I’ve been blogging at DadsforCreativity.com for almost ten years. I’ve shared in previous articles that I’ve value how this work has captured various events between me and my children. The article below was my first blog article and I’m incredibly grateful to have captured this moment.
I was recently at Cape Cod on a family vacation. Apart from my three-year-old catching Pink Eye it was a delightful and relaxing experience. One of the best things about going on holiday is the opportunity to spend quality time with the family. My three-year-old terror can be a handful, but his imagination is something I cherish dearly. With his help we transformed a simple bike ride into a memorable adventure with a Gruffalo, fairies, a magical wood, dinosaur bones, and a scary forest.
My brother-in-law was kind enough to offer his bike that comes with a little seat for my first born to sit on. With it, the two of us, bursting with excitement, embarked on our first bike journey around a little beachside resort in Cape Cod. Below is a summary of that adventure.
As we traveled down a path, we eventually came to some woodland. At first, my eldest was a little scared, calling it a scary forest that has scary skeletons hiding behind the bushes. Still, I decided to challenge his imagination to go beyond this current obsession and develop other things that might live in the treacherous forest that was emerging around us.
To my delight – as it’s my favorite picture book – he decided that we were in the deep dark wood where the Gruffalo lives, well, not just one, lots of them. They were popping up all over the place, and poor Daddy had to peddle quickly to escape them.
After my legs began to burn I needed a change in the story. With a bit of encouragement, we eventually crossed into a magical forest with fairies and dinosaur bones in the form of broken branches on trees. I was relieved because it turned out that the fairies were casting dancing spells on the Gruffalos, which meant I didn’t have to peddle away every time we saw one.
Also, the fairies froze the scary skeletons, so my son didn’t have to fear them as much. I was finally able to slow down a little. Eventually, the sun began to set, and it was time to make our way home.
On the way back, our creative efforts turned away from the adventure and toward the arts. We sang a bunch of songs. First, we started with a song about Scary Skeletons, but soon we sang songs about bones and dancing princess skeletons (they got back in there at the end). It became a fantastic bike ride that would compete with any afternoon at Disney’s Magical Kingdom.
As a parent, this experience came about by asking questions to engage the imagination. It’s incredibly simple, but we need to be ready to go with the responses, even if its means a workout on the bike.
