We have been packing in so many special moments these last few weeks! At the beginning of the week, instructors Raei and JJ both set intentions for leaving lots of space for friendship and being present to these final days together. Those intentions really guided our time together and allowed for a very special week together. For these young children, and in the greater context of living through a pandemic for the last two years, it feels more important than ever to support their social and emotional growth and the precious gift of friendship, especially after a time of so much separateness.
We opened the week with a beautiful song led by Raei. Children could add their own gratitude into the song, which became new verses. We sang our gratitude for the trees, the sun, the wind and fire.
On Tuesday, we started our final project of the season: a pendant necklace. What’s so sweet about this project is that nearly all materials will come from the land here and will be a little token of our time together. Students worked using hand tools to drill holes in their stream stones. This is no small feat for tiny hands! There is such a difference in the children’s stamina, strength, and ability to focus for longer periods of time compared to the beginning of the year. We worked on our project, listening to the birds (including a chestnut-sided warbler we identified) and the gentle rush of the stream. And of course, there was plenty of time for making crayfish castles and violet sand pies and splashing in the chilly waters.
Wednesday was yet another beautiful day! We continued our work on our pendants by sanding, buffing, and polishing the stones. They look beautiful! We had a special guest, Michelle, come to tell us a story at lunch: a tale from Ecuador about a magic lake with healing powers and a very generous and brave girl named Suma.
The rain didn’t put a damper on our last day, when instructor Dan Corral came to teach the students a song in our morning circle. Dan has been getting a family band together most Thursday mornings to play bucket drums, guitar, flutes and all kinds of instruments. He led us in a hilarious song with call and response and we ended with an awesome dance party!
Later on, we set out to harvest sumac to make beads for our necklaces. We spent time searching the land for this plant, identifying the leaves and spotting look-alikes. We learned that you can also make pink lemonade from their berries and this is an important plant in Persian cooking. Along the way a few, Woolly Bears tumbled into a forsythia vortex and were gobbled up by the flowering bushes! We all had a good laugh trudging through the brambles and watching the kids disappear into the head-high brush.
We hope families and caregivers can join us next week for our closing circle of the year when we celebrate and honor each child. We can’t wait to spend our final week together!
—JJ, Raei, and the Woolly Bears team
May 20, 2022