My children's formation.

I knew a girl in college at TAC who had a sense of the beautiful that was different from any anyone I had ever known before. It was subtle, but unmistakably there and I used to wonder what it was I was looking at.

Years later after I had some experience with Waldorf, and in turn later found out the girl in college had gone through Waldorf, I had my answer. Waldorf forms children to a sense of the beautiful like nowhere else.

I have never been able to afford Waldorf,(self employed architecture is long hours for poverty per hour wages), my oldest was in one of the schools for a while when she was young, but this year my 6 year old son, 9 year old daughter, and 12 year old daughter will be attending a charter Waldorf school.

All the parents of the children at the school are hip, just like those who attend every other Waldorf function I've ever also attended, so I have good hope it will be a good formative environment.

Until recently Waldorf leaned heavily on past Catholic cultural traditions to where Waldorf was more Catholic culturally than american Catholics are. And while Waldorf is starting to become multicultural, the Catholic vestiges should remain as most formative.

I like to think of our home as hands-off Waldorf where we form our children into a sense of the beautiful, so that just like the Faith its as natural to them as breathing the air.

The children for the last few years have been in Montessori where my oldest went to high school.

My oldest, a daily Mass going and very holy Colorado earth girl, is now a senior at Christendom College where she is likewise in formation. Christendom's motto is "Breath Catholic".

My oldest children were either homeschooled or in the local independent Catholic schools, with my oldest attending a charter Montessori high school.

My second oldest, who never really did go to school after 5th grade in so far as he never did anything at school other than show up and read some book from home he brought with him went through high school in ten weeks via one of the charter schools that does all school work online. When he turned 17 he decided he did need a high school diploma so he went to the school and did all the work sheets and tests as fast it was possible to do them and that was that.

My daughter is a philosophy major at Christendom. And my son has just enrolled at the local community college which is a very nice change for the better. Up until a few days ago he was adamant that college was a waste of time.

God gave him the ability to do almost anything he wants, for instance, when he was young he wanted to play the online computer game Rune Scape so he taught himself how to type at around 200 words a minute and worked himself up to 15th place in the world before quitting. And so it is with anything else he wants to do.

He started working at the local grocery store chain this summer and was last week promoted into management training, and now is at the local community college, and hopefully will progress in the next year or so to applying to Thomas Aquinas College where they could give him the foundation to see the world through scholastic eyes. So far so good, after all he just turned 18.

We always hope for what we think is best for our children, and do our best to provide it.

More to come - - - . . . . .