10Jul 2024 by catbird 1 Comment
Magical Summer Solstice Rituals & Traditions

Magical Summer Solstice Rituals & Traditions

Craft Project, Folklore, Recipes, Summer, Summer Solstice
The Summer Solstice is the longest day of the year. It’s the day that the earth is tilted the closest to the sun and consequently has more hours of sunlight and less hours of dark then any other day of the year. The sun is at its highest point in the sky on the Summer Solstice and shadows are the shortest they will be all year. The word solstice comes from the Latin, sol means sun and stitium means still. The sun on the Solstices seems to pause, leading our ancestors to surmise that it was standing still for a time. Humans have observed the Summer Solstice since the Stone Age. Stonehenge was built at least in part to track the Solstices. On the Summer Solstice the rising sun is framed…
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05Jul 2024 by catbird 6 Comments
Seashell Fragment Wreath

Seashell Fragment Wreath

Craft Project, Nature Art, Nature Collection, Summer, Summer Solstice
Every summer we seem to acquire an overwhelming number of shells. Little clam shells and river mussels from the creeks around our house, snail shells around the garden and a whole array of shells when we visit the beach. The kids and I will both often collect little bits and fragments of shells, they might be super shiny or have an interesting pattern of shape. They all have their merits, but all those broken bits scooped into a bucket, toted home and left to sit have tendency to just kind of disappear. I wanted to do something with them that would showcase them up close, the same way you hold them in your hand close to you when you are finding them on the beach. I wanted to emphasize those…
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05Jul 2024 by catbird 1 Comment
Summer Nature Table

Summer Nature Table

Craft Project, Nature Art, Nature Collection, Nature Table, Play, Seasonal Nature Table, Summer, Summer Solstice
Nature tables are the perfect place to store and display all those nature finds that we “just had to bring home.” Honestly, I am almost as bad as the kids about this… Ours is on our porch so that things can be easily added and subtracted at will and we change it out for each season. (And it substantially reduces the stray sticks in the house..) In summer, the rock and shell collections get especially prolific, along with interesting sticks, feathers and flowers. Use log slices or old shelves and add some height. Try a vase to hold flowers. I like to stick rooting houseplants on the nature table too, they love the heat and filtered light, while the kids love to watch the growing roots. The kids are always…
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21Jun 2024 by catbird No Comments
What is Summer Solstice?

What is Summer Solstice?

Folklore, Learning, Summer, Summer Solstice
The Summer Solstice is the longest day of the year. It’s the day that the earth is tilted the closest to the sun and consequently has more hours of sunlight and less hours of dark then any other day of the year. The sun is at its highest point in the sky on the Summer Solstice and shadows are the shortest they will be all year. The word solstice comes from the Latin, sol means sun and stitium means still. The sun on the Solstices seems to pause, leading our ancestors to surmise that it was standing still for a time. Humans have observed the Summer Solstice since the Stone Age. Stonehenge was built at least in part to track the Solstices. On the Summer Solstice the rising sun is framed…
Read More