...into the forest

Last week we saw flowers on the way to the park - small brave crocus that braved the cold and shivered with the rest of us... this week instead of going to the park we went to the local wooded area - maybe not the best patch of nature Stockholm has to offer - there is so much rubbish lying around but its just a 10-15 minute walk (for 2-4 year olds) to get there. So we can use it as a quick nature base to see how the seasons come and go - and also as part of a project for taking care of nature - we can go equipped with gloves and bags and help to keep nature clean (whatever clean means? - I mean mud, is that clean? Yet its part of nature? Could be an interesting discussion about clean...)

But we went in search of nature... and when we got there in search of fairies, trolls and tomtar...

signs of spring we did find - but we had to look hard - the buds are still well curls up in small fuzzy packages. Why fuzzy? Is it to keep the baby leaves warm?

Rock climbing

rock sliding

building a house for the fairies

"look at this big one"... back and forth, back and forth he dragged the branch with a big satisfied smile on his face

Exploring... freedom! The rule, stay where you can see us teacher, and where we can see you...
its a matter of trust...

Finally we can find pine cones again! The best part was when a child exclaimed - "Look I have found a squirrel" holding up the pine-cone. Hmmm, think we need to get out into nature MUCH more!

There was stick collecting, fairy house building, signs of spring searching, rock climbing and sliding - but most of the time was EXPLORING - just getting to know this collection of trees, rocks etc, and learning how to explore freely and stay within the limits (reminders were needed to be given)

 time to lie back and look up and just observe - even just for a few minutes - to gain a new perspective of a tree!

As we headed back there were sighs of disappointment - had an hour gone so fast - and when can we come back...