May Day Celebration

I am just bursting with joy today as I reflect on the amazing amount of fun that we had yesterday sharing in the celebration of May Day and the welcoming of Spring with a nearby Waldorf school that so generously allowed us to join in with their families.

We had never been to the park that we were all to meet at and I wasn't quite sure what to expect as we made our way down a gravel path leading behind the industrial buildings along the roadside. Not far along we crossed a wooden bridge with a small creek running below it and just beyond was a wide open field surrounded by forest.

It was as if we had stepped out of the city and directly into a country field as the surrounding brush and trees closed out all signs of the bustling streets beyond.

  

There were colorful blankets placed around the field with a cluster of children and parents in the center busily working together creating flower wreaths to be worn in their hair. The children and I found strings of ivy that had been cut into long lengths just perfect for creating the sturdy bases of our wreaths and we settled on a rainbow colored blanket to weave our ivy and flowers into wonderful floral creations to wear :)

It was so cute to see all of the little ones running around and playing in the sunshine with their flower crowns on and as everyone finished up we joined in a large circle around the May pole to get started. The littlest children in kindergarten were first as they sang and weaved around one another, sometimes into each other, but so bright were their faces as they performed what they had learned for the special day.

As each group of children took turns skipping around the May pole and winding up the ribbons in different patterns it was finally time for any visitors or parents with tots to join in and my little guy in the photo above was beyond excited as he had thought he wasn't going to get a turn *grin*.

My oldest son even took part in one of the rounds with his crown of flowers upon his head :) 

He's 13 years old and growing up so quickly but I'm so thankful that he still enjoys joining in with the younger two and has fun doing it.  

When all of the children had taken a turn around the May pole it was time for just the adults to try something a little trickier. We were all numbered either a '1' or a '2' and then both groups moved in different directions around the pole as we weaved over and under one another as the waldorf teachers sang White Coral Bells. What a challenge that proved to be *grin*. Once in a while there was a little mix up but we all giggled and smiled as we fudged through it while creating a lovely braid down the May pole.

With the festivities winding up for the afternoon we shared a lovely snack of fresh fruits and veggies, raw brownies and other goodies and made our way back home where the children have been talking about it ever since :)

Hugs,

Rosina

A Handmade Christmas

This Christmas was all about creating handmade gifts :)

I wanted to create special gifts for the kids so I made each of them felt crowns. A pink princess crown adorned with ribbon flowers and tinsel trim, a pirate one for my little monster, and a crusaders crown for my oldest because he's totally into the older Indiana Jones' movies and they used the crusader crest in one of them :) We couldn't forget about daddy though so I created him his very own tugboat crown complete with a little mini tug in the same colors as his boat along with its name embroidered on the bow *grin*. It was incredibly hard to keep it a secret though! I had to do all of my sewing after everyone had gone to bed because I couldn't let the kids see it for fear that they would guess they were getting one to. So I waited until hubby would fall asleep and then I would quickly whip it out and do more work on it LOL. Needless to say there were many very late nights involved!

The kids got involved in the fun to and they each created a special Kanzashi flower for Omi (my mom). It was so cute to see my 6 year old folding the fabric and creating her flower :) We decided to put brooch pins on the back of each of them so that she could stick them onto her purse, coat or pretty much anything.

My son surprised me with this lovely little hand quilled dragonfly!! He's such a sweety :)

We even experimented with making our own felt beads which turned out really well. We turned them into another little gift for Omi by making her a festive red and green bracelet with them :)

Of course I can never get enough felt so when I ran across a fabulous tutorial for recycled paper Christmas bows to decorate gifts with over at How About Orange I just knew I had to make one to but with a felty twist to keep up with my all felt theme *grin*. So literally minutes before we were supposed to be running out the door to my moms for Christmas dinner I was busy at my cutting board zipping off strips of felt, twisting and sewing it all together to make more brooches! LOL. Hubby was watching and teasing me because as usual I had found something that I just had to do which was going to make us notoriously late as usual :)

It was worth it! I finished up two of them, one for my daughter to wear on her Christmas dress and another for my sister which she just loved! Yay. I think this was one of the most rewarding Christmases for all of us as we were so proud of our creations :)

~ Rosina