Tender Tracks Tues. Week 7 Day 13

Oct. 23, 2018
Lake Lagunitas
Day before Full Moon

Luna absent for just this one more day. At days end the boys were all saying how much they missed her and, Ruby and I felt the same.  🙂

Everyone came with happy spirits. The clouds in the sky looked a great deal like rain might come and it became grayer and grayer through most of the day with a very cool chill in the air.  However, when we left the covering of the majestic Redwood trees, SUN was shinning all around with warmth that showered down upon us all.

So, during the entire day, we were, well, a wee bit cold!  We did, however, go to our sunny spot and set up camp there.  We shared with Holden all about our new jobs and he is now, for this next full week, the Weather Watcher. He gracefully checked the wind with our stick and looked at the clouds and the sky to determine what we should wear for the day. Then, story commenced.

It was a simple tale that showed the children what we were going to do; paint with our newly made soap root paint brushes with rock paint.

After circle they stretched their legs and played, as they are made to do, and then they all came to the picnic table where an introduction to these fine paints and colors took place. There they had a great deal of fun painting with Blue, Yellow, and Red and finding other colors, like in the story we heard last week when these colors played together.

Lunch came, more coolness came, explorations down by the creek and then, through some of their own findings, I took the lichen and some Redwood fluff I had and began to use my Ferro rod( a tool that works like flint and steel) to make sparks and fire. And, IT WORKED! a small fire was beginning and the children were encouraged to find small sticks and more lichen and such. They fanned out and did their best as Ruby and I worked to keep that little fire going.

Meantime, Holden and Eamon had their fun turning into brown mud babies and changing needed to happen due to the cold and lunchtime approaching.  I took them and Ruby stayed with the others to keep this little fire friend alive.
When we got back I had collected some more sustainable wood and WA LA! the fire was built up strong with these new supplies.  We all got our packs and ate lunch around the fire.  There we had much to navigate as the wind children were quite playful with blowing the smoke in a few directions.
Since Yellow Jackets have been an ongoing source of awareness I told them the story of How Yellow Jackets Got their Black strips.   And, then, they went off to PLAY!! exploring, discovering and, staying out of the mud and wetness.

We needed to make sure the fire was completely out so, since we did not have time to let it naturally go out, we got water, poured it on and listened to the sweet music of water and fire and it’s different notes.  The more the fire went out and the heaviness of the water and earth got together the more different sounds came forth.  Some people walked by and they wanted to join us in this adventure as well.  The children felt with their hands over the fire as it got cooler and cooler and discovered when a fire is truly out, as did our visitors.

Ruby and the children started to clean everything up as I, Holden, Eamon and Theo all got together with the sticks that they REALLY wanted to take home.  They have been learning about always giving something back when you take it and promising to give it back to the earth when they are finished using it.  I played a game with them to see how we could determine if these treasures would really go home with them. And, all was well. They took a bit of cornmeal and gave their gratitude to the Earth and then off to the bus we went.

Goodbye song, gratitudes and remembering of the day’s joys took place then, off we went.
We wondered if the whole week would be cold and gray. We will see.