Kids' experiences

Our recent visit to Seattle to stay with family members there for nearly 4 weeks made many impressions on us. And one of the stand-out observations was the richness of experiences obtained by modern children in well-off households. I compared such observations with my own experiences of growing in post-war Britain at a time of slow recovery, rationing of goods and services, and long tradition.

Our grand-kids, Ella and Flynn were involved in a huge range of activities even though their combined ages only amount to 14 years! For example, both are involved in gymnastics as you can see from these pictures, with Flynn sitting on the ground and Ella performing movements.


Their carefully choreographed and supervised classes were attended by scores of kids on the evenings we there. And almost everyone seemed high spirited and enthusiastic.

 And Ella spent quite a while practicing here hand stands at home.  Flynn plays soccer once or twice a week despite only being 6 years old.
















And here he is wearing team colours. During our stay he acquired a smart new bike











And this machine got a good workout while we were visiting.



Flynn also goes to Jujitsu classes and here he is dressed in the right attire.








Then both kids attend swimming lessons, and while Ella is highly accomplished, Flynn is also doing quite well.

Again, the popular classes are well-organised and conducted by specialist advisors. For her part, Ella practised pitching, catching and striking baseballs

Both kids also have great imagination. For example, rather than eat breakfast from kitchen stools, they constructed themselves an "eating box" reserved for themselves!

And Ella acquired a hover-board - presumably for her birthday. And she spent quite a while coming to grips with riding the device unaided. One of their friends across the road ably demonstrated how it was done and I'm sure Ella ... and perhaps eventually Flynn will master the device. They're both so young and so accomplished.




















On another occasion, Ella and Flynn headed to an unusual class where kids competed against each other on various tasks like racing through an obstacle course which involved climbing and jumping.

And on yet another occasion they went to a play-centre where they play dodge-ball, bounce into pits of foam and so on. Again, they both had an excellent time.

So, you can see that they led a highly varied, challenging, exciting, and energy-packed existence occurring multiple times a week - far different to the way I was brought up. Good luck to them!

AS