If Mother Goose only knew...

she would be rolling over in her grave right now. Some time ago, before preschool got out for the summer, we had a section on Humpty Dumpty that I taught at my house. Some of you may remember. One of the enriching ideas from the book was to let each child take a turn dropping their own Humpty Dumpties off a chair and catching the yolks in a pan, which you can save, and actually EAT later as part of the snack for the day. Although I found it to be sort of twisted and weird to be doing this, especially the eating of Humpty Dumpty, we actually did it. We even colored little faces on the poor little guys before sending them to their awful fate. You can call me creepy, it's just that there weren't too many other good ideas in the book, and dropping the eggs while reciting the nursery rhyme WAS actually pretty fun. At least for me. However, I think this particular lesson made a lasting impression on my impressionable daughter. Perhaps I traumatized her. At any rate, we were making Banana Bread today, one of my personal favorite things. Princess is always a handy helper when we bake. She loves to help, and she loves putting all the ingredients in herself. She lacks no confidence when it comes to dumping flour, milk, sugar, etc., as evidenced by the comment I always wait for: "I'm really good at this!" which she says every time. The only ingredient I don't let her do is the eggs, and it's not because of salmonella, it's more because if she does do it herself, we end up with crunchy banana bread (and it's not the nuts). So, I crack the eggs, they slide out, fall into the bowl, and Princess happily says, "See ya, Humpty Dumpties!" No remorse whatsoever. I don't think she has talked about any other preschool lesson up to this point. I don't know whether to congratulate myself on having a memorable lesson, or rebuke myself for turning all eggs in Princess's mind to helpless little victims we send plunging to their deaths. And that it's even fun. I'm feeling a little guilt over this (and also inwardly laughing). This is my public apology to Mother Goose and all of you for warping your kids' perceptions of this nursery rhyme. Scrambled eggs will never be the same around here.