Palo Alto Tender Tracks Day 12, Oct. 20, 2011

Huddart Park
Waxing Moon

Jennifer, Kashi’s Mom joined us with her love at hand, her camera, in order to capture some joys of Tender Tracks.   This day was very full, at least for me as there were two fires to get going right away and waters boiling for our two dye vats.  The children chose just to dye their caps with either Toyon or Redwood cones and not the Sage.  That was wonderful as making a third fire would have been a lot!   While I was rushing to get all the fire going, the children were all helping each in their own way.  We needed water for pots, fire wood brought out, and other varied items for our needs. Giulio was so beautiful to watch as he helped. He would take what was needed walk down the bus steps and put it right in front of the bus.  It all needed to be brought over to the fire pits so it was so sweet the way he fervently, intently and honestly thought that was just the right place to put everything.  After things were brought out everyone went straight to the places that they loved. Half went down the hill with Audrey and Laurie while Lucy,Bodi, Giulio and Alexi stayed with me and Jennifer.

They hung around helping out and milling about.  All the kids spent yet another day VERY involved with finding MANY!!!! Banana slugs.  After  a time all came up accept Jasper and Laurie. I found out later that Jasper just DID NOT want to come up.  They found some great shelters down there and he was loving, loving,loving it.  He had Laurie be many different kinds of people coming  in and out and they watched how the Sun’s warmth and rays kept changing it’s position so they had to keep moving around in order to stay with the warmth.

Earlier Audrey ran up very excited and shared a most beautiful story about Gracey and Jasper.  I will include it later as it was so wonderful I asked her to write it down straight away.  It will be posted here as soon as I get it.  But it seems that they have walked thru some of their struggles with much beauty and expansion.

Everyone was eating at different times but at one point we all came together in a circle like we did on Tuesday.  We then and there sang to and celebrated Audrey’s birthday.  She brought a wonderful fruit bowl and the children really loved it.   Bodi was clear however that he did not like the Kiwi’s in it and wanted them out.  He was guided by someone  to use his pincher fingers to just get those Kiwi pieces out of there, and he did!!!!  After all this some games came about. Audrey had some rousing chase and hiding games with the children and then while picking up Giulio in play, his foot hit Bodi.  The three of them were doing fine tending to this but then Bodi came over to me.  I put a cold pack on his cheek covered in cloth.  He stayed with that briefly and then all appeared to be well. However, Bodi was having a bit of a day of it because on the drive over he got very upset with Aleki.  Bodi was in his seat and kicking his own feet. Aleki joined in and Bodi was NOT happy that he was participating and made it very clear that he really didn’t like Aleki kicking his feet. It was only for HIM to do.  He was so sad that I stopped the bus and went back to see if some other kind of soothing could take place. It seemed to be of benefit. However, at the end of the day he came out of the bus stating what a bad day it was.  In  was seen having a very fine day throughout accept these two times.  I mention this in detail because I have been hearing from a lot of parents concerns about how your children seem to be more irritable, fussy, less easy going and other descriptions of a challenging sort.  I share about Bodi so you can see some similarities with your own children.  These guys are really working their feelings and sensations out.  Kashi was COMPLETELY involved with Bodi making a train, mmm what do you call it, like a bridge that goes up and down. Well, it was going down and not the way Jasper expected and Jasper got a bit knocked. Oh dear, he was REALLY angry about this and was kicking the ground somewhat  like an angry bull.  I was a bit concerned that this would turn towards Kashi but his self control was quite stupendous.  I stayed with him and aided him a bit with his anger. It seemed like there actually were a lot of tears underneath. They didn’t surface and He said he really actually wanted to hurt Kashi because he was so made but, HE DID NOT!!!  Wow, very brilliant.  As I said, there was some aiding with this, he settled a bit with some gentle talk, a reminder of some work he and his Mom have done around this stuff, some gentle talking in story form and then found some release by carrying a very heavy and large box of wood back to the bus.  By the time he got to the bus he was ready to play and had a big smile on his face and ease in his behavior.

All the while Lucy, Anjalie and Alexi were gathering plant items such as Fern and Bay leaves to put on their caps.  Then we all got the capes out, wet them again, placed the plant matter on the caps, rolled them up, tied them up and then children put them in the vat that they wanted for dye.  Kashi just wanted to put his in the Toyon vat without anything special on it.  Lucy did some extensive plant printing with Audrey and then dropped it in the Toyon vat as well and Bodi chose that one too without anything on his either.  It looked like this wasn’t dying very well so I asked them if they would be all right if I put some of the Sage soaked water and Walnut soaked water in it to add color.  They all said yes, so we did.  The rest put theirs in the Redwood cone vat that was already a deep red with a very purply pink dye that showed color straight away.

They had a half hour left and just played and played with vigourous delight while I cleaned up and the rest of the adults helped a bit but played as well with the children.

On the way back they got their loved books and had fun all the way home sharing what they found in the books.  I enjoyed watching and listening to Grace and Kashi play together as we drove to and from Huddart Park.

I am very happy to report that by the time I got home at 7:30 at night, the brown vat was getting beautifully brown and the purply/pink was looking beautiful as well!!!!

Here is the transcription from Audrey of Gracey and Jasper talking to one another: