I have a confession. I am in love. With more than one - is that possible?

Bluebird Exchange in NC

This season you will see our toys in about 40 stores, schools and museums! And these spaces carrying our toys are the sweetest looking and beautifully curated spaces one could hope to be a part of. I could spend an afternoon in these places if ever I was close enough to visit! (One day!)

Polliwogs and Petunias in PA

I suppose it’s like your children (whether those children are people or pets). You love one, and then the next one comes along and you love them with the love you didn’t know you had left to give.

After a year of so much uncertainty and anxiety and incredible loss, these spaces that believe in the hope our children represent feel like an urgent insistence — a gentle but persistent tug to remind us that yes, there’s so much good around us. It might be harder to see this year more than other times, but it is there.

Brimful Shop - an online boutique based in WA

There is hope in these individual acts, trying to share sweetness, kindness, gentleness, and imagination. There is good because each individual act adds up and bring me such joy! 

Are you lucky enough to be near these places? Because if you are, and if you can, go visit! Not just to support these neighborhood small businesses, but to feel the joy I feel just looking at their photos and posts!

I hope you have been able to find joy in the simple acts and witness hope in action - I certainly will keep my eyes and arms open to that.

P.S. I really must do better than these once a year blog posts - maybe I’ll get another one in before the new year.

This blog post will be written before October comes. Just putting it out there in the universe to make this happen as I start this in early September. Do you ever share your hopes with the universe, however tiny it is and you find that it actually happens? I’ve done it from time to time, and while I can’t remember the times it doesn’t work, I get a thrill when the universe provides what I need when I need it.

This blog post might not make sense, but if I edit this until I think it does, you might never read it. There’s such a seeming universe-wide divide between what I think should happen, or what I wish to happen and what I am actually willing to do to make that happen.

This blog post has started many many times since early 2018. I can say (with an abundance of truth, thank you very much!) that we truly have been busy. I can say that we were engaging in real world amusements and isn’t that more important? I can say that we have gone through so many changes, challenges, and triumphs since then. I can say all of these things quite confidently in my attempts to justify this delay but I know the truth. I just didn’t make the time for it.

I have two boys. That should be enough justification, right?

Where has the time gone? Yesterday, it was a fresh and shiny new year. And today it is over a year later. So much has changed and yet so much has stayed pretty much the same this year. In January of 2018, we had begun the process of a very big change in our family’s life. After decades of living in the same city, we were itching to move to greener pastures. 

I am excited to share our new adventures from our new neck of the woods, not a new year but a new season for Water and Lightning. There is so much good to share - but I’ll save that for the next post.

Now we can proudly say that our products were designed in Queens, New York, handcrafted in Laguna, Philippines, now brought to you from North Carolina. Where ever we were yesterday, today or tomorrow, what’s important is that we find the time to play. 

Have you made time to play today?

Happy New Year!

We didn’t have official resolutions this year but what I do have might be an unpopular wish for my children.

I wish to raise a wild child.  

Barring completely failing out of school, I don’t strive for my child to have the highest grades. I want my children to be free-thinkers, to be tinkerers, adventurous in their creations and inventions.

On New Year’s Day, in below zero weather, the boys and I got dressed and went to a nearby park. It has been our annual tradition to go to a nature area of some kind to start the new year. I’m glad the kids are still at an age where they are not complaining too much about going outdoors in freezing weather. Perhaps we have been doing this often enough that it’s been indoctrinated into their minds. Success!

During our new year’s day walk N climbs a fallen tree and slides down it multiple times. He says to me, “Mommy, look, it’s nature’s playground!” I hope his sense of awe and appreciation and ability to play like this lasts forever. My eldest, L, meanwhile has found a log and is carrying it on his shoulders in front of me. Later, we find some rocks and see how far we can throw them across the frozen pond. I can still hear the traffic on the road nearby, but for that moment, we are in our own world.

If the first day of the year is any indication of what 2018 will be for us, it will be a good year.

Noah and Lukas' Guide to Make Hiking Fun - Tip #2

Noah learned this lesson the hard way. We were on a late winter hike, made the mistake of not having him wear his waterproof boots. There was a semi-frozen puddle. What child could resist a puddle? However, this was a lesson he has never forgotten. Always bring a change of clothes, including socks and shoes. If there is a possibility of rain or snow, better to get that waterproof gear on. Proper clothing = comfort = a good time hiking.

Noah and Lukas' Guide to Make Hiking Fun - Tip #1

It is so important to give our kids a chance to have fun on hikes. It should not just be about getting through a trail, or getting to that “magnificent view” on the hike. For kids, it will just be a chore if the only point is the destination. We have to allow for kids to explore that cool rock along the way or walk across that fallen log. It’s important to notice everything along the path and experience all we see. So don’t rush them along. With kids especially, allow for time to stop along the way and observe the joy they will feel when they do find that awesome climb-able rock.

We have too much stuff. There is a constant battle in our household over toys that sit in the closet and the ones that they play with over and over. This battle involves me wanting to clear that closet and my boys need to keep just in case they want to play with it one day.

The toys that tend to survive my regular purges don’t have any particular theme to them - except for one. They are toys that have many uses and allow for many possibilities.

There was a lack of open-ended toys when our boys were much younger. Even the blocks were meant to be stacked a certain order. There were many battery operated toys, puzzles, or trains with tracks that were meant to do just that one thing. Our boys almost never “followed the instructions” with these toys. Almost never did they play with the toys as they were meant.

We have always wanted our boys to have memorable play experiences - indoors or out. But it is difficult to stick to that considering the choices we had in the toy market place. We’ve learned that simplicity is key. Buy less, play more is our intention and challenge to ourselves as parents.

Over the years, we’ve found that our kids just thrive being outdoors as well. As adults, being outdoors in our local nature areas reminds us of our own childhood. We are constantly reminded of the connection between play, nature and imagination.

We launched Water and Lightning in the hopes that we can provide toys that have no rules. Toys that provide the kind of play that is only limited by the range of your child’s imagination. Our pebbles, sticks and stones are our simple and humble invitation to play.

Come play with us!