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completing.
As a stranger remarked while I was installing the legacy piece: “Garden time is over.” She was referring to the change in seasons, I presume, but the words rang true beyond how she may have meant them. Garden Time is over. The piece will hang into the New Year and will, I hope, have a…
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sewing
They say many hands make light work, which proved to be the case yesterday as we gathered at Buemann House to sew together the legacy piece. I was joined by a generous group of friends, acquaintances and strangers who offered their hands and hearts to the work. We cut, stitched and sewed nearly 100 fabric…
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remembering
Sometimes you find yourself kneeling before the altar of articulation, trying to summon a few words that might go hand-in-hand with what you mean to say. If you’re lucky, words appear. If not, you might find yourself invoking poet Mary Oliver, who says: “I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.I do know how to…
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passing
Yesterday’s workshop felt like a saunter after Sunday’s appearance at Garlic Fest. The skies were clear of smoke, but a blanket of clouds made lumen printing a very patient affair. I was joined by the Flower Power volunteer group, who humored me as I enthusiastically went about squishing rotten fruit into pieces of photo paper…
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summer days, drifting away
Phew. Did it happen already, was I there? On Sunday, I ran a free Lumen Printing / Phytogram workshop at the 13th Annual Richmond Garlic Fest. I hear the event was 5 hours long, but it certainly didn’t seem like it from where I was standing … the festival ended before I could eat my…
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water & sun
On Friday, I returned to Terra Nova Rural Park to resume my work. I led the first of four workshops on Lumen Printing / Phytograms with a number of volunteer groups from the Sharing Farm – the community partner for this phase of the project. The workshops were a whirlwind and I left both exhausted…
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the language of the birds
On a cool, summer morning we gathered in ceremony. Rain and song in the air, we remembered the year. Parents honored educators, educators honored their mentors. The little ones picked silk scarves out of a bag and threw them into the air like falling feathers. In a circle at the bottom of a hill, I…
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divining
There was a moment in yesterday’s workshop – after the walk in the rain, the horsetail bouquet for the beavers, the finding of feathers and flower petals – a moment that has come back to visit me now as I sit down to write. In itself, the moment is ordinary, or ordinary given the circumstances.…
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scribing
The focus of yesterday’s visit was scribing – that is, working with each of the little ones to describe in words the birds from their imaginations, to be integrated somehow into the legacy project. This was harder than I thought; I’d figured that all I had to do was set up a table and chair,…
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turning
Wednesday marked the beginning of workshop sessions at the nature school. We set out in small groups to collect materials from the land – the forests, fields, and riverbanks – for our collaborative project. We gathered with these words in mind: Winter holding hands with spring. Twig and leaf in hand, we returned to the…