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I recently read an article about a mother who is teaching her triplets to garden.  The article describes each child's garden, and it's well worth a read for those charming details.  (I chuckled at the gender differences between the gardens.)

At the end of the article, the mother also offers terrific tips about successfully gardening with kids. She even has the triplets keep a simple journal about their plantings.

Overall, her tips, in fact, appear transferrable to any passion a parent is excited to share with a child.

A friend recently explained to me how her mother got her and her siblings into sewing, and the methods were not unlike the suggestions in the gardening mom's tip list.

Basically, it started out by taking the sibs along to sewing stores and allowing them to have a say in the outcome of their outfits.  Gradually, the kids expressed an interest in making something themselves, so the mom gave them each a modest budget and let them select fabrics and simple patterns.

Things grew naturally from there, and now my friend can confidently call herself a sewer.

Though I'm still a novice knitter, I'm trying similar methods to encourage my daughters to knit.  They recently saw me knitting a scarf (the first knitting I've done since they were born three-and-a-half years ago ... maybe next I'll rediscover exercise? All in good time, all in good time) and they each requested a purple scarf.

The key seems to be letting children express what they want.  My favorite quote from the gardening article: "'Let them tell you what they want. Otherwise, it turns into a project that Mommy does.'"

I'll keep involving them and making sure they have a voice in the process, and maybe I'll have a couple of partners-in-crime to knit with one day.