Good Messes

Is it strange that I love my daughter’s messes? She is 16 months old and leaves little or sometimes big messes wherever she goes. Recently she was eating a fudge pop. I had wrapped the popsicle in a wash cloth to keep it from melting as quickly. As she ate it, the chocolate slowly became more drippy and there were little brown drops on her shirt and on our porch. Whenever she saw a droplet she would crouch down and rub the droplet into the concrete, accidentally dribbling more fudgsicle around her. She also did this when she later dropped her Popsicle. I have little brown hand prints and smears all over our porch. And honestly, I love it. They are proof of life and love.

Another mess that I love is the water that gets all over the bathroom at bath time. Our daughter loves to splash and is exploring different ways to play in the bath. It is one of her favorite things ever, and I love the evidence of her fun. Messes are a normal part of life.

Even more than loving to see my daughter have fun, I love showing her that it is okay to make some messes. Not all messes of course. For instance, she likes to spit water out as a joke and that is a big no from me, because I don’t want her spitting everywhere. Some messes would technically be property damage and we are renting.

An Opportunity for Teaching Responsibility

My daughter is allowed to make messes and mistakes, and I want her to learn early to see the difference between messes and mistakes. Messes are often good; they are evidence that fun was had. No mess and no mistake is too big to be cleaned up by the right person. For the last few months she has been very interested in copying us, and I have been including her in as many of my activities as I can safely share with her. Her favorite game is helping me do laundry, and she will run after me when she sees me with a laundry basket because she wants to help. When it comes to her own messes, I show her how to clean up and then give her the chance to copy. Some messes are too big for her to clean up, and she needs for me to do it instead.

I have noticed that as I have involved her in cleaning up messes, two things have begun to happen. One, she has an increased willingness to follow instructions. She seems to have more trust that whatever I am asking her to do will be fun or meet her needs. Two, she is also becoming more capable in her reaches for independence as she develops new skills.

I know that becoming more independent (brushing her hair by herself, putting her shoes on alone, exploring new places without being directly by my side) is a part of the age my daughter is at, and that it will only increase. As I allow her to make appropriate messes and also to clean them up, I am helping her to build new skills and teaching her how to navigate her constantly enlarging world.