It seems like all the teachers arrived today expecting the same warm weather and were equally surprised to feel strong gusts of pretty chilly wind insisting that, no no no, it’s not quite spring yet, friends. So we made sure that, after marching over to Elky Elm, we had a short and sweet morning circle with just enough introduction to what the day had in store to get the imagination moving, and the rest spent actually moving and singing to keep the blood flowing, before making our quick way up to camp where the wind was a little less biting, and where we could get a fire going and have the space to run around with as much wildness as we could muster for warm bones.
Much of our morning was committed to this kind of warm and rambling free play, with a lot of focus around the three great boulders at the Northern edge of our camp, climbing, helping each other climb, sliding down, which fort is called what name??, swapping forts, are we pirates now?, how does this tiny tree survive on top of a rock? …
We eventually made our way over to our maple sap buckets to guess how much sap had been gathered up since last they were emptied, with several kiddos being right on it with their guesses. We thanked the trees for their generosity, closed up the buckets, took out the spiles for the trees to heal over, and finally undid the colorful ribbons we’d wrapped the trees in. Each child took with them the ribbon they’d contributed, and we aimed for an early lunch up at camp and out of the wind so we could make it down to the field by noon. We listened to a story about a Golden Egg at the beginning of the world, and how beautiful and entire things can come out of pieces and fragments.
We were grateful that so many of you were able to join us for the tail end of our day and get some time around the sap-boiling-evaporating station with us! We were happy to spend the time shooting boffing (foam tipped) arrow and learning the rudiments of safe archery practice, playing slack-’em (balancing 1-on-1 tug of war), feeding the evaporator fire, and chanting nonsensical peanut-gallery shenanigan noises around the pancake-making station to the delight of all involved! To finish out the day with a truly synchronized three-part rendition of “The Skunks Are Comin’ Out” with parents involved was really fun!
In Community,
Matthew, Julie, and Michael, March 24, 2023