Wallace the wormery – it’s the circle of life!
At the Toddler group two potential carpenters and wood workerss cut their first logs for our fire. With Mells on the other end of the saw, NAME and NAME cut logs from a Hazel cord to the rhythm of Row, Row Row the boat.
For the first time in my 60 years, I made my first fire. Where as once when I was a child, i hated firsts because it showed i did not know, now I am a so called adult, I love firsts. Like the first time I opened a pomegranate. It began by making a nest out of hay, lining it’s inside with seed, and covering the seed with charcoal material. It was on this that I directed the flint – rubbing two metals together. A spark landed. Just one spark. ‘It’s enough’, said Mell. ‘Now blow, long and controlled’.
So the nest caught fire and we put it on top of our thin as string dry sticks. I nursed the fire through the interruptions of the day.
I didn’t see much of the Home Eds, (as I was busy with Jonas sticking planks of Maple), but came back in time for the popcorn, race and banana moment.
Meanwhile Mell had introduced Todds shells to the group. They arrived by courier in a secure as Saint Quintin package. Once I’d cut myself inside the box, each one was wrapped in a plastic envelope and cushioned with polystyrene. Back in the Summer, Todd, the husband of my oldest friend Leslie, now both living in Los Angeles, had visited Kinda Forest School and told the Home Eds of the special shells to be found on Los Angeles beaches. It was Mia who knew the name of the Sand Dollar shells, and so we waited until she was back to open the shells and share with the group. They come from a species of extremely flattened, burrowing sea urchins. Here’s a bit about them:
The bodies of adult sand dollars display radial symmetry, a petal-like pattern of five paired rows of pores. The pores are perforations in the outside skeleton through which podia for gas exchange project from the body. These sand dollars in the course of their evolution have changed from from creatures that originally lived their lives on top of the seabed to creatures that burrow beneath it.
The popcorn was Molly’s surprise. Fin had already gifted hot chocolate and milk, so it was a day of epicurean tastes. The popcorn almost lifted the lid off the saucepan on the fire, and mixed with butter and sugar was eagerly devoured by all, giving energy for the race to follow.
The race was inspired by Finn, who wanted to give the sunglasses as the prize.
Luis, with his long legs won, and Finn on crutches, presented his gift.
The banana was our Conch – holding it gave you permission to speak and say what you liked about the day and what you wanted to do next week
Liked doing
Making hot chocolate with Kym
Wink murder
Hammock
Eating popcorn
Den making
Want to do:
Den building
Wink Murder
Working with Wood
Treasure hunt
Sun dial.
Mell said we’d prepare for winter solstice, work with the tree nursery and work with tools.
The twilight group contained a budding detective, who after finding a mystery on our walk up from Holton School, through the pits to the wood, spied an Ash tree with a hollow trunk at it’s base. Here’s a photo of the inside:
Kinda Forest School 