Posted 312 days ago

Living Simply with Kids

By Ricci Kilmer

When we first got married my husband and I had a simple Saturday morning tradition. We’d rent a movie on Friday night, then sleep in as late as we could on Saturday. When we woke up we would stay in our PJs, make waffles, watch our movies and snuggle on the couch. Now we have kids.

Living the simple life for us has changed dramatically. When kids come along you begin to realize that they are watching everything you do and listening to everything you say. And it doesn’t take long until they get to the “why” stage and challenge everything you ever thought you believed. Kids are concrete. They notice the difference if you say one thing and do another, and they won’t let you get away with rationalization. They want it pure and simple, refined: “Do you believe that or not?”

When our children came along, this was the case for us. We realized even before they could talk that we had better start getting serious—not only in knowing what we believed but in practicing it as well.

My exploration of issues of simplicity started around the time of our daughter’s birth. We were living in Puerto Rico at that time and my cultural references had changed dramatically. My background was in what I’d like to call middle-middle class white society. I was now living in a country where the average income was a third of what was made in the United States (and contrary to what many think, it is not cheaper to live in Puerto Rico.) And yet I saw more a sense of community, hospitality, and family cohesiveness than I was used to in the larger society from which I came. My in-laws especially lived very simple lives and yet were joyful people. They were and are people of deep faith and people I greatly respect. Looking at them and others surrounding me made me realize the need for changes in my own way of looking at the world.

One of the things I realized early on was that I didn’t want my lifestyle and that of our family’s to be oppressive to anyone else. (When you really start looking at what things in your life might be considered oppressive, you realize that you will probably be dealing with these issues for the rest of your life and yet you will feel compelled to keep at it.) Another was that we didn’t need much to make us happy and conversely that it was OK to enjoy what we did have. And that whatever we had we needed to use until it was really and truly broken (my father-in-law made a hand-me-down clothes washer last more than twenty years!)

People dive into the world of simplicity for many reasons and mean many different things by it. So here’s a little of what it means for me, my husband, and our children:

• Simplicity is a means of identifying ourselves with our sisters and brothers around the world. (A story told to me by a college student returning from a short-term mission trip to Africa probably explains it best. In talking with the people where they were serving and building homes, the Americans were telling about what their own homes were like. When it came time to explain the purpose of the garage, the Africans were incredulous, “You have a house for your car? Many in our area have no houses at all!”)
• Simplicity is a way to live lightly on the earth.
• Simplicity is usually a slower-paced way of living day-to-day.
• Simplicity can usually allow you to live with less expense and therefore opens up many choices you might not otherwise have (such as living on a single income.)

• Simplicity allows you to have more to share with others, either of time or money.

Making choices to live simply as an adult may seem hard but at least people know you are consciously making these choices yourself. When you choose to make these choices on behalf of your children, it can be a whole other story:

• Do you have the $500 birthday party at the bouncy castle palace or do you have a home-made party with handmade gifts?
• Do you buy brand new clothing that is completely coordinated with all the popular characters on it or do you go to the second-hand shop and try and find clothing that is not only logo free but doesn’t make your five-year-old look sixteen?

• Do you go to Disneyland each year or do you go camping?

Don’t get me wrong—under certain circumstances there are things we still do that others may not consider simple that I feel no guilt over. The difference is that we have chosen these things and made thoughtful decisions; we haven’t let society tell us what to believe. I guess that’s the key in simple living: Intentionality, thoughtfulness, and living it out practically. Our kids see all of this. Even when we make mistakes, they can learn how to make really, really good mistakes!

The story our family tries to live is the one shared in the gospels. Community, hospitality, sharing of wealth, sharing of our lives, sharing of ourselves. We have no set blueprint of what it looks like. We believe it’s a process and as we travel along, we do it as a family.

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