Sage's Three Tasks & Our Last Day

Bear Spirit had given Sage Three Tasks. Sage must complete each challenge in order to free Luna and bring her back to Poppy Mountain.

Bear Spirit spoke: "First, you must return to Scorpion Rock and lift the rock carefully. Ask the Scorpion Mother for one of her babies. You are to take the Baby Scorpion, tending to it with great care. Feed it a mushroom growing next to the creek beneath the Crooked Oak Tree. Once the Baby Scorpion has eaten the mushroom, it will speak to you the Secret of the Moon. Remember what the Scorpion says, for you will be asked by Luna the next time you see her.

"The second day you must follow your footsteps taken with Luna -- backwards -- from Scorpion Rock, across Rocky Ridge and finish at the exact spot where you first met. There you will find a Golden Acorn, which you must keep in your satchel. Make a chain of gold from pounded gold flakes you will find in the creek. Hang the Golden Acorn on the chain and give this talisman to Luna the next time you meet.

"On the third day, as soon as you awaken, you must go and drink from the deep pool in the creek. Take three long drinks. You will then be visited by Water Snake. He will show you how to braid with sweet grass, a braid just like Luna's hair. You must dry and then burn the grass. The rising smoke will be your final key to bringing Luna back to Poppy Mountain."

Sage awoke the next morning and was exhausted from his busy sleep and his visit from the Animal Spirit Counsel. In his heart he had his Three Tasks. His mind was questioning why he had to do this to see his friend again? But his Spirit in his heart knew that it mustn't be questioned. It must be done. He set off toward Scorpion Rock....

~^~^~

 The story has been told. Did Sage free his friend, Luna, from behind the stone door? Only the children on Poppy Mountain know.

Our final day was spent listening to the tale, making cookies, drawing something from the story, and visiting the swimming hole in Zayante Creek.

Thank you to YOU for reading this blog and following along with Poppy Mountain's summer adventures. I am grateful for a beautiful, creative, active summer spent with delightful children, and my own daughter and baby son. Many blessings to you all! With love...

Instant Gratification

Or not.

Let me say that I now have a new appreciation for every basket in my home. The one holding yarn. And the one holding wooden puzzles. And baby's blocks. And art supplies... I love baskets. So, it was in a burst of creative enthusiasm that I decided we shall make baskets on Poppy Mountain. Especially since Sage's mother made many baskets. Sage used them all the time to collect acorns, berries and even water. Basket-weaving was a big part of Ohlone Indian life. It often took women many months or even years to create a basket. I suppose making a basket in a single afternoon was pretty ambitious.

However, it was a perfect project to undertake on a warm summer day. There's something beautiful about projects that take time and effort to accomplish. It's good training for our wills. Especially a creation made with our own hands and with nature's gifts. It was just us, wisteria vines and water.

It really is a very special thing to make a basket. If you have never done it, I encourage you to make one! It's hard to describe the deep satisfaction of making something so practical with your very own hands.

The Counsel of Animal Spirit Guides

Sage made his dream catcher the very next day. Using vines and wet grasses he created his magic web. In the center, he placed a shiny piece of black obsidian. He called on his friend, Raven, who gave him three lustrous black feathers. And he tied those on. Before nightfall, Sage gave thanks to the Animal Spirits: Bear, Snake, Raven, Quail, Scorpion, Rabbit, and asked for their guidance to find his friend Luna again.

When he went to sleep that night, Sage hung his dream catcher right above his sleeping mat. He fell into a deep sleep and in his dreams he met the Counsel of Spirit Guides. Twelve Animal Spirits sat upon thrones of glass in a perfect circle. The Spirit of Bear spoke:

"We are here to guide you, as you requested. Please listen carefully. If you are to find your friend Luna again, you must trust in every word we say and follow our instructions to the letter. You have Three Tasks to undertake before you can call Luna back to Poppy Mountain," said Bear Spirit. "She is trapped in a timeless space and needs your help to unlock the stone door that keeps her from returning."

"Tell me what I must do. I will take on anything," said Sage.

Bear Spirit gave him the Three Tasks...

~^~^~

Today after story telling, we got right to work. It was bread baking day. In the wood-fired outdoor oven. In terra cotta pots. My husband, Hans, started a huge, hot fire for us, and built it up for about two hours. Meanwhile, our sourdough fermented in the terra cotta pots I had seasoned the day before. Read how here: http://www.livestrong.com/article/443734-how-to-bake-bread-or-cake-in-terra-cotta-pots/

Baking in our wood-fired oven, I often say, is an art. Each experience is different, every outcome unpredictable. Today we had the added variable of the pots, which we had never used before. I will say, it was a success. The loaves got slightly charred on the outside, on the side closest to the wood. In hindsight, if we had rotated the pots, it would've been better. But underneath the blackened crust was some very soft and delicious bread! I loved the idea of baking in a pot, and it was a super fun thing for the children to bring home.

While the fire heated up the stone oven and the dough was rising, the children did what we call in Waldorf circles "free rendering." Free rendering means a child constructs something completely up to them, in freedom of execution, and based on their imagination of an experience, a story, a lesson, etc. In our case today, the children made a creation from our story of the Animal Spirit Guides. They could make anything they wanted. The materials they had to work with included clay, beeswax,wool, paper, pencils, glue, glitter, pipe cleaners, and other crafts. The two photos below show Bear Spirit and Bird Spirit.

Dog Days

It's getting hot up here on Poppy Mountain. It happens every summer. I get through July thinking what a mild season we're having. Then August hits and we start baking. See, here in the Santa Cruz mountains, people don't have air conditioning. In fact, most people in the SF Bay Area don't. And up here where we are, on top of the world, and above the trees, it can get very hot. One year, it was 100 F upstairs in our house. So, yes, the dog days of summer are setting in. The fans are whirling and the windows are open all night.

I'm a little amazed to find that it's August already, and soon summer will be winding down. Poppy Mountain is in its final summer session, and I will be transitioning to a school-year emphasis, supporting home school families come September. I'm going to be holding an open house soon for Waldorf home schoolers, hosting sample classes in the arts/handwork realm for parents and children. If you're reading this and are interested in my offerings, stay tuned to Poppy Mountain's evolution.

As the story of Sage and Luna unfolds, we find Sage puzzled by the disappearance of his new friend, Luna. None of Sage's other friends recall ever seeing her, and they tease him about having a rich imagination. Sullen, Sage finishes his day's work and heads off to bed. In his dreams, the moon is full and so very bright. But then clouds roll in and cover the moon completely, making the earth pitch black. Slowly, the clouds clear and the moon is smiling down on Sage, a familiar face. He woke up. She is out there, he told himself. He felt sure of it. As sure as he could envision that smile. The next day, Sage made a magical dream catcher. One that would catch Luna in his dreams and bring her back to Poppy Mountain. But would it work?

...

Today we made dream catchers, much like the kind that Sage was making. Using wisteria vines from our garden, and embroidery floss, the children created beautiful webs to catch their dreams. We collected blue jay feathers to adorn the dream catchers and hung beads on them as well.

We also painted with watercolors in a wet method, and used small sponges to move the paint on the paper. The children painted Sage and Luna as they imagined them.

The Wonders of Zayante

The beautiful Zayante Creek

I did a little research on Zayante Creek. According to Wikipedia:

"The Zayantes, a local tribe of the Ohlone people, originally inhabited the area. Early history of the area recalls the Zayante people finding shelter and game in the plentiful forests. The area provided them with enough acorns, fish from Lompico and Newell Creek, and small game to live a peaceful, easy life. Temascals (saunas), songs, and games were the rule, while fighting and thievery the exception."

Yes, this is still the peaceful, easy life...

You pretty much know when your day starts with scorpions and snakes, it's a good sign. At least up here on Poppy Mountain it is.

And it was.

Look at that beautiful spiral the snake's tail made.

While the highlight of the day was, of course, the creek and swimming hole (or wait, was it the snake and scorpion?), a few other activities rounded out our afternoon perfectly: cooking, a scavenger hunt, and berry picking. It really was such a sweet day.

Today's snack was a home made breakfast cookie, made with soaked oats, chia, mango, dried fruit, banana and cinnamon (It got mixed reviews). And bacon on the side. Turkey bacon. Yummy. Everything's better with bacon. While the cookies were baking, the children went on a scavenger hunt.

 

There are three big blackberry bushes on the way to Zayante Creek. I would say the picking today was fair. There are still many unripe berries. But we managed to find enough sweet ones to satisfy ourselves.

At last. With our bellies full of breakfast cookies, bacon and berries, we made it to the creek. Exploring, wading, and splashing ensued for the rest of the afternoon.

Success! What a super fun day. It's wonderful to end this session on such a high.

It was a wacky day :P

We had an unexpected series of events on Poppy Mountain today.

First of all, what boys wouldn't love to build a fort in the woods? Well, apparently the ones who would rather find a place to slide down a steep hill on their bums! Alrighty, then. I thought about mandated fort building, but that didn't seem right for a fun summer adventure. So hill sliding was now on the menu.

While we were in the forest, I had the children collect items that could be used to paint with. Instead of brushes. They found a bunch of possibilities: ferns, clovers, bark, redwood cones, lichen, moss, etc. we brought those back to the house and rinsed them off.

Before painting, though, we had some snack preparation to do.

Today the children made a hearty snack that included a quinoa salad with mango, avocado, tomato and a lime dressing. They also made black bean and sweet potato quesadillas. Both were delicious!

Back to wackiness. After snack, we set out to paint with our tools from nature. It was such a fun exploration that any sort of form went out the window. I had thought we would paint the bum-sliding hill, but it was so much fun just to try the different plants and see which ones painted the best.

In the end, I challenged the children to see if they could find all the colors in the rainbow in their painting. Otherwise they were completely free to paint as they wished. It was delightful to see all of them spending time with the colors, and although the end result was on the *ahem* abstract side, the process was priceless.

I tried once more to encourage some fort-building. Some things, I guess, are best left for another day...

A Day of Scorpions and Gnomes

Who knew that they had so much in common, scorpions and gnomes. Scorpions have been on this earth for millions of years. So have gnomes. Scorpions live in the rocks. So do gnomes. Of course scorpions don't wear pointy hats and gnomes don't eat insects (as far as I know).

If you read my last post, then you know the story of Sage and Luna and the Scorpion family. Today, the children made a soft pastel drawing of that story on black paper. I love pastels. They are so forgiving and so alive. Form and color melt under your fingertips almost like you are sculpting. We practiced blending and creating edges of rock and luminous mountaintops.

And then the gnomes came in. I had read about a sweet wood carving project and wanted to bring that to Poppy Mountain. So simple, really. We found some fairly thin branches. About one inch wide or even less, and cut them into three-inch lengths.

The children carved first the pointy hat atop the gnome's head, next the face. Then, they scored the branch where they wanted the beard and carved that out. Finally, they colored their gnome's hat in pencil and drew on a face. Voila!

Wood carving is the kind of activity one can get immersed in and forget about all her troubles. It's meditative. Oh, and if you happen to carve with a dull knife like I did, the experience lasts even longer.

One of the children today was so focused on his carving that he had time to make two gnomes. It was a great project to get into deeply. We took a snack break and also explored the forest for the makings of gnome dwellings. Then back to whittling. At the end of the day, some wonderful gnome homes were built. The gnomes looked pretty happy about the whole thing. Maybe they'll invite their scorpion friends over.