DF Service with Blue Skies for Children 12-6-15

On this unusual indoor service day, we take a rest from exploring outside and instead explore the connections between us and some of the younger members of the community; this day our service was located at the Blue Skies for Children’s office. After a quick check-in and briefing about the project, the Dragonflies seemed ready for a day of service and action!

During service days, we take the time to remember how our needs are being met and how we can help meet the needs of other people. We reflected on our motto, Our Cups Overflow and decided we definitely had more than enough spilling over our own cups. This is our EC philosophy of service: those whose cups spill over have the joy and responsibility of sharing with others whose cups aren't quite full. Then we learned all about Blue Skies For Children's mission, and how they help "fill the cups" of hundreds of children in Whatcom County. It was just great to see how well the girls understood that mission, and to witness their emerging commitment to do what they could to contribute to it.

The commitment on this day was to stamp, label and stuff thousands of envelopes. As we talked about direct service vs. indirect service, the Dragonflies girls saw how this indirect contribution of labeling envelopes to potential donors could allow many children to be assisted by BSFC.

All service projects require some degree of persistence – it is work, after all. But somehow Dragonflies successfully made work into play on Sunday. This time was a great way to catch up with some of the girls on their lives, something we often don't have time for on outings. We shared our interests, upcoming events, and lots of goofiness!

In Explorers Club, we aim to create a culture that expresses the attitude of writer Rabindranath Tagore: "I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy." Our project involved a different kind of tenacity than usual: there was no inclement weather to work with, no hard-to-pull weeds, but rather, lots of repetitive tasks. But Dragonflies never seemed to tire of it; they took a short lunch break, but we were determined to finish the job we had come to do. This is integrity in action, following our EC motto Walk Your Talk.

Even amidst all the silliness and fun we had, this group put their best self-management skills to work. With great focus, they sticker-ed, stamped and stuffed a huge number of envelopes and donated 75 hours of time (3 hrs x 2 groups of girls)! Filled with a sense of determination and resolve to have the biggest impact possible in a finite amount of time, they even filled an additional round of envelopes up until the very last minute! They really left an impression, and received sound gratitude from Julie, Blue Skies' Executive Director. 

Our closing circle began with a Circle of Thanks. Girls expressed gratitude for lichen, trees, rain, fungi, sun, mud, Explorers Club, friends and family, and more... Gratitude makes one's full cup feel all the more full! Reflecting on the season past, we ended our day by creating a Web of Life. Each girl became something from nature she had connected to this fall: Medicine club, water, wind, leaves, sunshine…Through this web, we underline our EC motto All Things Are Connected, and understand that whenever one thing in the web is altered, it affects all the other aspects. 

 The laws of physics mean that when one's cup is emptied to fill others' cups, that cup becomes more empty. But the Dragonfliess' experience defied physics: they all could easily state that their cups were more full by helping to fill those of the BSFC kids. 

Our words of the day: "Love and giving, being connected through envelopes"

EC Mottos especially alive today:
Our Cups Overflow
Walk Your Talk
Collaborate and Compromise
All Things Are Connected
LIBK (Let It Be Known)
Widen The Circle
Everyone Helps

-Hannah

Find our photo album from the day here!

Medicinal Plants Skills Day: 11-7-15

For this special Earth Skills Day, the Dragonflies donned their medicinal plant owl eyes and discovered the medicinal magic that nature holds. 

When girls look at the natural world through a medicinal lens, well known plants become strong and powerful allies, protecting us from illness and helping our bodies heal. Cottonwood becomes more than just a tall tree with heart-shaped leaves: it is transformed into a powerful antibiotic with buds that soothe the skin, with analgesic properties that helps keep pain at bay. Usnea is no longer just a cool stretchy lichen, but one that has the power to staunch bleeding wounds; the dancing needles of Red Cedar become strong anti-viral heroes that pack immune boosting punches; the artist conch fungus (reishi) becomes more than a natural canvas for our fingernail sketches – it is an ancient medicine that helps strengthen the immune system and fights against cancer. And devil's club shifts to medicine club in the ways it heals so many things... What an incredible way to appreciate nature’s endless gifts in a whole new way!

Highlights from the day:

• Collecting and then pondering some of our well known plant friends spread out on a bandana, we used our naturalist skills to deduct the medicinal powers of dandelion, medicine club, cottonwood, foxglove, plantain, Oregon grape, reishi, cedar, fir, and more. 
• We walked down the path, seeing more than just green, noticing, one by one, the lichen, ferns, moss, fungi and other plants often lost when we look in a generalized way. We then turned our attention to the seeking medicinals, seeing with new eyes the young Hawthorne with its pokey branches that sprout red berries in the summer, berries that are a heart healer, reducing hypertension as well as easing anxiety. We saw the sticky sap seeping out of the Douglas Fir and learned of its powerful medicine to protect against bacteria and fungus. We noticed so many more plants and discussed their unique medicinal power: licorice root, Oregon grape, red alder, saxifrage, salal, plantain, dandelion, horsetail, and more...
• Seeking the debris shelters that other GEC groups had made during their skills' days this season.
• Gathering around and talked about the salve we were about to make, with lavender, St. John’s Wort, calendula, comfrey, and cottonwood steeped in oil, all powerful plants with the ability to heal and calm the skin. We carefully stirred and added the oil to the wax, blending it into salve perfection and pouring it cautiously into our tiny containers. Once the salve set we delighted in our creations, applying it to dry skin and lips.
• Playing a lively game of Medicinal Plant tag, with the person who was "it" acting as an illness and others acting as the plant that helps the problem. We ran, laughed, got warm, and made solid connections between plants and their power. 
• Enjoying "Vitamin C Honey' (rosehip honey) on some fresh bread and making medicinal forest tea with nettles, licorice root & dandelion root
• Discussing where plants put their energy in each season (shoots, fruits and roots)
• Brainstormed on what we could bring with us from our packs and clothing if we had to leave behind anything made from plants. Girls quickly realized there would be almost nothing they could take with them, including their clothing! Maybe a zipper... water, but no bottle. 
• Deciding that its not only the medicinal plants in nature that can heal but also nature itself, offering a sanctuary from our often busy, stressful world. And that we can, in turn, help heal nature's illnesses and wounds when natural systems become overtaxed. Each Dragonfly said one way she can help heal nature. Here are some of the ways they came up with: don't trample plants, remove invasives, pick up garbage, don't litter, leave what you find, teach others about nature, don't cause too much erosion, forgive nature when it harms us, leave no trace, conserving water & electricity, recycling. 

Our words of the day? Wet Fun With Medicinal Plants! 

You may check out the slideshow from our day here. 

Medicine Club Traverse: 10-4-15

It was SO wonderful to spend this beautiful autumn day with the Dragonflies! These girls brought their adventurous spirits armed with their abundant nature knowledge to successfully lead us on our off-trail trek to the Teddy Bear Cove trailhead, smiling all the while and filling the air with laughter.

There is a reason this is one of our favorite outings – it's jam-packed with all the best elements of an Explorers' day: route-finding, reasonable risks, the need for collaborative decision-making, unexpected encounters with natural elements (fields and trails, downed trees, water, mud, dense forest, myriad plants, etc...), a walk through a beautiful old farm, vistas of islands, and more. Below are some highlights of our day:

• Spending an hour in our gathering meeting, collecting leaves in their various stages and colors of life and arranging them in a wonderful leaf mandala representing the natural cycles of life. This color wheel that became a reference point for the cycle of the seasons, of leaves, of where plants focus their energy in each season, of humans' life journey, and of the importance of death and decay in it all (we agreed that death is sad but not bad. As one girl said "Death is part of the cycle of life – dying allows other things to keep living!"). This leaf circle was a rich teaching tool, and led to further discussion about the role of decomposition in the cycle of life that carried on throughout the day. We also macerated some cottonwood buds harvested at an earlier outing, to be made into salve on our next skills day.  

• Collaboratively deciding on the "challenge by choice" of route-finding our way to the Mud Bay trail through dense forest (there was an option to take the more direct route of the Interurban Trail, but no one voted for that!).

• Finding rosehips and appreciating them for their fleshy fruit that is full of vitamin C and other goodies. At our last outing we processed these wonderful fruits to make into rosehip honey for spring eating!

• Immersing ourselves in the earth skill of Navigation all along our journey, pausing to establish cardinal directions, and repeatedly checking in with them ("Where do you think we'll end up if we keep going this way?" "Which way is the sea, and what direction is that?" "Which way is Teddy Bear Cove and what direction is that?" "Which way do you think we should turn to get to Teddy Bear Cove", etc...), helping the girls practice navigational awareness all along the way. Later in EC, we'll tie this in to an awareness of life direction, paying attention to the choices we make that determine where we're headed.

• Learning about the wonders of Devil's Club (and renaming it Medicine Club, due to its innumerable uses): as blood sugar regulator, skin infection fighter, tattoo maker, lice controller, deodorizer, and much, much more. Like nettle, misunderstood Medicine Club has a bad reputation solely due to its effective defense mechanism. It asks for respect, and in return offers many methods of healing and support. In learning about Medicine Club, we also learn about people. Do we know any people with sharp, spiny aspects? Are we quick to judge them? Very likely they have many wonderful aspects, just beneath the surface, like Medicine Club. 

• Doing S.T.O.P. risk assessments all along the way, traveling slowly and with awareness as we navigated through salmonberry, nettle, blackberry and "medicine club". We called attention to the different plants around us, and tested the girls' naturalist knowledge by asking them to identify many plants, to differentiate them from Medicine Club. Watching girls travel through this medicine club patch was inspiring; they were calm, focused, aware, and attentive as they walked through. A few girls were nervous about entering the patch at first, but with much support from their Dragonfly friends, stretched their edge and were able to move through their perceived fear (we encouraged them to ask: "Is this fear helping me or holding me back?"). This practice and habit of awareness is an important skill to cultivate, in forest travel and in life.

• Making collaborative decisions all along the way, practicing the art of listening to everyone's opinion, then coming to consensus about what can work for all.

• Watching these girls explore and joyfully play in the receding tides and glorious mud of Chuckanut Bay. Goodness they had fun! Not all girls had appropriate water shoes, but all made their way with more collaboration. Ask your girl about discovering a mystery of fur, intestines, and stomach that gave us pause to think about what it was and who ate it...

• Enjoying the pastoral peace at Woodstock Farm, and learning about the generosity of its founder, Cyrus Gates, who donated land for Larrabee, Arroyo, and Fairhaven Parks, Chuckanut Island, and many other green spaces in Whatcom County. Thank you Mr. Gates! And thank you too to the Mamosee people who occupied this land before, and who were the ultimate preservationists. 

• Peaceful Place on a beautiful bluff overlooking the Salish Sea, blessed by the warm sunshine and the bright colors of our day.

• Thoroughly enjoying each other's company, stretching our edges, collaborating and compromising, and, at the end of the day, enthusiastically appreciating one another and all the gifts in our lives through a circle of thanks. Some things these gals are thankful for: trees, Explorers Club, medicine club, sunshine, soil, decomposers, friends and family, one another, Cyrus Gates...

You may see the slideshow from our day here.

EC Mottos especially alive today:

* Safety First

* Be Prepared

* It's About the Journey, Not the Destination

* Leave No Trace

* Collaborate and Compromise

* Stretch Your Edge

* Challenge By Choice

Scouting Service @ Future Education Site: 9-13-15

The Dragonflies came together for their first outing of fall season as if no time had passed. How nice to be reunited after 3 months apart!

Our task today was to scout our a 60 acre property with the intention of considering educational possibilities - we wanted to think about biodiversity, different habitats onsite, and how a future school/retreat center/local nonprofits might utilize the land to learn. Ideas below in bold are some of what the Dragonflies came up with. We started our day with the Red Foxes to create a plan for how we would explore as much of the 60 acres of property as possible. We talked about the information we wanted to collect, how we could keep track of all this information, and how the explorers could use their perspective to help plans for the site.

After identifying our meeting spot on the grass as a future game grove / gathering area, the two groups split up and the Dragonflies made their way along the pastureland. The girls thought the small house alongside the pasture would make a great teacher house. The extensive fenced pastures seemed nearly ready for teaching and learning about animal husbandry: working with goats (milking), horses (learning to ride and as therapy), sheep (shear, spin, dye using plants on site, weave), llamas (already there!), chickens. The girls brainstormed on large garden possibilities as well.

Moving along, we noted that the large open field would be ideal for stargazing/astronomy, archery, compass work, shelter building, family camping, an orchard, beekeeping, and survival challenge obstacle courses. 

The girls also agreed that "most of the school would be out here, not inside!"

As we walked, we noticed many native plants and trees, like native blackberry, rose hips, thimbleberry, big leaf maple, cottonwood, fir, cedar and more: the girls know these are great teachers in native plant walks, medicinal and food plants, willow basket making. We also noted possible future service projects, such as removing several invasive species we saw (and establishing all of the above projects!) and improving salmon habitat.

We left the field/farm area and wandered into the forest habitat, full of PNW natives, and soon came to the riparian zone with a healthy salmon stream. The girls embraced the stream with explorers' zest, discovering its mud and clay, little pools and fallen trees. They quickly identified the stream as a teacher of salmon and riparian habitats, including wood duck nest box building. We noted several wood duck boxes, and Aimee assumed (correctly) they had been erected by a GEC community mentor who would appreciate our checking them. So we did! What great lessons in data collection and wood duck habitat - the Dragonflies will be doing plenty with wood duck boxes in the years to come.

After a short stream side Peaceful Place we wandered downstream, loving it all on this fall day. We attempted to make it back to our starting point by following faint trails through the woods (trail building and repair was another project the girls envisioned), but made the collaborative decision after a time check to make our way back to the meadow and return that quicker route.

Our full scouting service day ended with comparing notes with the Red Foxes (having gone a different way, they found quite different things!), and a circle of thanks.

Check out the slideshow from our shared day here.