Tender Tracks Thurs. Day 28

Jan. 5, 2017
Waxing Half Moon
Lake Lagunitas

Ruby and Eddie absent today. Skylar’s Mom visiting today.

This was a glorious, sunny, crisp winter day. No rain and clear skies.
When we got there the waterfall was rushing with a grand roar and all the lakes were full, full, full!  We set up circle up on the plateau where the sun shone most warmly upon us.  The children played for awhile and then we had circle.  Skylar and her mom brought some snack that we added to ours and the children enjoyed their offering very much!  Those who were not here on Tuesday got to hear the story that was told then and it led us into a lot of tracking: looking for Dragon tracks! Jesse drew for us in the dirt what they looked like too!!!

We cleaned up, played a bit more and then off we went up the steep steps and down the long flat and wide open land bar where lot’s of puddle were to puddle jump!   What fun they all had with that. We then had a pee party for all of them when we got to the end of the long walk way and then up another set of stone stairs, through Woodpecker Heaven and down the trail. We found lot’s of tracks to figure out yet, alas, we NEVER found any DRAGON tracks!!

We finally got to a place that was open and right where the lake and land meet and set up our little camp there for the rest of the day.  From here there was a great deal of games that took place for the rest of the day.
Kai and Isabella were throwing Kai’s hat back and forth in a game. Jesse stood in the middle and said “Monkey in the Middle!”  And that went over VERY well. There were quite a few variations on this game with the children going in and  out of it.  There was them running over to the bouncy tree and trying to figure out how to bounce on it without falling off.  There was building a fort, by Jesse, Archer and Jake. Michelle created a game where they made hand prints with “Sanbo”. This is what Jake calls the black charcoal from burnt wood.  They all got some of this Sanbo and got it thick on a stump. From there they covered their hands, got them wet from the lake, and then sang a special song with Michelle to make a print on the paper.  It all started out where we had to guess whose hand made the print. The children would put their hand up to the print to see if it was theirs or who’s it could be!  One by one they all wanted to do this and that is how the game got started.
There was a great deal of chasing games, Freeze tag where the Mt. Lions would try to catch the Deer/ Myself and Skylar’s Mom, and then we would get unfrozen by someone else who tagged us.

This was a full, full day of games, exploring, running, building and sharing enthusiasm for their “nature school” with a nice ranger that drove by.:)

The walk back to the bus found many “brooms” from the Doug Fir trees. Archer was the most dedicated Sweeper as he swept the entire trail all the way back!