A New Creation Myth, Brought to you by Connor

A couple of weeks ago, I co-hosted a cookie decorating party for the children in my mom's group. I provided the house and the cookies, Amanda provided the doo-dads to go on top (and Laurie and Susan both brought frosting leftover from their daughters birthday parties earlier in the year to add to Amanda's quite extensive collection of doo-dads - apparently age 5 is the age of cookie decorating!).

I think I have discovered Connor's favorite thing about Christmas.

And Helen performed her own physics experiment, testing just how strong the cookie was.

In some ways, I love a party like this. Even though both Helen and Connor know I really do not like messes, I want them to know that sometimes, I'm totally OK with them. My mom was like that. Nobody would confuse her for someone who wanted to live in a messy house - and her house is rarely messy - but she was always letting my sister and I have friends over, and I'm sure we were anything but neat and tidy.

After the cookie decorating, Connor busted out his latest puppet show. It was a story about how the world came to be. He recruited his friends Eamon and Zoe to help out. I'm not sure they knew what was going on, but everyone seemed to have a fun time.

My friend Marya wins the award for being most engaged audience member. It's obvious she has a background in education. She really pays attention, she absorbs what's going on, she puts the action into context with what she sees happening.

At times, it's hard to stay the course with Waldorf education. I see Connor's friends reading and writing legibly, and clearly doing more academic things than he is. But when I see the joy in Connor's face and the creativity in what he's pursuing, my heart rests easy.

Elaine