Heaven on Earth
A Handbook for Parents of Young Children

Sharifa Oppenheimer

Softbound

$25.95

I really can't do any better than this review by Carla Hannaford, so I'll just pass it along to you and echo her assessment of Heaven on Earth as a "must read" book for anyone working with or caring for young children.

Sharifa Oppenhiemer has given the world a great gift in the pages of this book. The important child-development information is exquisitely combined with the best ‘How-to’s’ I have seen in any book for parents. Her book, is a ready guide that insures joyful, enthusiastic children who learn easily and contribute to their families and society for a lifetime. I have delighted in every page and feel this is absolutely a must read for parents, grandparents, teachers, and perhaps everyone who will ever touch the life of a child.

—Carla Hannaford, Ph.D., biologist and international educational consultant to 32 countries and author of Smart Moves: Why Learning Is Not All in Your Head and Awakening the Child Heart, Handbook for Global Parenting

The Wonder of Childhood
Stepping into Life

René Querido

Softbound

$5.95

This is such a dear little book. René Querido invites us along on two lovely excursions: the first, into the world of the child between ages 0 and 3; the second, into the world of Raphael's Sistine Madonna and then further, to explore what that painting means to a child's eye. Both these edited lectures paint warm and deep pictures that not only deepen our understanding, but evoke a warm caring for young children in our hearts. Wonderful for parents and teachers.

In a Nutshell
Dialogues with Parents at Acorn Hill, A Waldorf Kindergarten

Nancy Foster

Softbound

$18.00

What an absolutely wonderful book! Nancy Foster has not only given us great explanation of just about everything parents new to Waldorf education ever wonder about, but she has gone on to give some of the best parenting advice ever written down. In other words, she has poured over 30 years experience as a Waldorf kindergarten teacher into the most concise, readable and useful wee book every printed on the subject teaching and parenting young children. This is a genuinely must-have book for anyone working with or raising young children.

Table of Contents:

Our Classroom Environment

• Color in the Classroom
• Why Curtains?
• Teachers' Dress
• The Significance of Candles
• Naming the Teacher
• No Cars and Trucks?
• What about Puzzles?
• Musical Instruments in the Classroom

Work and Play at School

• The Rhythm of the Morning
• Saying "You may . . . "
• Ironing in the Classroom: Danger?
• Boys and Waldorf Education
• Playing Cats and Dogs
• Music in the Mood of the Fifth
• Can Energetic Boys Enjoy Handwork?
• Gun Play at School
• Field Trips?
• Fairy Tales for Young Children
• The Challenge of Circle Time
• Puppetry and "Told" Stories

Children at Home

• Colors for a Child's Bedroom
• Older and Younger Siblings
• Boredom
• Telephone
• Bedtime Ritual
• Feeding a Child
• Swords vs. Guns
• TV Away from Home
• Barbie
• Forbidden Words?
• Appropriate Gifts
• "What did you learn in school today?"
• Toys in the Neighborhood
• Helping Children in a Time of Trouble - A Few Thoughts
• Is the World a Good Place?

Crying and Restlessness in Babies
A Parent's Guide to Natural Sleeping

Ria Blom

Softbound

$16.00

Here's the book I wish I had when my children were babies. Every parent knows the sound of a baby who won't settle down to sleep. Crying and restlessness, especially in young babies, can be both distressing and tiring.

Ria Blom is an expert in swaddling—ways of wrapping babies securely and helping them relax naturally into sleep. Swaddling works by inducing a sense of safety and comfort for the baby—and it can work wonders for the parent as well.

This insightful book offers quick solutions for parents under stress, as well as plenty of background information on sleeping patterns and baby routines. Sweet Dreams!

Navigating the Terrain of Childhood
A Guidebook for Meaningful Parenting and Heartfelt Discipline

Jack Petrash

Softbound

$15.00

What an insightful and practical guide to the journey of parenting! Every parent can benefit from this artful blending of wisdom and experience, no matter what ages their children are.

- Rahima Baldwin Dancy
author, You Are Your Child's First Teacher

Jack Petrash has again succeeding in giving us a guidebook in clear language that is so true and practical it can't help but be helpful. With an eye for what both parents and children need, he has crafted this book as a map through charted territory -- some of landscape offering easy passage, other parts presenting challenges, even dangers. All of it must be travelled by parents as their children grow to adulthood -- with a bit of preparation, knowledge ahead of time as to the lay of the land, even the more precarious terrain can be crossed confidently.

This is a great book -- one that will make you smile as it gives you firm footing on the parenting highway.

Seven Times the Sun
Guiding Your Child through the Rhythms of the Day

Shea Darian

Softbound

$17.95

Seven Times the Sun is a simply the best parenting book I've seen.

Shea Darian's approach is radically different from any other I've found in print: where other's have offered considered, often good, advice, Shea sprinkles the magic of stories, songs, simple rituals whimsy and celebration into daily life, then seasons this mixture with quiet times and a few parenting tips for helping your child feel secure.

The result? As you bring her gifts, one after another into your life and especially into that of your children, you'll find your home becoming a happy place to live, a place where all of you -- children and adults -- come to know you are loved, a place you all look forward to being in when away and are at peace with when you are there.

Will this banish every storm cloud that overcasts your life? No, of course not. But in a home with song and simple ritual and stories, storms are only part of the landscape, seldom devastating.

This is an approach from the heart, for the heart. You'll find it's healing magic is just what you've always wanted.

Seven Times the Sun
the song collection

Shea Darian

Audio CD

$15.95

Here's a 'learning tool' that will make your heart sing as your voice sounds forth! Shea Darian is an accomplished musician with a voice that must cause the angels to bend nearer to earth whenever she sings. She created her companion CD as a way to share these simple songs with adults who may not have any musical training, but would like to learn these songs so they can sing for their children. As Shea says, "When young and old life our voices together as one, our ears and our hearts become more greatly attuned to one another. May these songs inspire moments of intimacy and joy!"

You may also be interested in "Celtic Quest" by Avalon a cappella, a CD collection of songs by Shea Darian as well as traditional songs and performed by the Mary Thienes Schunemann, Shea Darian, Amy Chevalier, and Suzette Nelson. It's one of my favorites.

Sanctuaries of Childhood
Nurturing a Child's Spiritual Life

Shea Darian

Softbound

$16.95

St. Paul enjoined his communities to "pray unceasingly". I have come to conclude that he didn't mean to train ourselves to repeat prayers 24/7 -- rather, I believe he meant to turn everything we do into a prayer, into a way to make manifest Love on the earth, into a way to connect ourselves to that which is Divine while remaining connected to that which is of the Earth, into a gift from Heaven to Earth and Earth to Heaven.

Shea Darian's Sanctuaries of Childhood shows us how to do just that - create a life for our children and ourselves that honors the spirit as it heals the soul and nourishes the body. More, she has done it deeply and truly, but has done it in a way that will unite parents rather than divide them, and can be practiced by families of all faiths, including mixed-faith families.

This is the best, most open, most beautiful and most healing approach to this crying need of our society which I have seen. May it find its way into every heart and home who seeks what it offers.

We live in a society that makes it ever more difficult for children to find access to these sanctuaries on a daily basis. More consistently, entrance to such sacred spaces is being barred by the obstacles of busy schedules, our overuse of television and electronic media, and a lack of understanding for a child's genuine spiritual needs. Parents and caregivers can help to unbolt the doors of these sanctuaries, and make it possible for children to experience divine comfort and inspiration

As we make room in our lives for children to share with us the sacred qualities of childhood, no doubt young and old will find that within the sanctuaries of childhood, we serve one another as rabbis, ministers, and spiritual teachers. So let us open wide the doors. Let us remember what it is to be a child . . .

- the author, from the book.

Waldorf Parenting Handbook
Useful Information on Child Development and Education from Anthroposophical Sources

Lois Cusick

Softbound

$19.95

This is a classic, deservedly beloved handbook for any parent wanting a helping hand in understanding how to bring the Waldorf approach into their homes and hearts. Originally published in 1979, the present 3rd edition (1992) brings Cusick's work up-to-date without sacrificing its heartwarming good advice or compromising her straightforward answers to important questions.

The Waldof Parenting Handbook is like having a wise grandmother to help you nourish your children as the travel through their school years -- it's really a pleasure to offer this book!

Contents:

• The Child is Born - Hereditary/Genetic Stream and the Self; Embryonic Sheaths and the Threefold Nature of the Child
• The First Three Years - Growing Down; Walking, Talking, Thinking; Play and Fantasy
• The Temperaments - Fourfold Bodily Nature; The Developmental Sequence of Juvenile Temperaments
• Fantasy and Fact in Early Childhood - Circle of the Senses; Mechanical Fantasy and Language; Nursery School
• How: Methods and the Three R's - Writing before Reading; Arithmetic; Main Lesson; The Spoken Word; Arts and Crafts
• The Magic Years: First to Third Grade - Fairy Tale Meaning and Language; Sequence of the Curriculum
• Grades Four to Seven - Animal Study; History; Plants; The Twelfth Year and the Fall into the Point; Acoustics; Color
• Puberty: Birth of the Self - Seventh and Eighth Grade Polarities; Adolescence; High School

Primal Health
Understanding the critical period between conception and the first birthday

Michel Odent

Softbound

$24.00

Odent, a leading pioneer for natural childbirth, indicates that the period between conception and a child’s first birthday is critical to lifelong health. In this prophetic book, first published in 1986, Odent argues that different parts of the “primal adaptive system” develop, regulate and adjust themselves during fetal life and the time around birth and infancy. Everything that happens during this period of dependence on the mother has an influence on this primal health.

The author suggests that the later well-being of adults, and their ability to withstand hypertension, cancer, alcoholism and failures of the immune system resulting in AIDS, allergies and viral diseases, can all be traced back to society’s ignorance of the vital importance of the primal period. This book is essential reading for all who care about the health of our children and the ongoing health of society as a whole.

Parenting for a Healthy Future

Dotty Coplen

Softbound

$17.95

Here is a commonsense approach to the challenging art of parenting; an offer of genuine support and guidance to encourage parents to believe in themselves and their children. Dotty Coplen helps parents gain a deeper understanding of children from both a practical and spiritual perspectives. Her invaluable insights help bypass the inevitable hurdles of parenting without compromising the enjoyment of the process.

Topics covered include:

• knowing the child
• finding the way
• relating
• allowing individuality
• learning boundaries
• from discipline to self-discipline
• learning values
• affirming and building self-confidence
• calm mealtimes
• happy bedtimes
• listening to your child
• growing social
• experiencing differences

Star Children
Understanding children who set us special tasks and challenges

Georg Kühlewind

Softbound

$25.00

While working on this book the following happened to me: As I checked in at the airport in Hamburg a young couple was in front of me, and the mother had a three-to-four-month old baby in her arms. All of a sudden the baby turned round, looked me straight in the eye, and I was deeply shaken; for that was not the look of a baby but of a very self-aware adult, a wise one, and he appeared to see right through me.

- Georg Kühlewind

Who are the star children? In recent years, much has been written about “gifted” children with special abilities, sometimes called “indigo children” or “crystal children.” It is said that these children are coming to earth to help humanity in its development. Based on extensive research, Georg Kühlewind confirms that this new generation has been incarnating among us for the past couple of decades. This event, he states, is one of the most important of our age.

Kühlewind gives us the necessary background to follow experientially what he has to say. He takes us consciously and scientifically into the realm from which we all enter the world as babies, “trailing clouds of glory.” We all possess the tools he describes for taking this path: our thoughts, our heart forces, and our willpower. By using these faculties with full attention—by focusing our attentiveness and eliminating everything else—we can enter the realm of the spirit where the prevailing laws are different from those on Earth. The author helps us by closing each chapter with themes for contemplation and meditation.

Star Children is a compelling addition to the literature on the theme of “special children,” offering a unique perspective based on spiritual science and research.

Home-Alone America
The Hidden Toll of Day Care, Behavioral Drugs, and Other Parent Substitutes

Mary Eberstadt

Hardbound

$25.95

Generally, I have tried to steer a wide berth around books like this. I still believe this is a more than reasonable response, usually -- after all, they can be very unsettling, often extremely depressing in that a chronicling of ills without a prescription toward health dredges up not much more than hopelessness, and usually they are written with more passion than skill.

None of that is true about Home-Alone America. Mary Eberstadt has given us an incredibly articulate, interesting and thorough chronical of the increasing trend toward leaving our children in the care of others while we go to work, even when the documented cost of doing so zeroes out any financial gain to the family. And, when those who do care for our children find them too unruly for easy "management," there's now a battery of prescription drugs we can use to get the kids to behave.

While both Eberstadt and I hasten to add and to underscore that in any given individual family, the children may thrive with Mom at work, Dad remarried and/or the children in day care. It is the cumulative effect of the modern adult exodus from the home that she draws our attention to -- and the hard data is sobering, challenging, and begs for all of us to consider and reconsider what is really best for America's children.

I believe this is one of the most important books to be written in years -- and urge everyone who is interested in education and children's health to read it and give it to friends and family to read. This is a landmark work with information none of us can afford to ignore.

Bringing the Best Out in Boys
Communication Strategies for Teachers

Lucinda Neall

Paperbound

$29.95

Although it is true that some of the material in this book is directed especially toward classroom teachers (the parts, for instance, about constructive ways to handle parent meetings), the better portion of the book contains gems that will be valuable to all teachers (whether at home or in the classroom) and parents.

Neall offers time-tested communication strategies that help get the best out of boys. The tips for tackling difficult behavior wil result in more cooperation and learning to the benefit of everyone.

The author works with teachers and schools to identify what helps boys learn. The result is this handbook, packed full of techniques, examples, and tips. Topics include:

• Affirming and channelling boys' energy, so you can get them on your side
• Improving boys' emotional literacy, so they gain in confidence and self-awareness
• Using boundaries and appropriate discipline to calm classes
• How to encourage boys so that they can be at their best
• Getting boys to cooperate without nagging and shouting
• Engaging boys with hmor and playfulness.

I feel strongly that this approach is something almost everyone involved with educating or rearing boys in this world of ours has been longing for - it is clear, practical, warm and, best of all, effective. Very highly recommended!

The Good Sleep Guide
for you and your baby

Angela Henderson

Softbound

$12.95

After my first child was born I was astonished at how little sleep I got because she slept so fitfully. At that time the available advice on the subject ranged from "just let the baby cry" (with the "guarantee" that babies could cry for at most 45 minutes - something my baby disproved absolutely when I tried this in desparation) to "just sleep with the child, then everything will be alright" (unless you have a child who would literally nurse non-stop all night long . . . and did I mention restless?).

Anyway, it was months and months before anything that resembled a real night's sleep came my way (or hers). Having reviewed this book and Sound Sleep (see below), I have to say that had I known these techniques, and had these balanced voices in my life, we would have been sleeping long before.

This book has been available throughout Europe for quite a while - in fact our grandson benefited from it a few years ago. It's a gem and covers everything from the techniques that sooth babies into a sound sleep to diet considerations to room temperature - and at each turn there is an assessment you can apply to discover if your baby is really having trouble sleeping or if you are (both) merely going through a normal period of intermittant sleep.

A wonderful, welcome contribution to the good health babies and the good rest of mothers!

Sound Sleep
Calming and helping your baby or child to sleep

Sarah Woodhouse

Softbound

$16.95

I just love this book - it is so wise and so warm! And, it addresses the different sleep concerns that a parent might encounter with different aged children. Truly a beautiful work from a warm soul.

This well-researched guide is for parents with babies, toddles or older children. There are useful insights, inspiring stories, handy checklists and a variety of easy to use methods for you to draw on as needed. Woodhouse offers practical tips for:

• soothing your new baby to sleep with touch, warmth and settling routines
• understanding crying and screaming - so you can cope and know what to do
• using timed settling for getting older babies into the habit of sleeping through the night
• tackling toddlers' and older children's sleep problems
• contacts, information and finding support

The author is commited to the reality that every baby and every parent is different - and that we all change from one time to the next. Her advice: choose what works for you - and get a good night's sleep!

Set Free Childhood

Martin Large

Softbound

$18.95

A Parents' survival guide for coping with computers and TV.

Children watch TV and use computers for five hourse daily, on average. But electronic media demands conflict with the needs of children. The result? REcord levels of learning difficulties, obesity, eating disorders, sleep problems, language delay, aggressive behavior, anxiety - and children on fast forward.

Set Free Childhood shows you how to counter screen culture and create a calmer, more enjoyale family life with:

• striking research on how the TV "tunes out" the brain and affects child growth
• why doctors and educators say 'the later the better' for electronic media use
• successful media coping strategies for families to prevent electronic addiction
• countering pester power by making childhood a commercial-free zone

Covering Home
Lessons on the Art of Fathering from the Game of Baseball

Jack Petrash

Softbound

$8.95

I am actually not a baseball fan (give me a good basketball game any time!), but I love this book. I'm also not a father - I'm a mother - but I still love this book. This is the first book on parenting that is such an engaging read that I felt like I had found a long-lost friend - one who spent the years of our separation the same way I did: raising children. Jack Petrash has managed to give the most realistic account I have thus far read of the process, the glory, and the gritty REALITY of parenting - and, he had me rolling in the aisles with laughter all the way through.

Whether you're a father or a mother, even if you don't like baseball, I suspect you'll love this book as much as I did. It is a great book for new parents or for old, tired parents. It uplifts, informs, entertains and energizes - what more could any parent want? Plus, you can learn one heck of a lot about baseball, too!

You give 100 percent in the first half of the game, and if that isn't enough in the second half you give what's left.

- Yogi Berra

Working with the Angels
The Young Child and the Spiritual World

The Gateways Series - Two

Compiled from articles published in the Newsletter of the Waldorf Early Childhood Association

Softbound

$21.00

Working with the Angels is clearly the result of intense, deep, sustained love: the love of each article's author for children and the world; the love of those responsible for publishing each article in its turn over the years; the love of the current editors in gathering all these remarkable insights and experiences together in one place; and, of course, the love of the angels for us.

This is a collection that is almost palpably alive with love and with love's possibilities. And with that, I'm going to let the contents speak for themselves:

Working with the Angels

• Working with the Angels, Archangels and Archai - Helmut von Kügelgen
• Conversation about Angels and Human Beings - Helmut von Kügelgen
• Finding a Connection to the World of the Angels - Helmut von Kügelgen
• The Meaning of Angels in Education and Self-Education - Michaela Glöckler, M.D.

The Destiny of the Child in Our Times

• Working with the Karma of the Young Child - Margaret Meyerkort
• Walking and the Incarnation of Destiny - Joan Almon
• Continuing the Work of the Hierarchies - Werner Glas
• Early Childhood and the Consciousness Soul - Joan Almon
• Threshold Experiences of Children and Adults - Helmut von Kügelgen
• Religion of the Young Child - Elizabeth Moore-Haas

The Gateway of Birth - the Sistine Madonna

• Raphael's Sistine Madonna - Is It Approriate in the Kindergarten? - René Querido
• The Sistine Madonna in the Waldorf Kindergarten - Joan Almon
• The Sistine Madonna - Symbol of the Eternal in Humanity - Rudolf Steiner

The Gateway of Death - Working with Death in the Kindergarten

• After-Death Care in the Home - Beth Knox
• Helping Children in a Time of Trouble - Nancy Foster
• Helping Our Children and Loved Ones at the Threshold of Death - Nancy Jewel Poer
• A Festival for a Threshold Crossing - Patricia Owens
• Birth into the spiritual World - Nancy Blanning
• A Story for Mia - Louise de Forest
• Grandma's Dream - Sheila Rubin
• For Anastasia and Her Dear Grandmother - Cynthia Aldinger

The Inner Path

• Self-Development as a Basis for the Relationship Between the Child and the Adult - Michaela Glöckler, M.D.
• Through the Eye of the Needle - Felicitas Vogt
• The Path of Inner Schooling - Jorgen Smit
• The Spiritual Foundations of Waldorf Education - Michaela Glöckler, M.D.

The Great Discipline Debate

Alan Whitehead

$22.95

An outrageously funny, extremely well-considered look at the very serious topic of disciplining and caring for children and teenagers. Includes: the role of humour, parenting, family breakup, 7 canons of teaching, corporal punishment, expulsion, exclusion, forced labour, punishment, record keeping, teacher conduct, college of teachers, uniforms, smoking, delinquency, new stories, violence, nature and art therapy.

Mothering with Soul
Raising Children as Special Work

Joan Salter

$16.95

This portrait of motherhood and its gifts is at one and the same time both an affirmation of value and a guidepost for those wishing to find their way out of society's conflicting viewpoints. The soul of the child, the heart of the family, the vocation of Mother are all portrayed through real life stories enhanced by Joan Salter's special quality of understanding. Topics covered are pregnancy, birthing, mothering, breast feeding, milks for weaning, daily rhythms, development of consciousness, work outside the family, childcare, love, grandmothers. A warm, heartfelt presentation.

Helping Children to Overcome Fear
The Healing Power of Play

Russell Evans

$19.95

Helping Children to Overcome Fear is one of those books that is itself a legacy, reaching out beyond the threshhold of death to those of us still working with others on this teeming planet of ours. Jean Evans was a hospital play leader whose life work was with sick children. Her husband, Russell, has gathered together her stories and pictures that illustrate and teach so beautifully how the healing power of play can help children suffering illness to give voice to their feelings and find security.

Actually, I feel strongly that almost all children can benefit from Jean's wisdom and creativity. In my experience, almost all the young children I meet - and many, many I have known in the past - come into the world afraid. Or perhaps I should say, they come into the world acutely aware that the adults who love them are anxious about . . . well, the children don't know just what the adults are anxious about [you and I do, though], but they feel it and live it. And this is where Jean Evan's shining legacy can do so very much good. As we learn how to heal children's fears through play, we can find ourselves healing; as we also heal from our fears, the world our children live in shines ever more brightly.

This is a powerful, graceful book. I hope it reaches millions of hearts. It is a reminder of what is true, what is everlasting - and it is a pathway toward learning to live within that glorious truth.

Raising a Family
Living on Planet Parenthood

Jeanne and Don Elium

$12.95

Sometimes I offer books out of my own enthusiasm; other times I select them because I know others are enthusiastic about them. Raising a Family is a book I chose because I knew so many other people liked it. After reading it, I have to say this is the best book I have encountered on the subject. It is warm without being sentimental, clear without being rigid, and filled to the brim with ideas and suggestions that offer some real hope to those of us piloting our way through the uncharted waters of family life. My recommendation? Go for it!

Raising a Son
Parents and the Making
of a Healthy Man

3rd Edition

Don and Jeanne Elium

$14.95

Having raised two boys, we think that the ideas presented in Raising a Son are so powerfully true that we only wish we had known of them when our sons were younger. The Eliums base their book on their observation (we agree) that boys need to know three things: Who's the boss? What are the rules? And, are you going to enforce them? What sons need is leadership that is both firm and kind. Raising a Son leaves theorizing behind and gets right down to what works. Excellent!

Raising a Daughter
Parents and the Awakening
of a Healthy Woman

Jeanne and Don Elium

$14.95

Anyone else ever notice that girls are different from boys? We thought so. Give a girl a clear sense of her own uniqueness and the worth of that uniqueness, and she is well on her way toward a healthy womanhood. However, in our modern world, this is no small challenge. The Eliums unravel many of the conflicting messages and relationships that beset girls and their families and pave a clear path for parents and their daughters. We are currently raising three teenage daughters. This is a good book!

You are Your Child's First Teacher

Revised and Updated

Rahima Baldwin

$16.95

This book beautifully covers just about everything I (Nancy) remember experiencing as the mother of three young children (who are now all teenagers). Unfortunately for me, I didn't have this book to help balance my perspective and offer one creative suggestion after another. If you feel somewhat alone and maybe a bit confused about how to sensitively raise your children, I really think Rahima's insights will help you find your own positive direction. It would be wonderful if we all arrived at parenthood knowing everything we need to know, but many of us do not-that's why this book is such a gem.

The Incarnating Child

Joan Salter

Sorry - Out of Print

We all stand in awe and wonder before the mysteries and miracles of conception, pregnancy, birth, and the growth of our children. Joan Salter examines this unfolding mystery all the way through to adolescence in a way that warms parents hearts while offering much practical advice. I know many parents who have said that they didn't know how they could have managed without Joan's help. This is one of those guides that can rightly be called "indispensable."

Brothers and Sisters
A Study in Child Psychology

Karl König, MD

$7.95

Brothers and Sisters is one of the first books that I read when learning about Waldorf Education and Anthroposophy. I can still remember how strikingly valid I found the ideas to be. Later, I discovered how very helpful Dr. König's insights into the importance of birth order and family constellation were to both my parenting and my self awareness. This is a study of the meaning of birth order that is unlike any other I've read, as it takes into account the spiritual destiny and the soul needs of the various children. I recommend placing Brothers and Sisters high on your list of books to read - you won't regret it!

Thirteen to Nineteen
Discovering the Light

Julian Sleigh

$10.95

Julian Sleigh does not see adolescence as a temporary struggle for freedom, but as a passage into life where freedom becomes a possibility even as the options of adulthood narrow one's choices. Preserving this awareness while helping guide the teenager through the rocky shoals and narrow channels leading to vigorous adult is the task of parents, teachers, and adult friends. Thirteen to Nineteen can help all of us become more effective and more at home in this work.

Loving the Stranger
Studies in Adolescence, Empathy and the Human Heart

Contributions by Dr. Lotte Sahlmann, Dr. Thomas J. Weihs, Anke Weihs, Birgit Hansen, Angelika Monteux, Michael Schmundt, Michael Luxford

compiled and edited by
Michael Luxford

Softbound

$19.95

We must come to understand that our love can also hurt another person. There is no assurance that because we have good will we can only bring about pleasure. This is a childish idea. To the extent to which we have learned to cope with this discrepancy in ourselves, thus far can we extend empathy to others and also help them to cope as well.

- Dr. Thomas J. Weihs

Weihs' thoughts on love remind us in a poignant way that if we are to help young people along their journey from childhood to adulthood, then we must offer them the empathy and understand we can develop from an honest assessment of ourselves.

Loving the Stranger is a collection of talks and essays by doctors and teachers who have been involved with Youth Guidance as part of the work of the Camphill Movement. They are warm, deep and wide-ranging in content and challenge us to examine new ideas and adopt new approaches in our relationships with young people, many of whom may find themselves in difficulties during their journey through adolescence.

Raising a Teenager
Parents and the Nurturing of a Responsible Teen

Jeanne Elium & Don Elium

$12.95

Jeanne and Don Elium, authors of Raising a Family, Raising a Son and Raising a Daughter have turned their expert eye to the challenges of parenting our teenagers in the midst of our modern world. They focus on two goals most parents have for their teens: graduating from high school and becoming decent human beings. They recognize that the tools for achieving these goals are active and continuous communication combined with unconditional, loving support. Then they offer those tools to us, the parents of teenagers, and help make clear the path for us to walk toward a successful adulthood with our teens. Highly recommended.

Homemaking as a Social Art
Creating a Home for Body, Soul and Spirit

Veronika van Duin

$24.00

I longed for a book like this when I was a young mother and wife. I felt so alone in my desire to create a home in which my entire family could thrive. I also felt rather lost and uncertain in the face of the enormous responsibility that entails - I often simply did not know how to go about things, what to do. Such a book, of course, didn't exist 20 years ago - fortunately for all, it does exist now.

Veronika van Duin was trained as a nurse and lived for many years in a community with people with special needs, her own family and, later, teenage boarders. She and her husband currently live with young children with special needs. Her own children are now grown. Needless to say, she has had ample experience in making a home for diverse personalities with extremely different needs. She shares her experience and insights in Homemaking as a Social Art.

Her perspective is that the task of homemaking is at the center of our social existence - a role that creates the heart of society and is nothing less than an art. She never claims that there is a blueprint for creating the perfect homemaker, but rather offers principles and observations based on a study of what she calls the seven "life processes" and how they affect us. She addresses the significance of rhythm, relationships, artistic environment, caring, self-development, and much more besides.

This is a welcome and supportive work - one which I believe will be embraced with gratitude by those who read it. Highly recommended.

The Spiritual Tasks of the Homemaker

Manfred Schmidt-Brabant

$12.95

Manfred Schmidt-Brabant helped organize the first-ever Conference for Homemakers at the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland. This book presents the three lectures he delivered at this gathering which drew thousands from all over the world (instead of the hundreds that were expected), eager to come together to consider a fundamental aspect of human life that has become everywhere neglected.

I am so grateful that he honored homemaking as the life-giving art that it is - especially when I consider that even now, at a time when I would have thought we'd all "know better," such honor is rarely bestowed upon those who truly rock the cradle of the world. I find his lectures fascinating in their connections of daily life with cosmic reality. I also deeply appreciate the practicality of his answers in the question session at the end and his emphasis on understanding as the foundation for creating today's homes.

This is a wonderful antidote to our modern, pedestrian view of homemaking ("Ward, I think there's something wrong with The Beaver.") - an invitation to crown our homes with grace and gratitude.

Lifeways
Working with Family Questions:
A Parents' Anthology

Gudrun Davy and Bons Voors

$26.00

Now that this original, great resources is back in print, we all have reason to celebrate! Lifeways is about children, about family life and about being a parent. Most of all, it is about freedom - and how the tension between personal fulfillment and family life may be resolved. Lifeways originated amongst groups of women - and some men - who were seeking a renewing spirit for family life. They sought to create a new vision of the tasks of mothers and fathers, a new eye for the meaning of home as a place which supports all those involved, children and adults, in their "life-ways."

More Lifeways
Finding support and inspiration in family life

Patti Smith and Signe Eklund Schaefer

$24.00

More Lifeways is parents talking to parents, sharing personal accounts of their life-journeys, their times of rejoicing and times of tears. I always find that first person stories, "How I got through it," can be deeply heartening and often encourage me to take my own next step. More Lifeways is filled with this sort of strength.