We have had a busy September and October here at Appleseeds. We pulled up the tomatoes in the garden and have planted arugula, kale, collards, turnips, beets, lettuce, and fava beans. In our front yard, the children also helped to plant a persimmon tree, which was quickly joined by another persimmon and three paw paw trees. We have been busy with seasonal crafts; making an autumn banner, pressing apples, making applesauce, making autumn crowns, capes and wands... 
We've been enjoying the applesauce from our Apple Harvest Celebration, and we have enough to last for many, many more weeks thanks to all of the apples brought in by families. 

We have started taking our forest hikes now that the poison ivy is dying down. It is a tremendous challenge to children because there is no clear path, so they have to constantly either step over or around or under the vines or sticks. But they feel so proud when they have climbed a steep slope by climbing vines, or when they manage to get through a mess of vines to find a cozy little forest home tucked into the branches of some low growing vine covered trees. 

Inside, we have added some new items that have enhanced the children's play time. We have some new autumn trees and a beautifully carved wooden boy, girl, and gnome, some wooden arches and a home made heavy baby doll. The children have really taken to doll play this year, taking turns being babies, mothers, fathers and siblings. Doll play is a wonderful way to bring out the nurturing side of children. 

One of our stories in October has been about a little hedgehog who must search for a home when his leaf pile nest is blown away by the autumn wind. He meets an autumn fairy who is busy painting all the leaves on the trees, but who tells him to "follow the path of the sun". He finds a snug little pumpkin and makes his winter home there, blanketed by the falling leaves. The next story we've told is based on the story of "The Turnip" wherein a boy named Hugin enlists the help of his animal friends to pull a pumpkin from his garden so that he can make a jack-o-lantern for Halloween. The children tell the stories to one another in their play time, and I believe in telling the stories themselves, they begin to absorb the values inherent in the stories: a feeling of safety in the world, the help available from friends and loved ones, the beauty of the changing seasons. 

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With September still being so warm and some of our garden waning, we've been slowly but surely pulling out what is spent, and planting some seeds for the fall and winter. The children particularly love the watering part and have no problem being watered themselves. On Thursdays, they help pick up pine cones in the front yard, and we've been noticing the light brown "squirrel snack" pine cones, which are those that have been nibbled. Just a small sign that the season is changing. Inside, the older children like to tell stories, sometimes setting up a "campfire" and tents to create a good spot for storytelling. 

Our story for a couple of weeks was "The Magic Fish" about a man who catches a fish that can grant wishes. The man keeps going back and asking for more and more things until eventually he winds up with exactly what he winds up with and lives contentedly ever after. The children made a couple of fish crafts for fun, and eventually acted out the story (with help). This week, we started our apple-picking themed circle time, which is one of my favorites as it's the first I ever learned. 

Our new year has just begun and we are greeted with some new faces! The children are still watching carefully and exploring the space to begin to understand what it's all about. Our old friends introduced the new ones to the guinea pigs and the garden, and how we celebrate birthdays! Our story this week is one that I find fitting for this summer season and new beginning; it's a story of a little fish who finds a nice big shell to live in and is joined in turn by unique and kind friends. They each make space for one another in their shell and live happily together in their underwater garden. During our inside playtime, the children like to use my story props to re-tell it to one another. 

We've been practicing our summer circle time inside and it seems that the children's favorite verse is one where they get to log roll across the floor as we say, "Daisies so bright, grasses so green, tell me I pray, how do you keep clean? Summertime showers, summertime rain, wash dusty flowers all clean again". 

We made our bread together this week, as we will every week this year. It's a wonderful sensorial experience to make bread together. While we knead it, we sing a song about kneading our dough for our snack time. Once it is kneaded, the children make it into a shape and we bake it. So the children are experiencing the feel of flour being sprinkled onto their hands and the table, the squish of the dough, they're hearing a rhyming song, and later smelling the fragrance of the bread filling our play space. It's one of the richest sensory experiences of our week and the children love it. 

Summer went by so quickly and we enjoyed the warm summer mornings with crafts, car washes, kid washes, and slip n' slides. I love summer as a time to break out some of the ideas that have been in the back of my mind and just do them. Summer winds up being a time to test out different projects and crafts and perhaps bring that with me into the school year. And all the colors! My brain unwinds enough to gain new inspiration. Even though it is such a hot time of year, and generally my least favorite season, our time in summer camp makes it my favorite time for gathering new ideas. I hope the children enjoyed it as much as I did!

Pirate ships and outdoor concerts were a popular theme in their outdoor play. There were some unique songs of "I'm gonna rock and roll all day and party all night long". We painted with ice on big drop cloths, and pipettes on handkerchiefs. We made some pancakes outside during our "Three Boy Week". Popsicles were never forgotten, thanks to the children's unique inner popsicle timers. And the guinea pigs were fed lavishly from our bean tee pees, from which the children loved finding the purple pole beans. 

Inside, once the morning heat was too much to bear, we would have a cool-down snack and play for awhile. Many "campsites" were built and stories of the beach or underwater gardens were told. 

The hammock is up and so summer is officially around the corner. The carwash was re-instated and the kids happily became car washers and construction crew. Picnics are happening both inside and out and our mud kitchen, which had been ignored a bit has had new interest. 

We kicked off May with our May Day celebration, dancing around the May Pole. This has ushered in several other ring games with the children that we sing and dance to each day. Dancing in a circle together is a practice that spans many cultures. It's a wonderful exercise for the older children who are ready for more difficult circle time exercises. Staying in one place ready to hold hands and shift directions, not going too fast or too slow, demands a significant amount of body control. It's an excellent preparation for kindergarten. 

Our nursery time has been switched a bit so that we can enjoy the cool mornings before the playground gets super sunny and hot. We've had a very vigorous circle time with many gross motor movements during the song of "I Traveled Over Land and Sea".  I know it's been a success when they are panting at the end. It's a great way to wind down after being outside and to prepare for our snack. 

For Mother's day, the children wound ribbon around wreath forms and beaded some wire to make a little bird feeder. It's fun to watch the children carefully pick out the colors they think their moms will like best, and they usually choose very well! 

Our week was filled with all the busyness of Spring that one can ask for on beautiful April days. Some bean seeds were planted around our bean teepee and the basil and peppers we had started in our nursery window were finally put into their garden homes. There was some excitement when the children discovered that a few of the radishes they had planted in early March were ready to be harvested. Already the children have been enjoying picking come lemon balm, mint, or chives to have for a little nibble while they're playing. A few butterflies and ladybugs have also made their homes in the play yard, so hopefully they'll be helping us with the garden as well.

During our morning times inside, it's been so delightful to see the stories unfold that the children create. Many times they play all in one big group, the youngest children often just watching and following along. Or, they may find a little spot and begin telling a little story on their own.

Our circle time lately has been about a caterpillar creeping and crawling on "leaves and stems and old stone walls" who then after eating and eating, spins a "little house that has no door". The children pretend to sleep and while their eyes are closed, I put a silk around their shoulders, tucking the ends into their hands to be "wings". And then they "waken as a butterfly" and we fly around the nursery. 

Because we have a group with a number of older children, we've been practicing a fairly challenging clapping game called "Bim Bum". They don't have it down quite yet, but hopefully with practice, they'll get it soon. Hand claps and rhymes are wonderful exercises for the developing brain as they combine rhythm, hand coordination, singing and memorization all at the same time. 

I had some help in our new garden area this week. The children helped me dig our swale pathway around the beds and then shovel some pea gravel into the ditch and spread it around. There were many busy watering cans watering our new plants as well. We will plant nasturtiums, borage, and climbing beans in the upcoming weeks. The children also were busy designing boats with our blocks, crates, ropes, and tubes. A bit of rain this week also provided opportunities for puddle splashing and malleable wet sand. 
Inside, the children have been working on a little paper weaving using some watercolor paintings. They folded one painting in half lengthwise and cut slits about an inch apart. This was an excellent exercise in control, because they had to stop cutting before they reached the edge. There were a few lessons learned, but those mistakes were fixed with tape. Next, they cut strips from another painting. Lastly, they wove the strips. It took concentration to weave them first under and then over, and to remember to start the next strip in the opposite way! Primarily, this was a craft for my older 4's and 5's. Our younger children enjoyed painting and just cutting strips of paper into little pieces while they watched the older children. 

We've been playing some circle and ring games which the children love. One is called "My Lady Spring" and is based off of an old Springtime poem. A child, who is Lady Spring, weaves in and out under the arms of children holding hands in a circle while we sing "My Lady Spring is dressed in green, she wears a primrose crown, the sun shines if she laughs at all, my lady spring, my lady spring." Then the "lady spring" comes to the middle and leads us all as he/she twirls in the middle singing "And little baby buds and twigs are clinging to her gown, and if she weeps, the raindrops fall, my lady spring, my lady spring". We also have a little poem about flower elfins and their bulbs, and the children take turns being the flower elfin (who wears a colorful cape) and flower bulbs. The flower elfin pushes down the flowers roots and pulls up their shoots, then paints their petals. When father sun says it's time for bed, the bulb curls up again and the elfin covers it and protects it from winter cold. Lastly, by popular demand, we play some farmer in the dell, which is always a favorite. 

I've also been reading some carefully chosen fairy tales to the children at lunch time. These fairy tales are usually lighthearted in nature and also there are no pictures (which helps deal with the "I can't see!" issue at lunch). Last week we read about a tiny little boy named Pimpernall who accidentally got carried out of his chimney by some steam, but through his wit and help from a friendly giant, made his way home again. Prior to Pimpernall, we read The Queen Bee, about three brothers, the youngest of whom helps some ants, some ducks, and some bees. When he later must fulfill 3 tasks, the animals help him. I often hear some of the themes of these fairy tales repeated in the children's play later on!

Our playground recently received a facelift over the spring break. The sandbox was enlarged to make room for so many busy workers. I added some greenery and silk flowers along with some animals to create stories and scenes or decorate "cakes", or whatever the children came up with!
Where our old sandbox was is now a new garden incorporating our apple trees. We'll have a pair of neighboring bean teepees, goumi berry bushes, cone flowers, chives, batchelors buttons and tall artichokes and cardoons. Or so I hope. 

Play both inside and out has been expanding and evolving. A racecar pretend game initially was tricky to start the other because some children couldn't agree on whether there could be more than one driver. In time they agreed that a mechanic or engineer was just as crucial to the game as a driver, and they rode along with their "driver" enjoying the task of checking the tires and engine. A restaurant was opened near our "race track" and the driver and mechanic enjoyed taking a break in their racing day to have some lunch. Later, some mamas decided to come for a ride in the racecars along with their babies. I love watching how children's play can expand and grow if just given the uninterrupted time to unfold. 

We celebrated Spring's Birthday before our break, making a little spring "garden" with the wool caterpillar, egg, and butterfly that the children made. But the real treat was the Italian Easter Bread that we all love so much. The children dyed their eggs in red cabbage juice and then placed them in a little "nest" made of an especially rich dough. Delicious!

We're just beginning to see those first hints of green new life around here. Our seedlings are emerging and some will go out to the garden this week, while others need to wait. Our daffodils have been coming up and the children love to pick a couple to put into our flower arrangements inside. Our peas and radishes have sprouted and each day we water them to help them along. A visitor recently asked if I do lesson plans such as "How does a seed grow?" and create a curriculum for the things we're seeing growing. I explained that I don't because I feel the child's task is to simply observe and wonder. There will be so much time later in the child's life for information to be given to them, but the time is limited for them to just wonder and observe without explanations being given to them. As adults, we feel the weight of information overload. What a gift to be given time to simply BE in the environment and watch day by day as the garden unfolds, without being given lessons about HOW it happens. 

Our seasonal circle has been quite an aerobic workout with bunnies hopping, bears waking up and bumbling around, snakes waking and slithering, and on it goes. By the end, I'm often panting out the last verses, as are the children! For our morning table activities, the children have been doing wet felting to create butterflies for their spring garden projects, as well as little felt caterpillars. Wet felting is such an interesting sensorial experience. It requires careful, light touch in the beginning so that the wool doesn't just break all apart, and then progressively firmer and faster movements to get it to bind together. It's warm, wet, soapy fun. 

We've been preparing our garden for planting over these past couple of weeks. Last week, we planted pea seeds in one of our outdoor garden beds. This past week, we've been filling egg cartons with soil and planting more tender seeds to grow on our sunny windowsill until the threat of frost is gone. The children planted swiss chard, arugula, peppers, kale, lettuce, tomatoes, and basil. It's so hard to wait, but each morning the children check for tiny green sprouts and I think when they come in this Monday, they'll be quite pleased with what they see!! At the same time, we have daffodil and tulip bulbs popping up in our play yard and our circle time is about all of the bulbs coming out and catching sunbeams in their cup. We'll be adding more songs to our circle this week and singing about the beetles and caterpillars and other creatures waking up to the changing world around them. 

Inside, we've added some cypress knees to our play time. They are wonderful for creating stories and the children right away figured out all kinds of things to do with them. They love to drape silks over them and create little canopy areas to tell a small story, or they nest stuffed animals in them, or even just create a "sculpture" with various ropes and pom poms. It's so nice how something so simple can create so many new ways to play. 

We've had special spring crafts that we've been working on. The children used hole punches to cut shapes out of kite paper. Later, the children stuck the shapes onto contact paper and mounted the contact paper between an egg shaped frame that they cut from some watercolor paintings. These will be displayed in our window as special Easter egg suncatchers to decorate our room for spring.