miss out on the comfort and security that is built while singing with those who care the most about you. And that's why I've felt the urgency to take on this project now, as every year I watch a few more songs slip away.

I'm so excited about this project that it keeps me up at night. My family might tell you I'm obsessed, and I might agree. But that's passion for you! The process has been interesting, and at times hard. Trying to get something that's been forming in my head for nearly a year, out and into the world with a real plan has been challenging, to say the least! I'm making it up as I go along. But I've always had pretty good instinct, and my instinct tells me the time is right. I know things will happen over the next year that I can't even imagine now. I know, because that's already begun. Many gifts will be opened along the way, and I hope you share in the giving and receiving of those gifts as Sing With Our Kids takes shape.

Please share a favorite memory you have of being sung to, or of singing to your children. Because when you share your story, it will remind others of their stories, and that will become the thread of this project. And if you don't want to share it on this blog, allow yourself to remember, and share it with a friend - or better yet, your child.