Nature-ing

The children and I spent a week exploring music in and with the natural world.  (I'll include a link below to a short musical video of our time together).  After experimenting with sound making, we carried our instruments to our arboreal friends.  First, we needed to meet our audience: Ash, Bradford Pear, Red Bud, Silver Maple, Peach, Apple and Pear.  (Yep we have all those trees out our backdoor!). Then we played our noisy hearts out! 

We then gathered a few peaches to share and delighted in the warm, juicy sweetness ruining off our chins.   When finished we stop by the compost to add to our decaying fruit and vegetables pile and meet all the wonderful worms and insects converting our trash back into soil

We finished in our prolific garden, picking some collard greens, basil and tomatoes for food prep in the studio!  

Stay tuned to see what we make with our bounty!

Click here for a peek at our music in the making.

Grapes Glorious Grapes

Today BJ joined me in the studio to harvest and juice grapes.  This is a long standing tradition and Children's Garden and this years harvest was INCREDIBLE.  Here are a few pictures from the day:

peaches

toddler gardening

Our garden is a wild mass of growing goodness.  The toddler class came out to explore the deliciousness in our backyard.

 We tasted fennel, basil, nasturtiums and parsley on the spot. 

 We all reveled in the wide blue sky and the good 'ole Colorado sunshine.

When we wrangled the group back into the classroom, I cut up some of the peppers and tomatoes we had gathered, added a little salt and prepared for a sampling.

 Many of the children were eager to try, others were not.  For those with a more adventurous palette the tomatoes were a huge success but the green peppers were met with brow furrowed suspicion.

 It was another wonderful day with the children of Children's Garden.

potato soup from the children's garden

 First we harvested our vegetables...

 next we talked about the harvest ... then scrubbed the produce...

 Peeled them.... and cut them

 Once all the veggies were cut we went to the garden to collect some sage, chives and thyme...

 And added it to the crockpot.

 We cooked the potatoes', celery, onions and a few other garden veggies in the crock pot over night, along with enough broth to cover.

 In the morning we blended the soup adding a few more chives, salt, pepper and milk.

The result was delicious!!

the art of listening

To further our study of community and communication, the XP class is investigating what it means to listen…not just to one another but also deeply to all life everywhere.

In an effort to support this process, your child has agreed to adopt a plant for the year. 

Together we identified the needs of a plant, discovering that they are the same needs shared by all living organisms: sunlight, water, air, food, temperature and space.

Over the next year, the children will be listening to the plants and how they communicate their needs… Does it need more light or less?  Does it need more water, less or is it just right?  Does the plant need a new pot with more room or is it looking a little peckish and in need of some plant food?  What do plants eat?  Where does plant food come from?

It’s my hope that the whole family might enjoy listening in new and different ways to the life all around us.