Fairy Size Organic Fun

Fairy Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 tbsp. organic sugar
1 tbsp. organic firmly packed brown sugar
2 tsp. organic unsalted butter
1/8 tsp. baking powder
1/8 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. water
3 tbsp. whole wheat flour
4 tsp. organic chocolate chips
2 tsp. organic confectioners sugar
 

Mix sugars and butter. Add the baking soda, vanilla, water and flour.  Stir until flour disappears. Mix in the chocolate chips. Roll dough between fingers to make 12 small balls about 1/2 inch each.  Place three balls on a greased and floured Easy Bake Oven sheet with 1/2 inch space between them.  Bake 5-6 minutes. Repeat until all the cookies are baked.  Let cool 5 minutes.  Sprinkle with organic confectioners sugar.

Makes 12 fairy-sized cookies. 

The Art of Non-Doing

Sometimes the best thing we can do for ourselves and for those we love is put down the to-do list and let go a little.  For many of us, the results-driven world makes that a difficult task.  One place I can usually cultivate a little mindful non-doing is in the tub.  The bubbles, the warmth, the calm of the water all have a way of restoring balance.  Yesterday's art project taught me that we don't even need to get our whole body in the tub to reap the benefits.  

We began with an afternoon walk and collected stones that were round, semi-flat, and stacked easily.  We brought the stones home, washed them, and then I filled the tub with warm, soapy water.  The girls wrapped their stones tightly with wool, then dipped them in the bubbly tub.  When wet, the wool shrinks around the stones.  The process of dipping, squeezing, and swirling the wool-covered stones in warm soapy water might calm even the most cantankerous kid.  It didn't take long before the girls were immersed fully in the moment.  Anything can be an exercise in mindfulness.  

We started with solid colors.  Then we went back and added little wisps of additional color.  I reminded the girls that this project was about the process more than it was about the end result.  As they worked, they learned that they couldn't force the wool to take the shape they wanted nor could they try to create too specific a design with the colors.  The best results came from letting go and allowing the result to manifest in its own time.  This is the art of non-doing.  When we let go of our attachment to the results, we are free to enjoy the process.

As Jon Kabat-Zinn writes in, Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life, "Non-doing doesn't have to be threatening to people who feel they always have to get things done.  They might find they get even more "done," and done better, by practicing non-doing."  

Too often, we sacrifice the joy of this moment for some distant objective.  We are already half way into the next moment before this moment ends.  Yet, enjoying our life requires that we are present for it.  Our striving, our constant doing, stands between us and our joy.  Non-doing may be a lost art in today's world; nevertheless, it's an art this home-educator intends to keep in the classroom.

Om Gnome & Fairy Garden Workshop

The Om Gnome and Fairy Garden Workshop has been busy during our spring break.  We were quite inspired by The Magic Onions amazing tutorials for making fairy furniture and toadstools... 

and got out into the garden this week to make a few additions.

We collect stones and had a bunch of nice round ones to work with.  We started with traditional red and white toadstools, then chose bright colors and, with just a little imagination, created some pretty psychedelic mushrooms.

Our fairy garden is beginning to look like a fairy wonderland...   

The new additions are so bright and cheerful...

Our kitty seems to be aware of magic in the garden...

Bright purple flowers are blooming on the Wild Lilac... 

And there is always time to just sit and enjoy breathing together...

Easter Au Naturel

We started with all organic ingredients... a dozen hard-boiled eggs, a bushel of kale, two beets, skins from two yellow onions, grape juice, vinegar, plus crayons, and rubber-bands.







Hoping for a tie-dyed result, we wrapped some of the eggs with rubber-bands.  We used crayons to draw hearts and flowers and to write intentions on the shells -- we chose the four Brahma-Viharas, mudita (joy), metta (loving-kindness), karuna (compassion), and uppekha (equanimity).

In separate pots, we boiled the kale, beets, and onion skins in three cups of water with three tablespoons of vinegar for 30 minutes... then let the dyes cool.  We filled a mason jar with grape juice, added three tablespoons of vinegar and two eggs, and put it in the refrigerator for an hour. 

Last, we let each egg soak in dye for 20-30 minutes... and voila!  Easter eggs au naturel!
 
This was a fun way to honor the day and Mother Nature by using only gifts from the earth rather than harmful chemicals.  More info on Natural egg dying is available here.

Much spring joy to all.

Midweek Balance

It's easy to get swept away by the busyness of our daily lives.  As parents, our schedules are crazy, our to-do lists are long, and our days are too short. By mid-week, it's easy to feel frazzled or even overwhelmed.  The weekend feels so far away and there is still so much left to do. But our kids mirror our energy, so it's essential for us to cultivate a little inner-Om.  Midweek is good day to set our intention to restoring balance.  

We began day three of the letter O with oatmeal but before we put it on the stove, I had Amelie make a letter O with her fingers in the dry oats. Feeling the shape of the letter is as essential to understanding it as seeing it. 

After breakfast we moved into the classroom for Circle Time. Because rhythms create balance and harmony, our Circle Time always consists of the same elements: a song, a verse, a blessing, meditation, "Creative Infinity" (finding something in our inner-world during our short meditation to "bring back" to the classroom), and sharing.  Today Amelie shared the piano composition she worked on before breakfast and some stones from our basket.  She wanted to compare and contrast the shape, size and weight of the stones so we got out our little scale and had an impromptu science experiment.  She recorded her findings in her Science Journal and we were both surprised that the smallest stone was one of the heaviest.

Then we popped open the laptop for five minutes of mindfulness with Susan Kaiser Greenland on mindfulness together.  Today's exercise was "zipping ourselves up" and listening deeply.  We're both enjoying sharing these practices this week and they help center our attention for the Morning Lesson.

Next it was desk time.  Today's O words were: of, old, on, one, or, and other. She traces each word once before writing it twice on her own.  Then we spell each word by singing it:

o-l-d "old"
o-l-d "old"
o-l-d "old"
that's how we spell old!

For story time today, I read from a book we have on loan from a dear friend, The Lady of Ten Thousand Names: Goddess Stories from Many Cultures retold by Burleigh Muten.  In the spirit of our letter of the week, I read "Oshun - the Great Mother."  This is a creation story from Nigeria and her name means "The Source." More than that, however, it is a timely story about the importance of honoring and balancing both the male and female ascpects of our human nature. 

When the gods sent to prepare the earth for human beings neglect to invite the goddess Oshun to their planning mettings, their effrots are thwarted.  Upon reporting this sad truth to Olodumare, the the Supreme Sky Being, Olodumare says, "You have upset the balance.  A team of men cannot create harmony on Earth without a woman.  Without Oshun, no plan will unfold."  To restore balance, they have to give up something they love and ask for her forgiveness. Oshun forgives them, but only after they share with her the secrets of the Universe.

Through archetypal stories like this, Language Arts integrates with Social Studies.  We also use art to demonstrate understanding of the story and to answer questions on content, sequence, characters and moral -- and keep a Main Lesson Book where Amelie draws pictures from the stories read in the classroom.  She writes the letter of the week on the left page a few times and then has 15-20 minutes to draw something from the story with crayons and colored pencils. Today she drew the goddess Oshun in colorful clothes, as expressed in the story, with big arms wrapped around three of her children. 

More valuable than anything we can tell our kids are their direct experiences. So for our Afternoon Lesson we got outside for Earth Science, O is for Organic.  Fresh air is calming and even just a few breaths can restore peace when we're fragmented.  Our plan was to collect all things organic and bring them back for a collage craft. (Crafts help with eye hand coordination, fine motor skills, reinforce core subjects... and they're fun!)  

Because immersion means retention we also set our minds to seeing oes everywhere. Amelie enjoyed learning that she can see her breath because it's warmer than the air outside and comparing organic things (rocks, leaves, branches, dirt, flowers) to non-organic things (rubber tires, plastic tubing, asphalt).  Then we brought in all of our samples and made a pretty collage.  


After dinner, Amelie read two of her favorite stories, Amelia Bedelia by Peggy Parish and Mr. Brown Can Moo, Can You by Dr. Seuss.  At bedtime tonight, I'll read Oshun - the Great Mother one more time.   Mid-week Wednesdays are for centering and creating Om in the home.  Tomorrow we'll tackle five more O words and then it's off to the city with daddy for some fun.