Book Nook: Wonder Awaits!

 Have you ever noticed that children are always listening, seeing, touching, smelling, tasting… and thinking? Wonder Awaits! encourages children of all ages to use those senses and everyday activities to see the miracles of creation. Kids are encouraged to get close, get dirty, look carefully, look up, make art, make friends, be brave, be curious, be present, and be amazed — all activities we adults should do too, right?

Accompanying the words are dozens of photos portraying children from 2 to 6 years of age representing the practices encouraged by the text. Diversity is a key aspect of photo selection, reflecting a variety of races and abilities. The book also includes pages for families to list the wonderful things they have noticed, the places they find filled with wonder, and what wonder-filled faces look like. Finally, the book suggests religious practices and passages to enhance their wonder-detection skills.

You can learn more in this interview.

Why did you write this book?

The short answer — I wrote this book because of our son! He was 10 months old when we first went into lockdown for the COVID-19 pandemic, which meant our world seemed to shrink significantly. Yet, as I watched him explore this little world, it opened up, and he reminded me how to find wonder and recognize the holiness in our backyard. 

At the same time, I was having conversations with a dear friend about how to raise children who are compassionate, curious, and attuned to God’s Spirit. We often discussed how to provide a foundation for faith in the dumpster-fire context of the United States in 2020/2021, and we kept returning to the idea of wonder, of holy curiosity. 

The form of the book came when, for a period of many weeks, our son only wanted to read three books — a counting style book about collecting rocks and two books of pictures of babies. Wonder Awaits! takes a simple counting form, with ten ways to learn to seek wonder, beautifully depicted with real photographs of kids in their actual lives.

I am thrilled to be publishing with Chalice Press as they branch out into children’s books! I am exceedingly grateful that a portion of the proceeds from every sale will go to Week of Compassion for programs that support and empower children experiencing poverty, displacement, or disaster.

Why is it so important for kids to have books that show real examples of other kids?

For one, kids just really enjoy them! My kid, at least, loves to look at books with real photos and describe the different kids, and we were really limited in our options. Plus, I find books with real photos of people to be a great way to talk about and celebrate our diversity and differences. Young children are also in a process of learning how to recognize emotions, gauging the trustworthiness of people they don’t know, and developing a sense of self and relationships — books can be a way of widening the circle of people they see and identify with.

In Wonder Awaits! I wanted the photographs to show not just real kids, but kids in their real environments. I wanted to capture the real experiences of wonder that happen in our everyday spaces — our homes, our yards, our neighborhoods. The photographs are actual snapshots, taken by parents, grandparents, and friends, which lends an authenticity to the book that I hope connects with families.

Why is it helpful for books to have ways to families to make them their own, with places to record their own family practices and values?

Books are such a powerful way we, as adults, connect with the kids in our lives. Opportunities to personalize books and recall books at other times can reinforce that positive connection. Those moments of connection (and perhaps the kinds of mindfulness and creativity I hoped to inspire with the interactive pages at the end of Wonder Awaits!) build trust and relationship and are moments of meaning-making for our kids. My hope, too, is that those pages provide concrete ways for families to put into action the ideas of the book—to be curious and reflective about the world around us, to nurture a sense of appreciation and gratitude and wonder. For me, as a parent and pastor, it is a way of inviting our family into an awareness of the goodness of God and of the world God made (us included!). It is a way of offering a foundation for exploring questions of faith and spirituality that is not moralistic or dogmatic, but that is based in a sense that we are part of something beautiful and far bigger than ourselves.