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Seasons
Walking With My Lantern
"The sunlight fast is dwindling, My little lamp needs kindling. Its beam shines far in darkest night. Dear lantern guard me With your light." In this time of year when the days grow shorter and Winter draws near, parents and children involved with Waldorf Schools all over the world are making beautiful handmade lanterns and holding Martinmas lantern walks. As my children have gotten ...
Fall on the Farm
There are so many things to enjoy about Autumn time. The trees put on their brilliantly colored mantles of red, orange, rich brown and golden hues. The abundance of fruits, vegetables, nuts and mushrooms is ripe for the picking. Gardens are tucked into bed for the winter. Flocks of Canada geese sing travelling songs overhead. Creatures and humans alike nest and settle into their homes and burrows ...
Autumn Leaves
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Passing Through the Graveyard on Halloween Night
I aimed for an old fashioned Halloween this year, with creative handmade costumes, lots of jack-o-lanterns, a party, bobbing for apples, homemade cupcakes, and a bonfire. In keeping with this idea, we began and ended our trick-or-treating at the old Masonic pioneer cemetery that sits on a forested hilltop with winding paths lined with native plant ID plaques, and interpretive historical plaques at ...
A House for the Fairy Folk on Halloween
In keeping with my yearly tradition for Halloween, I carved one of my pumpkins into a fairy house. I endeavored to make this one very cozy. After all, it's important to give those roving faeries a place to stop, kick up their shoes and have a cup of hot mulled wine. They have a lot of hard work to do making mischief! I chose this pumpkin out of the pumpkin patch for the misshapen top ...
Happiness is a Great Pumpkin
I don't know exactly what it is about them, but pumpkins make me happy. Perhaps it is that way they stand out like glowing orange beacons against the fading autumn landscape. Perhaps it is the way in which they are round, and full, and imbued with the abundant qualities of the season. Perhaps it is the artistic medium they become when one applies some carving tools, chisels and a candle. Or maybe ...
A Day at Blair Lake
On the Fall Equinox, we headed up into the mountains outside of Oakridge for our annual Blair Lake huckleberry picking trip. Typically this has been a big weekend campout, but with how busy life has been the Fall (and you will notice the Fall Equinox was some weeks ago, and I'm just posting about it now) we decided to make it a day outing with friends and head back after dinner around the ...
Baking Lughnasadh Bread
Each year on Lughnasadh, an ancient Gaelic harvest festival, I bake a loaf of multigrain bread with my children to celebrate all the things being harvested in our garden, in the farmers fields, and that we have cultivated in our lives. I usually like to do something with oats and seeds added to it, and we often end up forming it into a lovely spiral shape. Last year, we made this ...
Like a Bowl of Cherries
It's cherry season, and I am so thankful to be living in the middle of an orchard. Over the past couple of weeks, I have made a morning ritual of going out just after sunrise with my bucket and picking cherries for my breakfast and some to munch on during the day. I love fresh cherries so dearly, and am such an avid food gatherer that I have often imagined what ...