Raising kids is tough. Raising confident, self-reliant and resourceful children in today’s world even harder. With my daughter I’ve taken an approach of “you can do it” rather than I’ll just do it for you.
In the long run I’d love for her to find her passions and to try on as many hats as she can on her journey to self-discovery. To give her a maximum amount of tools I first try to model for her. Using tools of all kinds, overcoming difficult tasks and learning new things. I’ve not put together a list of what I’d like for her to learn. What I have done is make a list of what I can impart, what we’ll learn together that I haven’t mastered myself and what I’d like to research so that I can add that to our skill set.
I was inspired to write this article after the overwhelming response I got when I posted this photo on Facebook.
I’m actually shocked at the length of the list. I’m also excited to continue to learn new stuff. Mostly I can’t wait to teach my daughter everything I know and to see what she wants to add to the list as she grows up.
The following is the I’m really good at this stuff and I know I can teach it:
Carpentry (hand and power tools)
Sewing (by hand and machine)
Sculpting (clay, plaster, resins…)
Beading
Horticulture
Distilling
Advanced first aid
Sylviculture (growing trees)
Photography (whole process)
Screenprinting
Natural dyes
Felting
Painting
Drawing
Cooking and baking
Herbalism
Foraging
Communication
Critical Thinking Skills
Language arts (in English, French and Spanish)
Animal husbandry
Healing
Tool maintenance
Framing
Swimming
Driving (stick shift: cars and trucks up to 1 ton)
Laundry (incl. ironing)
Boating (sailing and motorboat)
Meditation
Street smarts
Jewelry making
Survival skills (tropical, temperate and winter)
Graphic arts (traditional and digital)
Next comes what I either need a serious refresher or am not as confident to teach (hence the learn together):
Ceramics (namely firing without a kiln)
Woodworking (felling dead trees, stripping bark and splitting large logs)
Plumbing
Tiling
Embroidery
Electrical work
Masonry (stone and cement)
Metal work (incl. welding)
Knotwork (technical and decorative)
Geography
Astronomy
Biology
Chemistry
Navigation and cartography
History (as broad as possible)
Basic mechanics
Paper making
Finally this is a short list (because it’s already really long) of what I want to learn more about, of the top of my head:
Fermented foods
Self-sufficient dentistry
Archery
I’d love to know if you have anything I should add?
P.S.(thanks to my parents for encouraging me and teaching me much of what they know. My progressive upbringing started me on my journey to be the strong confident woman I am today!)
Esencia Adaptivore 
I would only add fearless dream chasing to your first list. This list idea is crazy good. I am going to have to look at putting a list of my own together. Extremely empowering. Reading your list, I can feel a critical spirit towards myself and what would my own lists look like, however, if I take and moment and breathe, give myself credit for what I really have done, I can create a proud-to-be-me list as well! Thanks for the great post
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You’re right! that is a great addition to the list. I hope to be modeling that type of behaviour. Please do be very proud of your accompishments. My list is long as I wandered for a good while. Dabbling here and there to find my passions. We are all different and get to share our experiences with each other. Thanks for taking the time to read my blog and commenting💜
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