Tender Tracks Friday: Day 25

March 29, 2019
Waning Crescent Moon
Lake Lagunitas

We had plenty of sunshine for our adventure at Lake Lagunitas! Blake was not with us today and his smile and silly hat were missed by his friends. The children were excited to explore the creek and some foam had collected against the logs in the water. There was a lot of foam poking with various sticks, which would then cause some of it to fly around and Margot had some stuck on her jacket which we all found quite hilarious.

Rohan, Siena and Charlie helped Ruby split some sticks with a knife so we could build a fire for our super special secret surprise snack! The children helped make a nest of soft, fluffy and dry materials for the fire fairies, and then gave Ruby sticks to build the house. We sang for the fire fairies to come and they were being very stubborn. Tender Trackers are persistent, patient, and great singers, so we kept coaxing the fire fairies with our song and soon we had a wonderful fire. Some of the fire fairies even danced in our cooking pan. Our super special secret surprise snack was QUESADILLAS! We got to choose a combination of cheese, avocado and beans and they were delicious!!  A big thank you to Ruby for her quesadilla-cooking skills!

Thoroughly fueled by melty cheese and toasty tortillas, we ventured to the sunny meadow by our climbing tree and took some time to test the branches. Violet, Charlie and Miles also found some sourgrass to nibble. Miles had his first taste of sour grass and he happily munched away on the sour stems. I thought it was very sour, and he thought it wasn’t too sour at all and the children enjoyed a few stalks, after thanking the sourgrass for the treat. If you are interested to try some sourgrass at home, you can munch the green stalk and save the flowers for a yellow dye. For a simple dye, collect the flowers and submerge in hot water (can also be done with cold water) add cotton or wool fabric to sit in the dye bath until color is to your liking, then rinse and dry. Here is a link to more information.

When we reached the top of the steps, Charlie  yelled, ”Puddles!” and proceeded to run through all of the puddles on the trail. We headed out around the lake and Rohan spotted some turtles right away! The sunshine has been bringing them out to bask on the logs. Violet, Siena, Miles and Charlie also found a very long banana slug in the middle of the trail. It scrunched up as we reached out to touch it. Margot munched on some sour grass as she climbed the stone steps. Rohan found a small tree that he immediately dubbed his “Baby Tree” and then proceeded to hug it. That Baby Tree got many hugs from many children. Siena was on the search for more signs of spring and found a purple flower called ‘houndstongue.’

Our adventure led us to the fallen tree with the large root ball for climbing and the branches reaching out into the water. Rohan spotted more turtles in the branches that lay in the water, so we proceeded to sneak out closer. I think I was being too big and noisy because the turtles plopped back into the water, Rohan suggested that next time I should be more sneaky and quiet. I agreed.

Later, Ruby was sneaking out onto the fallen tree, towards the water and heard a munching noise- she’s pretty sure she saw a muskrat! Soon, all of the Tender Trackers were sneaking out, and the turtles returned, too!

After lunch, we took to the trail and played our ‘fire in the forest’ game and ran along the trail as our secret animals for a few rounds. On our way back, all the children visited with the Baby Tree and gave it more hugs. Charlie and I looked for the banana slug from earlier and saw it hiding in a nearby plant.

Back on Juniper Rose, we had so much gratitude for Baby Tree, banana slugs, houndstongue, fire, quesadillas and friends!!