A seed is sleepy (until it sprouts)

Our daughter loves helping her dad plant and tend the garden - today it was putting in more bush beans after the garlic was harvested.  I had to smile to see her reading one of our favourite garden books for kids "A Seed is Sleepy" by Diana Hutts Aston, right there in the garden as she was working, following along what will happen in the life cycle of a bean from seed to harvest.  We love the whole nature series by Diana Hutts Aston, each with such beautiful artwork and detailed explanations and illustrations (her great titles include: A Seed is Sleepy; An Egg is Quiet; A Butterfly is Patient; A Rock is Lively; A Nest is Noisy)!!

Local Forest Schools!

We are absolutely thrilled that there are now not one, but two local options right here in KW for families who wish to send their kids to a "forest school" experience.  The Grand River Forest and Nature School offers one day a week for discovery & fun in the woods; and the KW Forest School also offers options for forest school sessions as well as shorter one-day sessions occasionally through the Transition KW(through the eco family activities subgroup).  We've been participating in the Grand River Forest & Nature School and just loving the experience.  The idea is to dress for the weather, no matter what, and spend the whole afternoon with a small group of kids and two super facilitators who guide the kids through hands-on learning in the forest.  There is a small shelter to store extra dry/warm clothes, and from there the kids have done hikes, salamander discoveries, journal writing, swamp explorations, snakes, frogs and toads, tree watching, bird watching, branch fort building, map making, story telling, singing, nature crafting projects, and more!

Solstice lanterns

We had a great time hosting a lantern making session with a group of neighbourhood kids here this week.  The kids had fun making water colour lanterns with tissue paper cut-outs, a perfect lantern that all ages can easily complete.  We also made lanterns with tissue paper pasted onto mason jars and paper-mache onto balloons (for lovely simple round lanterns).  In the neighbourhood friends of ours have been organizing an annual Solstice Lantern Walk (postponed this year for Dec 23), with everyone bringing along homemade lanterns of all shapes and sizes, as well as hot drinks and plenty of warm gear for walking through the streets on a cold night.  We come back for a little street party and bonfire, and for this our household also prepared a huge basket of cedar & sage bundles, which participants can toss in the solstice bonfire as we speak of hopes and joys for the coming year.  All are welcome to join the lantern walk coming up this Monday.

Spelt Banana Bread

We're always on the look-out for healthy snacks, including wheat and sugar free options whenever possible.  We are having fun going through Molly Katzen's kids cookbooks with our almost-5 year old, who loves helping in the kitchen.  The recipes are simple, healthful and vegetarian - three things that are surprisingly hard to find in a kids cookbook!  The books include step-by-step pictures so kids can follow the recipe even if they are not fully reading yet.  We see how kitchen projects can build confidence for children - reading, measuring, numbers, cooperation as well as independence, learning to following something from start to finish to get delicious results - not to mention creativity, as each recipe gets adapted based on what we decide want to add or change.  Needless to say, we love working together in the kitchen as a family and try to do a little of that every day. 

Here is a new favourite recipe for a banana bread that is sugar-free.  It's great for breakfast or mid-day snacks, and has lots of stages for kids to help (mashing bananas, beating eggs, mixing dry, mixing wet, etc):

Spelt Banana Bread

Ingredients:

2 cups whole spelt flour (or other flour you wish to use)
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnut
1/2 cup chocolate chips, optional (this makes the bread a little sweeter)

4 bananas, mashed
2 eggs, beaten
1/2 cup milk or milk substitute (or even yogurt)
1/2 cup applesauce, pearsauce, applebutter, plumbutter (whatever you have)
1 tsp pure vanilla

Method:
1) Preheat oven to 350F.  Oil large loaf pan.
2) Mix dry ingredients in a bowl.  Mix wet ingredients in another bowl.  Combine wet with dry.
3) Stir just to combine, do not over-mix at this stage.
4) Bake aprox. 55 minutes until knife inserted comes out clean.  Let cool before cutting.

Winter crafting - Ice Candles

Since the weather has turned cold again we have been searching for wintery projects, both inside and out.  We have been reading about the history of ice candles.  There are many ways to make ice candles, and many northern countries have wonderful long-standing traditions and festivities using ice candles during the cold dark months.  This would be a great project to do with kids just before the winter solstice, but mid-February will do!  To make an ice candle you can simply freeze buckets or cartons filled with water which, when unmolded, become candle holders; or create more elaborate ice scuplted shapes as the water slowly freezes; or another variation is to add ice chunks or cubes to a candle mold, add a wick and pour hot wax over (the ice leaves designs in the candle).  We used a very easy method - freezing water in a round bundt pan - but first added sage, lavender, hops, cedar and thyme from the garden (and other bits from the yard) as decoration from our garden to add delicious scent as the ice melts and candle burns. 

Birthday celebrations

Someone turned 3 today!  The woodland fairies arrived at our place to celebrate the day: there was a new birthday crown (sewn the night before), favourite stories & popcorn in the tent, then roaming through the gardens, wood-fired personal sized pizzas from the outdoor oven (with our most-loved pizza crust from Feeding the Whole Family), zucchini spice cupcakes (recipe below) topped with fresh local berries (decorated by our 3-year old), and later, dinner outside in the evening with a little campfire.  Lovely day.

Zucchini Spice Cupcakes - wheat-free, dairy-free
1/2 cup margarine
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
3 farm-fresh or free range organic eggs
1 1/2 cups light spelt flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 Tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp cardamom
pinch of sea salt
1 1/2-1 3/4 cups shredded zucchini, packed

1) Mix margarine, sugars and eggs in a large mixing bowl, stirring well. 
2) Mix dry ingredients in a separate bowl.  Add to the margarine/sugar mixture.  Stir until just combined (do not over-mix). 
3) Then fold in zucchini and mix again until just combined. 
4) Pour batter into lightly greased (or lined) cupcake tray.
5) Bake at 350F for about 40 minutes, until golden and knife inserted comes out clean.
6) Ice with your favourite icing (as cupcakes), or serve plain (as muffins).  Variations - add nuts, raisins, chocolate chips to the batter.

Wild berry smoothies

A favourite at our house these hot days...any variation on cold berry smoothies.  We love wild foraging berries and already this season have made many mulberry, saskatoon, strawberry, and wild raspberry smoothies - as well as trying currents, elderberries, cranberries, and of course our most loved, blueberries.  Fresh berries have huge health benefits, including vitamin C, lutein (for maintaining healthy eyesight), and flavonoids (which may help in preventing some kinds of cancer).  Plus they taste wonderfully sweet without sugar added, and are a simple refreshing treat.  Here's our homemade recipe, that can be adapted easily to incorporate what you have on hand.  Kids love to help make these smoothies, measuring and adding in all the ingredients one by one.

Wild berry smoothie
1 cup live culture yogurt or kefir
1/3 cup homemade applesauce (no sugar)
1/4-1/3 cup wild berries, or combination of berries (fresh or frozen)
1 large banana
1 tsp hemp oil or flax oil
1 tsp nutritional yeast
optional maple syrup (a dash)
optional pure almond butter (1 Tbsp)

Puree all ingredients together in a blender until well combined.  Add a few ice cubes if you are not using frozen berries to make this an extra cold drink.  Thin the smoothie as you like, using rice milk or pure fruit juice.

Yields: aprox. 2-4 servings

Maya's kitchen

We're so absolutely lucky to have someone in the house who has the skills (and loves) building beautiful projects out of wood - my partner, and Maya's dad - Greg!  We'd been admiring wooden play kitchens in various natural kids shops, but couldn't bring ourselves to purchase one. Yesterday's hot weather found him taking a "break" in the shade of our porch, building the most lovely play kitchen out of wood he'd been saving just for a project of this scale (left over tongue-and-groove boards from the ceiling in our strawbale house addition).  The kitchen includes a real bar-sized sink for washing dishes that can drain into a pail below.  Maya helped with passing tools, measuring boards, and checking the level...and by the end of the day, there it was, ready to fill with stacks of dishes, baskets to hold food, and her tea set.  Definitely going to be an heirloom piece we hold onto, and will get many hours of creative play.  Currently she is drying her own calendula in one basket, "curing" a few bars of soap on the top shelf, and keeping her dishes washed in the sink.   There's been a request for wool felt play food, so I'm working on that. 

Herbal sunscreen - make-it-yourself recipe!

I've had quite a few requests for an all natural herbal sunscreen.  We've been experimenting with a recipe here, testing it out and tweaking it to use ingredients that are easily available.  I'm really happy with the results - a nice thick creamy spreadable sunscreen that absorbs well and doesn't feel sticky.  It has natural sunblock (sesame oil), soothes the skin (cocoa butter), has natural antiseptic qualities, smells lovely, and is easy to prepare.  We hope to have this available in our etsy shop at some point this summer, but for now here is our recipe so those of you who like to experiment with all things herbal can make it at home yourself!  Our recipe is based on one from an old issue of Mother Earth News magazine, modified it to suit our needs.  Here's the recipe:

Herbal Sunscreen - safe for kids (use externally only, and reapply every few hours)
70 grams organic sesame oil
45 grams organic cocoa butter
15 grams pure beeswax
110 grams (4 oz) strong green tea
2 Tbsp zinc oxide
1 tsp vitamin C powder (or other natural preservative)
10-20 drops pure lavender essential oil

1) Melt sesame oil, cocoa butter and beeswax in double boiler or in a small saucepan on the stove over low heat.
2) Remove and add green tea, zinc oxide, vitamin C powder and lavender oil.  Mix well with a stick blender until creamy.
3) Store in glass jars or other small containers with tight fitting lids (or reuse an old sunscreen tube).  Keep in cool location to keep in thick spreadable condition (or firm sunscreen back up if necessary by placing in the fridge for half an hour).

Peas and more peas...encouraging kids in the garden!

We are loving the fresh peas around here these days..the ones in Maya's garden have come up first (because she watered them faithfully every single day!).  There is so much information out there about the benefits of connecting kids with gardens - tactile learning, confidence building, creativity, health, encouraging stewardship of the land, etc...Here are some simple tips on how to make kids feel successful and connected to their gardens and a nice article on this topic from the City Farmer website:

- give kids their very own space to garden in
- let kids help choose (buy/save) the seeds themselves
- encourage them to grow lettuce, carrots, peas, radishes that come up quickly
- spend time exploring the garden (learn about soil life, insects, plants, etc)
- add artful elements (let them make signs, fences, other decorations)
- allow kids to harvest, nibble, and cook with the foods from the garden!

New crafting - kids hemp-linen messenger bag

Since it's winter...and the garden is still under snow...I'm spending a little time sewing each day.  There is so much inspiration from a 2.5 year old, especially when she is enthusiastic about each and every item that comes off the sewing table!   These messenger bags will show in in my etsy store soon.  They are made of a beautiful sturdy yet soft hemp-linen fabric, are reversable (with a full contrasting liner), have two back pockets and a wooden button closure that little fingers can open themselves.  The perfect bag for spring foraging, packing snacks for a walk, taking books to the library, etc.  It's a basic design that I created from looking at a variety of messenger style bags, made simple enough for a child to enjoy using every day!