Reclaiming Advent With Nature

The word “Advent” means “coming” or “arrival.” It is used in the Christian tradition to refer to the four Sundays before Christmas, when people prepare for the birth of the Christ child. However, this seasonal observance has been kept by people around the world from all paths and beliefs; as autumn gives way to winter, we prepare for the return of the sun, the lengthening of days, and for the insights that we can gain from reflection on the year that has been and what we hope to manifest for the future.  -Sarah Logan- City of Lakes Waldorf School

When I was a child we celebrated advent in the traditional Catholic way. My mother brought out the nativity, which seconded as my favorite childhood dollhouse. Next to the nativity went the handmade wreath made from evergreen branches in our backyard. We nestled four candles into the wreath meant to represent the 4 weeks before Christ’s birth. I always found this alter space to be a magic place. It was placed in a darker corner of the living room and was often lit by the Christmas tree lights.

My mother would hide the baby Jesus who would not be placed into his manger until the night of Christmas Eve. Each night of advent we would light one candle per week until all the candles would be lit by the 4^th week. My mother would read us a prayer and that was that. It was a lovely, simple ritual that brought meaning and painted a vivid picture for me of the celebration of darkness turning into light. 

As an adult my views have changed some, I don’t follow the same Catholic path I was raised with and now celebrate the advent season in a different way. I claimed the Winter Solstice as my neutral religious holiday.  I have found the basis beyond most winter holidays, no matter the religion, is the celebration of sunlight coming back to our cold, dark wintery earth. Our family has created our own ritual around Solstice and has also adopted Christmas as our gift giving and family holiday as well as Hanukkah, which we celebrate with Jewish friends. With so much celebration you would think that would be enough, but I continued to experience nostalgia for the simple beauty of the ritual of Advent. 

As an educator with a particular interest in alternative education models, I came across Waldorf Schools (early childhood through high school) and was very intrigued. “Waldorf education, also known as Steiner education, is based on the educational philosophy of Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Anthroposophy. Its pedagogy strives to develop pupils' intellectual, artistic, and practical skills in an integrated and holistic manner. The cultivation of pupils' imagination and creativity is a central focus” (www. Wikipedia/waldorf.com).   

I have had many close friends graduate from Waldorf schools and have learned some about their experiences and philosophies. I got my biggest dose of information on this kind of schooling and movement by working in a Waldorf early childhood (Life Way’s) program. I did online courses while working there and immersed myself in the knowledge of mentors who had chosen the Waldorf path. In my studies I learned more about the rituals and celebrations of the school. I love the connection to nature , the four seasons and the focus on making our daily life work magical and important. I also love the Waldorf focus on seasonal celebrations and making each season important, beautiful and full of meaning.

One winter Solstice my family attended a winter celebration at the Waldorf schoolhouse where I worked. We walked through a spiral made of Evergreen branches ending with a burning candle in the middle of the spiral. On the path were objects of significance including bones, seashells, crystals, plants, animals made of clay and other beautiful objects. We were meant to walk the spiral quietly, one at a time with a candle. When we got to the middle of the spiral we were supposed to light our candle from the flame and then walk out of the spiral with our candles lit. It was a wondrous evening, full of warmth and meaning and left me with questions about all that I saw and did.  We went to the space without a guide so the whole thing felt mysterious and new. 

A year or so later, after leaving my position at the Waldorf school, I decided to research the way Solstice was celebrated in the Waldorf tradition. This led to my discovery of how advent was celebrated. “In Waldorf schools, for many years, children of all backgrounds have participated in the month-long observance of the rebirth of the light through songs, stories, craft activities, and the Winter Spiral festival. It is a way for children to experience quiet beauty in a season of busyness.”-Sarah Hogan. There was my childhood holiday steeped in Catholic tradition and belief laid out in a nature based fashion that included all the love of ritual my raised Catholic heart craved. Yes!

This is the prayer of advent in the Waldorf tradition:

 

“The first Light of Advent It is the Light of stones:
The Light that shines in seashells In crystals and our bones.
The second Light of Advent It is the Light of plants:
Plants that reach up to the sun And in the breezes dance.
The third Light of Advent, It is the light of beasts:
The Light of faith that we may see In greatest and in least.
The fourth Light of Advent It is the Light of humankind:
The Light of hope, of thoughts and deeds,
The Light of hand, heart and mind.” -Rudolph Steiner

“It is no accident that so many festivals are planned for these dark days. Celebrations of light, community, and sharing remind us to carry the gifts of summer with us into the quiet of winter. At the time of the longest night, we find joyful celebrations of returning light. The Jewish celebration of Hannukah, the remembrance of the rededication of the Temple and of the miracle of lamps whose oil should have lasted one day and lasted for eight, falls at this time of year. The Hindu festival of lights, Divali, has just passed. Many earth-based traditions honor the winter Solstice with special joy, lighting fires and candles and exchanging gifts.”

 -Sarah Logan- City of Lakes Waldorf School

We have been celebrating Advent this year the Waldorf way. I started in November making watercolor backgrounds and writing out the verses from the prayer above for each night of Advent. My daughter and I collected cedar boughs from a local park and decorated around our candelabra that always lives in the middle of our table.  We put out our good beeswax candle tapers. On the first week of advent I assembled shells from our past travels. I also displayed crystals and dried starfish for bones. Before dinner each night, we lit the candle and said the verse. During dinner we spend some time discussing our favorite mineral or plant or animal, dependent on what week we are on and then spend the rest of dinner chatting as we normally do. Our family altar has been focused on Saint Nicholas and Saint Lucia, two other holidays we like to celebrate*, but will also soon have our nativity scene. Baby Jesus will again be hidden until Christmas Day. Some rituals still live on. J It makes me happy to see my daughters play with the nativity characters with as much enthusiasm as I did.

I am still learning the whole significance of Advent and will have to read more as my new family tradition unfolds, but that is just what it is, an unfolding. I have relieved myself of the pressure of creating the perfect, most researched ritual that mimics exactly what I think a Waldorf celebration should look like. I am taking the things I do know and adding my own twist. I use my children’s input and love of story, ritual and celebration to infuse the way we do Advent and make it truly our own. 

I love to reclaim holidays and pass on the traditions to my dear children. How do you like to bring home the magic of celebrations in your life?  

 * Saint Lucia Day is a holiday celebrated most commonly in Sweden marking the beginning of the Christmas Season celebrated on December 13^th with a procession of girls with candle wreaths on their heads and boys with star crowns. My family celebrates by having a party where the children serve cookies and coffee and make wreaths and crowns, hear the legend of Saint Lucia and process around the backyard.

 * Saint Nicolas Day is the Czech Christmas on December 6^th. We celebrate by telling the story of Saint Nicolas, his life and good deeds and having something special in the children’s stockings as well as eating apples and fish, traditional Czech food. 

Designing Natural Outdoors Play Spaces

It is easy to imagine an idyllic kids back yard. I see a huge jungle gym, a trampoline and dreamy playhouse. All of these are awesome things to facilitate environments children will be excited to play outside in. The only problems with these kinds of play structures are they are just what they are. You can play imaginative games on them, but in the end they only provide one kind of play. Designing a space that is more imagination focused requires some strategizing. Investigating the way children play outside happily for hours takes some forethought and consideration for the way humans like to live outside.

You do not necessarily want to recreate an indoor environment outside, though using some of what you learn inside will help in the outdoors. It is about reconnecting with all the elements that make an outdoor play space great, such as having a spot to dig, having different terrain to traverse, and having a combination of wet and dry ingredients available. It is also about thinking like an animal. Finding warm, sheltered places, good spots to hide and good spots to stretch out. You can also plant herbs so that young people run across their fragrances as they play. You can set up whole gardens that attract wildlife and allow opportunities for families to study nature up close and examine butterflies for hours.

Designing a natural play space can look a bit like designing a cozy forest. You want gardens, sweet, village-like home setups, pathways that lead to adventure and take you in a circular fashion around the yard. There must be places to dig and get messy and places to clean up afterward. Below is a list of all the things I have figured out about making a natural play space in my backyard.  

Elements of a Natural Play Space

Loose, open ended materials lying around

A pile of leaves in the corner, trimmed branches from the hedges, a pile of river rocks, these are just three examples of materials that become open ended play opportunities. Bundles of sticks become forest shelter construction, tinder for a fire pit, even a mat for babies to sleep on, or fishing poles for sale. The possibilities for an old pile of branches are endless.

River rock is smooth and easy to fit in you hand. Buckets of river rock become trade objects in imaginary towns and river rock in the sand box makes for great hide and seek games when hidden under piles of sand. Rocks can also become decorative elements on mud/sand chocolate cakes.  

Leaf piles are great hiding spots, a chance to explore bug life and inhale the sweet scent of decaying leaves. A leaf throwing party and a chance to rake it all up and play again is the intentional and resilient work we want to see young people engaged in. Using their bodies, hearts and minds to play.

The Hammock: A hammock immediately brings cozy warmth to a space. It’s a chance to climb in, learn balance and how to steady one’s self. It also gives you the chance to get snuggly with others and have a quiet spot to observe trees and wind. The Hammock is a perfect respite for a long day and once you have one up you will find yourself longing for it and it. It may even become a part of your daily ritual of relaxing.

A deep sand pit: When we were researching what kind of sand pit to make or buy we realized in order to achieve the kind of sand play we wanted to see happen in the yard we definitely had to make our own. Ready made sand boxes do not get very deep. They don’t seem to hold children’s interest as long as big, deep, sand pits. We dug a large hole into the earth and then filled it with concrete. After that dried we lined the hole with bricks to give it some structure. We then filled it up with play sand, about 25 bags full. The sand pit is central to the backyard play, it seems every age of child that has come into our yard loves the sand pit. I have seen complicated sand castles constructed. Whole cities and towns have been built with moats and dinosaur rulers. I have seen vet clinics established and full on scavenger hunts for things buried in the sand. The extra fun play in the sand box happens when I keep the hose near by. The combo of sand and water is irresistible to most children. My Oklahoma backyard becomes a sandy coastal beach as children fill it over and over with a few inches of water. Getting your toes in wet sand is creating another peaceful experience outdoors. Many deep holes have been dug in that sand box, with intentions to reach China, though no one has made it to the bottom so far.   

Pathways

Pathways establish a garden and natural play space. They lead you to the different play areas and lead you away from the more delicate plants that should not be trampled. The key is not to get to controlling with the paths, you want your pathways to be open and able to change. The best paths I have found follow the way people naturally move through a yard. Observing the way adults and children like to be in your yard will help you figure out the best way to route them. Paths can be as simple as grass mowed in curvy directions around garden beds in your yard or as complex as mulch paths lined with stones. Paths are especially helpful in a forested yard where its hard to tell which living things you should not tread on.

Varying Terrain to Transverse, a little hill or slope

Different aspects of terrain in your yard can create all kinds of exploring options.  I have observed that a little hill or rise in the ground can create lots of adventure games, two hills can create a moat to cross when a board or branch is laid across them. Play can involve rolling down the side of a hill, hiding around the corner or just lying on the side of the hill and observing the sky. I have seen many games of king or queen of the mountain and many processions go over the small hill in our yard. If you do not naturally have a hill in your yard you can easily create one by digging a hole and piling the dirt high. You can seed grass on the hill or just let it lay there. We used the extra dirt from digging the sand box for a hill in our yard.

Vegetation, fragrant plants, habitat gardens, butterfly gardens

Imagine a pack of children running around a yard, hiding behind bushes, and rubbing against lavender plants just to smell that delicious scent on their clothing. They stop for a break and grab a handful of ripe black berries growing along the fence and stop to examine a spider web in-between the grape leaves. Gardens are a huge part of creating a harmonious outdoor space. Starting with native shrubs and flowers can start you on the right path. These will provide habitat for your explorers as well as local wildlife. You will also create beauty and sensuous experience for all the people that enter your yard. Planting native vegetation can require little water and can easily be kept pesticide free because the plants already are acclimated to the place you live.  Once you get hooked on gardening the possibilities are endless, creating butterfly and hummingbird gardens, zen rock gardens, and of course vegetable patches and fruit orchards. Let your imagination run free and let your children help. They often have great ideas and will learn so much from putting life into the earth.

Fairy circles

In our home we have two fairy circles. Our fairy circles are a circular shaped garden bed with a stone in the middle of it for sitting. We also have a circle of stumps we use for fairy tea parties. In the circular garden bed we plant spring and summer flowers, we cut out this part of our yard and lined it with stones, one large flat stone sits in the middle. In the summer sunflowers can surround you. In the spring, poppies of every shade sprout before you.

We also have a set of old stumps we gathered from a friend’s yard. These stumps quickly transform into a fairy tea party. They are a great space for children to have imaginary and real meals and delight in a natural outdoor table area.

Elements of home in the outdoor spaces

My Virgo daughter Sweetpea loves the cozy feeling of home. Taking the comfortable elements of home and putting them outside has made all the difference for her nature connection. When I incorporated the different design elements I describe below it made our backyard a more inviting place for my homebody daughter to play.

Mud Kitchen

This is a fun way of saying an outdoor play kitchen. Old pots and pans, a few make shift burners made from the tops of canning jars screwed into a wooden bench and you have yourselves a perfect beginning to a play kitchen. The most important thing is to not put fancy things in the mud kitchen. Make sure everything is sturdy made from wood, metal or hard plastic and is ok to get dirty. This is not the time to take out the porcelain tea set. Many stews and chocolate cakes topped with dandelion flowers have come out of our mud kitchen.

Pergola and picnic table for outdoor eating

A pergola is a wooden or metal frame that is used to grow vining plants and make a living roof over a part of your garden. Ours grows thick with Wisteria and adds the perfect structure and shade to make outdoor living a year round activity. We have a large enough pergola to house several tables but the one that gets used the most is the wooden picnic bench. Having a big table for everyone to sit or craft brings us outside more. In good weather we eat outside at least once a week. I teach classes at the tables and have used it for cooking projects, painting and many more activities. Having a designated cozy space to work really brings the indoor feeling outside. 

Fort or Tree House

A fort or tree house is a great way to make a home in the outdoors. It is not necessary to making a cozy feeling outside but it is so fun to make, you might find yourself doing it just for the happiness it brings you. My dream when I was young was to have a full playhouse in my back yard. We had a platform my parents constructed. The platform became my home away from home. My friends and I would make house up in the tree. We would construct roofs from old pokeberry branches in summer and fir branches in the winter. The key with constructing a fort is to make it as open ended as possible to not limit the scope of the play. A full on playhouse, while spectacular has trouble becoming an army bunker, or campsite. A raised platform in a tree can really become anything.

The tree house we have now is a raised platform big enough to hold fifteen people at a time. One side sits up against a huge pin oak tree the other three sides are held up with huge posts that have been placed in concrete in the ground. There are two entrances via ladders. I see many rope and pulley systems go up to haul buckets of leaves and materials. Pop up shops selling acorns, herbs and berries and whole bedrooms have been constructed on the platform. Sometimes sweet pea just drags a blanket and pile of books up there for some reading time with her back against the trunk of the big pin oak tree.

Ability to control the temperature

Chiminea’s are little outdoor ovens used to warm up your patio on a cool day or make enough smoke to scare away mosquitoes in the summer. They are easy to start fires in, mostly safe and beautiful to look at. You can buy them at most garden or outdoors stores. We purchased ours from a Mexican pottery import place. 

Big Trees

Not everyone is lucky enough to have big trees around them or in their yard, but if you do take advantage of it. Big trees do a lot to cool the temperature in the summer; they provide the necessary shade to be happy for a long time outside. During my July outdoor summer camp the children were able to survive the heat by staying in the shade of the giant oak trees in my yard. I give thanks for them daily. If you do not have any large trees in your yard consider getting a table set with an umbrella and or making a pergola.

These are just some of the ways I have figured out how to make a dynamic space to be happy outdoors year round. If you are interested in more tips on designing beautiful outdoor nature play spaces stay tuned, check out the Under The Canopy blog for more info in the near future. I would also love to hear what you have figured out on how to make your yard into a natural play space.

The Self Entertained Kids

 

There is a new phenomenon in modern parenting. The concept that waiting around doing nothing is irrelevant and being self-entertained can only be achieved if one is playing on a screen. Sometimes I think I just hopped on the technology band wagon later than others. But when I look around a restaurant and almost every child is on a screen of some sort, even the babies, I see it as a transformation of the way our culture spends time.

I am not against technology. I use it frequently for entertainment, to promote my business, to stay in touch with long distance friends, and even to make art. The thing I have issue with is when and where to put the technology down. Most people think of their smart phones as an extension of their body. No longer do people ask each other for the time, when a bus is coming or, what the weather is doing. Why would you when you have your own personal computer with all your questions answerable at your fingertips?  It makes for a quiet in public space that can feel isolating, insular and non-adaptable. 

I recently went on a camping trip with a few other families. These families have prioritized low amounts of screen time for their kids. They believe in having experiences and being outside, and that one can be self-entertained without screens. The children we camped with ranged in age from 20 months (my little pickle) to 15 years old. There were 10 of them total. These kids were some of the coolest I have hung out with in awhile. Its not like they were spending all their time hanging with us adults; they immediately formed their own pack and had adventures galore. The entertainment was a little rowboat on a shallow creek, a beach of rocks, sticks, pools of water in-between boulders and the fun of a tent full of sleeping bags and camp paraphernalia

We made a fire and roasted different foods on it, we told stories at night and watched the stars. It was dreamy. When they weren’t all playing together in a pack I saw the older kids reading on a camp chair and fishing. One afternoon Little Pickle took a stick and poked it in holes where some bugs were nesting. She was at this for a full half hour while I got some writing done near by. At one point they set up a balance beam with two ropes strung between two trees, and all afternoon the kids took turns walking across. Two pieces of rope was all they needed to have a blast.

Witnessing children of a wide range of ages being self entertained with almost nothing was a revelation for me. I often see very young children able to be happy with just about anything, though it seems that at some point as they get older the technology becomes more enticing and their ability to be satisfied with simple tools stops working. We have all seen the kids who become a complete mess without their Ipad or a movie playing at all times. I have also witnessed the adult who completely freaks out when they can’t find their phone or the battery dies. I have regularly seen adults on Facebook during church services.

After our sweet weekend in the woods we went home and decided to treat ourselves to lunch at one of our favorite Mexican restaurants. We don’t eat out a lot so we were all excited. Our table was chatty, usually Sweetpea has some great question we all get to ponder. Little Pickle was hungry, so she was able to sit still for a longer period and enjoy her food. We were all glowing from our long weekend outside. I peered at the booth behind ours, a family of four with two young children was sitting there, and all of them had screens. The baby had an Ipad propped up and was watching a show while he ate, the 3 year old also had an Ipad he looked like he was playing a game on, both parents had out their phones. The table was mostly silent as they all sat together having lunch out completely immersed in their screens.

I know I do not have the whole story, I have no idea what these kids are like and I certainly know how hard it is to be a parent and need a break. But this seems extreme to me. What kind of example are we setting when no one talks to each other and even the very young and impressionable are connecting with virtual reality instead of the people around them? I mostly felt sad for what they were missing. The chance to have family discussion, get to know each other more, engage with the people you chose to create your life with. At another table a 6 month old was being entertained on a phone while the parents ate. Is this the new normal? Remember when there used to be no cell phone signs at restaurants?  

I am calling for a reversal of the current trend. I want to see bored kids, kids that are bored enough to get creative and create really cool stuff from their boredom. I want to see more reading with actually books. I want to see adults and children engaged with the outside world not tinkering away on smart phones obsessing over the latest horrific news story. I want to see more random conversations with people around you, awkward dialogues about the weather, what is happening in your neighborhoods and how to make things better where you are, right here, in the present.

How do you get your child to be self-entertained you may ask? Well, it’s a belief to start out with, a belief that your child will figure it out. That it doesn’t have to be a screen to entertain you and them, that there is a vast imagination waiting to be tapped and a wealth of engagement in the everyday. It is also about setting an example. Choosing to not always turn to your phone for info, kinship and boredom. This is a hard one for me too. I am still learning.

On road trips Sweetpea does what she has always done since we started taking her on epic road trips, she stares out the window. She has an assortment of small toys, some snacks, and a sketchbook. Our big splurge is a sticker book; this keeps her entertained for literally hours. At restaurants we talk to her, and if we want adult dialogue we pass her an activity book and she doodles on it. It can really be that simple. If she wants screen time at home she typically has to do a set of chores and wait till her sister is napping. The only exception is when she is sick then she gets to watch a bunch of television. I really encourage all parents to get away from the screens, you and your children don’t need them, you will be happier with less screen time. Lets get back to the rhythm of a less virtual age. 

Rhythm and Intention

As a parent it is second nature for me to take care of people. Figuring out how to balance my needs and my children’s/families needs is my life’s work. Finding time for each important thing and being fully present is my ultimate goal. The difficult thing about finding balance while parenting is that parenting is innately imbalanced. Just as you think your getting over the curve of yet another phase, a new one side swipes you and you have to figure out how to live in temporary insanity. Parenting keeps me on my toes, ready for the next wave of change, the next desire to absorb, learn and grow from.

In my current job as a preschool teacher I see the ebb and flow of life all day long. The rhythm of our day is essential. We are always thinking well about everyone's bodies, needs, sensory experiences including our own as caregivers. The whole program is set up so that we are properly nourished, infused with warmth and nurturing and taken through the progression of a day slowly. We thoughtfully transition from one thing to the next. In a capitalist society that is always saying go, go, go, it feels like entering into another world to focus on the essential tasks of simple daily living. It is kind of blowing my mind. 

I started working at Roots of Wonder, a Waldorf inspired, mostly outdoors pre-school last fall. At first it was just weekly observation, being in the classroom and getting to know the children. In the new year I am now a daily caregiver taking on a co-worker’s maternity leave. At Roots the theory is we can create a rhythm that flows seamlessly through our time, one that includes what they call “in breath” and “out breath.” Everyone is held by the rhythm and feels nurtured so there is little interference. We get to play as adults, children are given time indoors and outdoors, they are nurtured with wholesome homemade food they help make with the knowledge adults are close by but not interfering with their work or confrontations. Mostly we let the children settle their disagreements and stay close by in case they ask for help. One of my roles is to hold space for the little ones by doing my handwork. I sit in a rocker and mend holes in socks that have sat for months collecting dust waiting to be mended at home. Now my work provides time for me to take care of the clothing that needs mending. It also provides a chance for children to see me fully engaged in in a task, a task worthy of them mimicking. I get to use my creative mind and learn to knit. I get to make beautiful hand made things letting the aura of inspiration shine on the little souls around me.

We teach in a forest sanctuary, a man made forest in the back yard of some dreamers who decided to create a bird and butterfly habitat fifty years ago in midtown Tulsa. The trees are tall, birdbaths abound, and one of my jobs is tending to the birds with the young people. We check the baths each day, taking out leaves and breaking up chunks of ice. We refill the bird feeders with seed. We offer thanks to our feathered friends. We learn about what birds and squirrels use our feeders and teach in a sideways style. Learning by doing, learning through play outside.

Incorporating life experience into my day while working with young people feels natural, like being at home. Sweeping of the floor is just as important a life skill as tying a shoelace. Knowing the cardinals behavior is just as important as learning the alphabet. Teaching in this environment gives me a chance to have some balance, sharing a long conversation over rice cakes and almond butter with my co-workers and the young people, singing them through each transition and using theatrics to learn life skills at story time. 

We create a seasonal program where we learn the importance of dressing warmly in winter and the magic of the tale of Jack Frost’s bite. We learn about how robins stay warm in winter and how to chop wood for a fire to keep warm. I love pretending to be father winter through the play of a story circle I get to imagine myself as a strong, burly, man of winter with my axe. I channel dwarf energy as I haul huge crumbly logs to create a retention border for our mammoth sand box. I tell the children I chipped way my home from rocks called Basalt. Embodying these characters brings me as much delight as it does them.   

I also get to bring Little Pickle with me! This is the icing on the cake. So many of my jobs lead me to these fun experiences that I wish my family could benefit from. At Roots of Wonder Little Pickle is by my side, getting a chance to be in nature for a good part of her day. She is watching her mom relaxed, supporting other children and her too. Its not always perfectly easy having her there but it also feels right that we get to be in this experience together.
I am still figuring out balance in my life. It is nice working at a place where the whole circle of life is well thought of, that we get to be parents and caregivers and weave magic in our time together.

    

Adult Unschooling

Definition of Unschooling: An educational method and philosophy that advocates learner-chosen activities as a primary means for learning.

By Diala Brisly

One cold, January morning earlier this year, I told my partner, “let’s take this year to get our finances in order, no big trips, just focus on work that will pay off our debt and get us in a better place to do more of the things we want.” It sounded good to both of us. I was a little sad to put off seeing family and friends we love far away, but felt I was making the proper kind of adult decision a family with small children should make. Then life happened. My job became something I didn't want to do anymore. I got so inspired by the book I was listening to, "Last Child in the Woods," that I decided I couldn't wait any longer to follow my life path of teaching the skills of sustainability and living in connection with the earth.

I struck out, I quit my job and went rogue. I started my own business: Under The Canopy.  I am in month four of being a small business owner and it is going well. Currently, Under The Canopy consists of two after school programs and a series of workshops. I hold all my classes outside teaching about nature and how to connect to a deeper sense of place. It is a lot of work, but my passions in the driver’s seat and my family is supporting me. 

I can see how a life of unschooling has led me to this point. As a teenager I dropped out of mainstream education. I was thirteen and my mom and I decided I could take a "break" for 8th grade. I was unhappy at school. I always struggled with the way school was taught and I also was having trouble with the social dynamics of the middle school we chose. I went from a sweet public elementary down the street from my house, to a stiff upper-lipped prep school in another town where I knew no one. In elementary I was co-editor of the school newspaper; I was known as the writer and had a close group of girlfriends. In middle school I was an outcast, from the tough streets of my hometown, a much more urban environment then those posh suburbs.  I started getting low grades even in English, my favorite subject. There was less and less creative writing and more essays focused on correct grammar rather than the flowery, poetic, language my romantic heart loved to use.

We viewed taking a break as a chance for me to homeschool for a year before I entered high school. After leaving the prep school I was down trodden and spent a lot of my time watching TV.  I wanted to check out from the world. As I started to shed the layers of self-consciousness and slowly rebuild my self-esteem I saw the whole beautiful world that lay before me for the taking. I met a bunch of "unschooled" teenagers, youth that had never gone to traditional school, forging their own paths, working in the world and following their interests not based off of what they should be learning. I found a community in these “unschoolers”.  I decided on a plan, and I was not going back to school.

Fast-forward many years later to my adulthood. I worked many jobs as a young adult, lots of nanny gigs and clerk jobs in small shops. I knew I could pull off the unschooling as a teen because I had my parents backing me. As a young adult I wondered how unschooling would look now that I was grown up. I got a sense of what adulthood would look like and figured out a myriad of ways to side step all the boring BS I saw other young adults going through. I got a high paying, low hours, very precarious, job as a nanny. Being a nanny you never knew when the family would change their mind and not need you anymore. I made good money but rarely had the job security other more regular jobs come with. I worked as a nanny till I had enough money to travel for a few months. I would go off on an adventure, come back and repeat the process. I became interested in going to art school in my early 20's and did what I had always done when I had a new goal. I broke down the steps it would take to get me there. I got my GED and applied to college. I got in to my first choice school that did not use traditional grades and had an interdisciplinary liberal arts focus. I was also eligible for in-state tuition and being twenty four, not reliant on anyone else’s income, I was eligible for more money to make it all do-able financially. 

While in school I met my life partner. We decided to be committed to each other and then we got the surprise of our lives, our first child. I was uncertain how to pull off this parenting/unschooling life. One obvious choice would be to leave the financial part of our lives to my partner and be a stay at home mom (SAHM). SAHM's got all the freedom to do what they pleased with kids, play while others worked and it seemed like a good package. I started off SAHMing but two big things hit me with a thud. First, SAHM only truly works if your partner makes enough money that you are not constantly worried about making ends meet. Second, being an unschooler for most of my life I had so much creative ambition, so much zest for life. I wanted to make a bigger dent in the world then just parenting my children. I wanted to carry them along with my vision and parent them while affecting change on a grander scale. I had also been a nanny for many years, caring for young people was grand but I wanted more, I also wanted to work with adults and not always be in the care giver role.

I started looking for work with strict criteria. Being a recent college grad, in Austin, a new city, with a young child, and without the exorbitant amounts of money it costs to put a child in day care, it was slim pickings. I was thinking,  “this job better be worth leaving my kid, it better make enough money to pay for her childcare, and it better be fun and engaging”. It took me two years to find a job of this nature. Still, precarity followed. I got a job working at an after school program teaching art and social justice. It was perfect for me creatively. I got paid enough, I got to make art, write fun curriculum, work with interesting artists and activists, and be a leader. It was all the things I could want in a job. It was also part time work that changed seasonally. I was moved to different schools and had long stretches during school breaks where I made no money at all. Finding childcare for just the afternoons to make it all financially do-able was super challenging. Still the pros out weighed the cons and I stuck with it, picking up holiday shop work when I was off for too long. I found a flexible in-home day care Sweetpea loved that would have her just in the afternoons. It felt like I sort of had it made. I had a really fun job and I got to be with my family a lot. The uncertainty was hard going though, never knowing when the next job would be and where. We also started desiring other things, like a home we could set roots in, a weekly connection with family. We were ready to settle and Austin didn't feel like the place to do it.

We moved to Tulsa two and a half years ago. Upon arriving I got a job doing visitor services and programming at a public garden. The garden was dreamy work, flexible with my child care schedule, not too many hours, and the biggest plus: stability. My hours were set. This was a great thing until it became not a great thing. After 2 ½ years of being locked into a low pay non-profit job I was feeling the urge to move on. I still felt like we were scraping by and the only ways to move up in my organization was doing more stuff I didn't want to do. It was time to follow my bigger vision for teaching sustainability. Under The Canopy was born.

So here I am, a full-fledged adult in my mid-30's with two kids, a life partner, a mortgage and a degree. I am also now officially an adult unschooler.  I am living authentically, financially soundly, presently for the important work of parenting my dear children and sharing my vision for a sustainable future through the work of nature awareness at Under The Canopy. The next step is helping daddy get a chance to be an adult unschooler.  Our vision is to form a beautiful life doing the things we love with our family at the heart of it. We might be in debt for a while, we might not be able to travel for a while, but you can be sure we are following our dreams. Wish us luck!

 

 

The Do-able Camping Trip: Tips on Camping with Little People

I always imagined we would be a camping family. Being outdoorsy and loving adventure the way I do, I saw camping as my family’s way of bonding and having a cheap alternative for vacation. While all this is true, it took us awhile to make it happen. I often run into the stumbling block of having a partner that does not feel the same way about prioritizing adventure, so it’s all on me to make these jaunts into the wild happen. Finally, last winter I set the intention that we would go camping Memorial day weekend and by gun, we did!

This trip went smoothly and it was fun.  Our camping trip included nostalgic experiences from my childhood, and a sense of awe for the beauty of late spring. We also stayed mostly in our budget! The trip included two adults, our 5 1/2 year old and an 11 month old. This trip went so well I am now on a mission to encourage more parents to take their young children camping. Most people I know think it’s a good idea to go camping but rarely get to make it happen. It can be daunting, what will we do all day? What if the kids can't sleep? What if terrible weather hits the campsite? I will lay out for you how to make camping with young children go well. I know you all can do it too!

 1. Keep the location simple. Families with young children need lots of uncomplicated time in nature to relax and discover the world around them. You don't have to go far from a city to find this. We asked friends for recommendations, checked out websites and looked at a book about camping in Oklahoma. I chose a site that was 1 hour from our home. The place had bathhouses, water pumps, a pool, a play ground, tent camping away from the RV's, and some nice, easy to manage trails. The location was ideal, far enough so that we felt we were having an adventure but close enough so we could come home quickly if we needed to. It was also in the country but close to a town where we could easily get amenities and play if we wanted to.


 2. Warm your kids up to the idea of camping ahead of time, and test all your gear beforehand.  I have talked up camping to Sweetpea for a while but since we have never gone she didn't really know what it would be like. A few days before the trip we set up our tent in the living room. She helped me put it together. We played in the tent most of the day and imagined what it would be like to be outside under the stars. I told her stories from my childhood camping and stories from when I got my own tent in my 20s and backpacked across Europe with it. As we went to put "Minerva" away one of the zippers broke. I was so sad to see my tent broken and knew we could not fix her before we left. When I told the news to daddy he said it was time to get a new tent. A big one our whole family could be in together. This is where we went over budget, but now we are the owners of a big, cushy tent we will be able to play with for years to come. 

3. Have a good mix of activities but don't pack too much into a day. With little ones its good to have two major parts to the day, but keep it to that. They mostly want to be in the rhythm they are at home only in this new, fun context. The day we did push it by renting a canoe for the evening lead to two whining and crying kids. Luckily near the end of the ride they both fell asleep and daddy and I got to have the awe filled experience of canoeing around in the evening. That said, we vowed to axe it next time.

4. Make your trip mostly tech free and plug into nature. Daddy definitely was checking his smart phone some by the campfire at night, but mostly we tried to leave the technology at home. I didn’t realize it was bothering me that he was on his phone till I saw him do it. To get him away from the screen I would just suggest we go for a walk to the look out and watch the stars. We also played cards by candlelight one evening. This opened time to using our senses and seeing more clearly what was around us. We took in the smell of the cook fire, strange bird calls, and the dazzle of late spring wild flowers. Our lives are often a buzz with technology, camping is a great chance to take a brain break from our phones and busy lives at home.

5. Keep the bar low for what your kids can do outdoors and they might surprise you. We took Sweatpea on mini hikes though out the campsite. We did not expect her to hike for hours in the heat; we just took her on the easiest trail and turned around whenever she was ready. Since she was leading, we ended up stopping a lot but that was good. She owned the hike and gave us a chance to take more pictures of wild flowers. When she would say she wanted to turn around sometimes I would push her and say maybe a little more? What’s beyond that bend? That sometimes worked and sometimes did not, either way we were building a relationship with nature and the more she got to decide how long she wanted to be away from camp, the more excited she was to go for a hike.

6. Always pack water, granola bars and Band-Aids before setting off anywhere. The first hike we went on was just to explore the camp ground. Sweatpea fell and scraped her knee halfway down a hill. She was super upset so I said I would go back to the campsite to get her a Band-Aid. While there I grabbed a few water bottles and granola bars. The band aid made her feel better and later on when we got a little lost following a deer path, the water made all the difference in us being able to happily finish our hike. Moral of the story, even for the shortest time out, make sure you have these things.

7. Don't let the threat of rain stop you. I think one of the major things that keep people away from camping is the fear of bad weather. I am here to tell you can even have fun camping while it is raining. If you prepare and have a good waterproof tent you can cozy a rainy afternoon away in your tent. Or, grab your boots and find puddles to splash in. Examine what the forest looks like before, during and after the rain. It is not a lot of fun cooking in the rain with no campfires, but the water can bring on other fun like playing with mud and telling stories about the rain. If you pick a campsite near a town you can even order pizza to go and eat it in your tent. Or go out for the meal and come back to your cozy tent that evening for playing cards and reading books. You can sleep with the peaceful sounds of raindrops. Rain also tends to clear out less intrepid campers so campsites are quieter. You feel like a real outdoors person after braving a few days outside in the rain. Also, nothing can beat the smell of trees and plants after rain.

8. Take advantage of all the things the park has to offer. The first thing I did after signing us in was look at all the brochures in the park’s office. I went over the map with the ranger and found out about all the cool things happening that weekend. We used the pool and the canoes. I bought a glow in the dark constellation bandana, and I got a fun mini passport book for Sweatpea for free. This booklet had all the state parks in Oklahoma and activities to do in each park. Activities included checking out special sights in the park, fun yoga moves, and a scavenger hunt on the trails. We did them all and she got a stamp at the end of our stay. There are so many fun and inexpensive ways to connect to nature in a park, it only takes time to look up info and ask around.

The hardest thing about camping with a baby was feeding her. The picnic bench was too much fun for her and she kept trying to stand up and eat. Her standing made her fall a lot and get food everywhere. I was a mess after every meal trying to hold food in my hand and put it in her mouth. I highly recommend some kind of traveling high chair for the baby stage of camping.  I also found it hard that she was crawling around in the dirt and putting everything in her mouth. Though this was challenging I still think it was important for her to explore and get dirty. We just changed clothes a lot, fished for rocks and acorns in her mouth and when I could not take it anymore, played in the tent or just put her in her carrier.  


Remember that adventure for your family is as simple as all sleeping in the same room with only a layer of tent separating you from the outside. Eating outside and seeing the stars are huge benefits as well. There is no need to plan a lot of stuff to do; the adventure is found in living outdoors for a small span of time.

 

The Burning Hot Nanas

There is a "gentleman’s club" my daughter and I pass on the way to her Pre-K. It is a place right in the middle of a busy, family oriented neighborhood strip. Her dance school is a few blocks down, its surrounded by a vet office, plant nursery, restaurant and violin shop. I don't know how the club came to be there but there it is, right in our faces as we drive from point A to point B. I find the place sleazy & do my best to ignore it.

One day my very observant Pre-K kid asked me about the place. "Mama, why is there a picture of burning hot nanas on that building?" (nanas is a friendly term for breasts we used when she was breast feeding, pronounced nah-nahs.) The strip club has its name emblazoned on a red sign with women's nude torsos engulfed in flames. This is it, that horrible moment where I have to decide how to explain to my daughter the exploitation of women in our culture. I rack my brain for the most simplified response I can imagine. "Well, honey, the person that owns that business put up that sign. What do you think of that sign?" a pause from the back seat, "I don't like it." Neither do I honey." Another pause, then she says, "We should tell them to take it down. " I said “yes that is a great idea."

After our talk I was motivated and ready to put pen to paper and give this business a piece of my mind! But by the time we got home a million other thoughts had swept through my head and we were onto the next thing. We pass by this place a few times a week. Since  the initial conversation Sweetpea sometimes notices the nanas and sometimes does not.  When she does notice she says. "I don't like that sign, let’s tell them to take it down." I have told her to not look if it bothers her. I have told her yes it bothers me too and I agree we should ask to have it taken down. Finally after many excuses I told her we will write to them she just needs to remind me when we are home and by paper and pen.


I started to get a daily reminder, "Remember mama to write to the place with the burning hot nana sign." This reminder comes to me in the same vein as " Remember to take out the garbage." I tuck her into bed and she reminds me to write the place with the burning hot nana sign. I am fixing her snack and she reminds me again. Its incredible how something so intense and confusing as talking about sexual exploitation of women has become such a run of the mill conversation in my home.

One night I finally set the wheels in motion and started the letter. I am tired of feeling worn down by offensive media. I am tired of accepting the BS that says this world is just crappy and we can't do anything about it.  Even if they don't take down the sign I know it’s important to write the letter. It’s important because I want to show my daughter that we can try to make change. She needs to know that we can state our opinions no matter what. Also, that stating her opinion makes things better. In my ideal world there would not even be a strip club my daughter and I would have to interact with. Confronting the burning hot nanas is giving us a chance to say what we want in our community with our voices. This is a powerful step against sexism and towards empowerment even if the nanas continue to burn.

Foot note: To all women/mothers working in the biz and ex-sex workers this is not about what you do. We all have to make money and for some this is the most reliable option. I salute you in your efforts to pay bills and raise families as a female in this society. We are all in this together.