We had a wonderful first week at Earthwise Forest School! There is so much beauty and biodiversity to explore at Cascade Mountain Ranch. This week the children enjoyed climbing large rocks and old Madrone trees, eating manzanita berries and the tips of pine needles (both of which are high in Vitamin C for immune system support), exploring turkey tail mushrooms, cracking acorns, observing woodpeckers, Stellar's jays, lizards, and many types of insects.
During craft time, we welcomed the autumn equinox with our students by peeling back the husks of some multicolored flour corn harvested from my garden and making our own corn husk dolls.
Right away the children observed the acorns dropping from the abundant oaks on the land and began collecting them, so we are working with each child to sew their own acorn gathering bag. Next week we will gather, crack, and process acorns from the land together and cook acorn cakes. For anyone who hasn't tried acorn before, it is a traditional staple food of many Native American peoples and has a delightful sweet, nutty flavor similar to corn flour.
Thanks so much to our parent community for supporting our growing program! We will be updating this blog weekly throughout the year to share stories and photos from our days together in the forest.