First Grade painting

Last week's painting class produced a serendipitous result in Grade One. As the children washed their colors on their wet papers, one of the images emerged as a hummingbird, instead of a flower like all the others. Now the hummingbird sits proudly on the wall at the head of the long lines of floral images. It looks as if she's just beginning her day's work of sipping nectar from the 31 flowers.

Biodynamics: Life Begets Life

We farm biodynamically at St. Anne's. I bring the ideas and practices of biodynamics to the children in simple ways over the course of the seasons and their four years with me.

One moment we shared recently involves this lovely Ceanothus bush. It is teeming with blooms right now. Each year I look forward to riot of bumble and honey bees that feed on the periwinkle blossoms.

My routine is to stop with the children next to the bush and let our eyes take in the show. First the children see one bee, then three, then five and then they lose count. The students zoom in to watch one bee at a time gathering nectar or pollen, then I remind them to listen. The roaring buzz of the bush is magnetizing. The children can hardly believe it. We listen and smile.

Then, before we move on, I urge them to step back and scan the air above the bush and garden. Their eyes unfocus and with that the atmosphere comes alive with movement. Bees and bugs flying everywhere!

"Ahhhh", I say. "Just look at all that life in the air. That's a sign our garden is happy."

Each day when I'm in the garden, I pause to scan the air to take the pusle of our garden community. In biodynamics we gardeners tend and nourish the life forces of our land. Air that is full of insects and birds flying hither and thither is a sign of biological diversity and liveliness.

Kindergarten Corn Husk Dolls

We've had a lot of rain this week! It's great for the garden and we've even been able to squeeze in a few garden classes. The Third Grade Weavers had a wonderful rain walk to St. Anne's on Wednesday, frolicking in all the puddles and generally loving all the wetness.

Today K1 came and we managed to hear the story "How Bees Got Their Job" and then play the beloved Bee Game outside. After that, we retired to the dry first floor of St. Anne's to make corn husk dolls.

Corn husk dolls are easy and fun to make. You can find husks at many grocery stores and besides that you just need some twine and, if you like, a few fabric scraps. I use these directions to make the dolls. I recommend forming the head with the pointy end of the corn husks, however, rather than the flat ends. I think the pointy end makes for a more proportional head size.