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Our days and weeks of late have been filled with both settling and exploration. Each day we settle into our new home a bit more, create new cozy nooks and spaces for play, find the just-right spot to hang a piece of art or a kitchen utensil… And each day, we venture outdoors to explore the land. We are getting to know the map of our land, getting acquainted with the flora and fauna of the area, including a little owl, a few deer, and a snowshoe hare. And the kids are also busy nesting and creating space within the forests – several forts can be found, including a post office, a jail, and some home spaces.

We’ve found a lovely sledding hill that lands in the frozen marsh, surrounded by cattails. At least one of us (myself, ahem) is eager to harvest the cattails for food and craft in the coming seasons. We’ve wandered along deer trails and found bursting poplar buds to harvest, and foraged in the pine forest for resin. There is so much wild medicine here, so much healing and wisdom held in the trees and plants. I’m looking forward to using the poplar bud oil along with the pine resin and maybe some willow bark to make a powerful healing salve for myself and my friends and family who deal with pain on a daily basis.

This weekend, we’ll start tapping the few small maples and few clusters of birch to make a small, but special batch each of maple and birch syrup. Or, depending on the volume we receive from the trees, we may just enjoy the sap as it comes out of the tree or use it for wild sodas. Just before Pi Day we went for a walk and measured the circumference of the trees, and then figured out the diameter, using Pi – trees should be at least 6″ for tapping. Some people work with a minimum of 8″, but I’ll trust our local tapping expert (mainly because our trees are pretty small, and we really want to tap them, ha.) There is so much learning that just happens on a daily basis, even outside – especially outside? Yes, that. Looking forward to a spring and summer of nature based learning!

 

          

 

Well, that is quite a loaded lately! It’s hard to believe that I’ve been pulled away from this space for almost a year now. Though my mind and hands have been too occupied to make it here to share and connect, my heart has been here. If you have stuck around and are checking in periodically, thank you.

The past several months have been a whirlwind of planning our family-run homesteading festival from fall through spring (with the hard work of so many amazing volunteers), holding the festival in the end of June, recovering from said festival – and all the while, continuing our search for a farm to call home. Right around the time of the fest we found a place that was a dream come true and put in an offer. We were heartbroken to find out another offer was placed and accepted the same day. This was just one more in a series of similar heartbreaks, though it felt harder than most. Later in the summer we found out that the deal on our dream land and home had fallen through and we had another opportunity to make it happen. And we did!

Late summer and fall have therefore been mainly about packing and moving, and now unpacking and settling into our new home. Getting acquainted with the 80 acres we now steward has been such a joy and the ideas are swirling around in a dreamy way – we’re quite eager to feel our feet firmly planted on the ground, once we’re settled in, so we can begin the work of turning observations into plans and DIY projects for future events, plantings, and more.

If you’d like to follow along with our homestead journey, you can find us on Instagram as @cityfolkfarm. We know we are going into this journey as city folk who will make a myriad of mistakes that may invoke the “Oy… city folk” response from our country neighbours. We figured we should come into this from a place of humility, acknowledging our greenness and honouring the opportunity to learn from our inevitable mistakes! And, of course, continue to be able to laugh at ourselves when we make them, learn, and move on.

We are all keen to settle into this space and re-establish our family rhythms. Things look different and feel different for our crew, and in this season of chaos I am so very thankful for the seasonal rhythms we have grown in our family life. These rituals and celebrations will anchor us as we establish new roots in this land and home. Bigger things like our lovely Advent activities and gift-making that carry us through the holidays with intention and love, and the smaller but oh so important things like a seasonal book basket, tea and story time, bird-watching station, and nature walks.

There are just too many photos to share here in one post, so enjoy this small selection of pics from the festival and our new place. Please do stay tuned for more photo posts of what we have been up to as of late!

 

    

 

 

A glimpse into our days before the snow graced November…

 

// rose hip harvest

// forest fort building

// co-op trip to the zoo

// hanging with a runaway turtle at the plant conservatory

// garden clean-up actually happened this year (kinda) due to the late snow!

// nourishing cocoa with cacao, chaga, ashwaghanda and elderberry

// basketball coming out of our pores. oh, the focus. the energy. the passion!

// knitting and finger knitting stacks of head warmers to string up in our neighbourhood for the folks who walk our lanes in the biting cold of winter.

 

     

There’s a lot of pressure on young children to learn how to read and write; it seems as though this expectation is now in stride with learning how to tie your shoelaces. Just today I heard from a mom whose five year old brought home worksheets to fill out as homework. For kindergarten. Homework.

As home learners, we have the freedom to allow our children to pick up reading when they are ready. We’ve exposed them to countless bedtime read-alouds, morning story times, letter sound exploration (SOUNS) and a home rich in word – read, written, spoken, sung.

Admittedly, it was nerve-wracking at times to trust that our first child would pick up just what he needed to when he needed it. And he started recognizing letter sounds on our outings – the S in safeway as we drove by, the O in the pattern on a railing.  Next came spelling out small words phonetically and pretty much reading at four or five. Even though he could read, he wasn’t really interested in reading himself books even at age seven. Other kids were reading small chapter books. We continued to read to him and support his learning in a gentle manner. At nine years old, he developed an intense love for reading and jumped right in to chapter books, reading for an hour or more most mornings as he waited for the rest of us to wake up. He has read entire chapter books to his little brother on road trips, and eagerly awaits the arrival of new books from the library. The other day he said, “It’s funny how sometimes when you’re reading, you’re kind of just reading the words, but other times it’s like you’re right there in the story and part of it all.” Right now he’s reading about a book every day or two and working on writing down new words and looking them up in the dictionary.

Unfortunately, reading doesn’t just happen for everyone in such a smooth way. Sometimes it’s a bumpy and even turbulent ride, especially when they tire of hitting those bumps. This is the case for our now 13 year old who is on the autism spectrum. She can read and this past year has marked a huge leap in her reading skills, though she is still at a very low reading level. The struggle is finding very simple and non-distracting chapter-book like books that aren’t babyish for a teen. Even with the right book, it’s a struggle to get through our reading times, though the successes are increasing and leading to more enjoyable reading times together.  I think the importance of reading is finally sinking in, as she comes to realize how it affects her ability to act out her passions. This kiddo loves to cook and bake. She loves to eat. And loves good food. I recently purchased a couple of recipe books for her and we’ve continued on with our cooking-baking-herbal program. Today we baked the delicious pumpkin loaf you’ll see below. I pretty much stepped aside while she read the recipe and went through the steps, only asking questions so she could double check her reading. We talked through how different the recipe could turn out if she had in fact put 2 cups instead of 2 teaspoons, used baking baking powder instead of baking soda, or put two ingredients where the recipe said “or” for example. She would be over the moon to be a chef and the experience of working through recipes is really illuminating this practical-life value of reading.

On top of that, it’s a great life-learning scenario for practical math and the importance of teaspoons versus cups, and knowing basic fractions. Today we ended up playing with measuring cups and cutting up an apple to explore fractions in the middle of our baking time. We’ve explored these things before, but these are the times they become more concrete and meaningful. In real life. Within a context. Within a context that really matters to the learner. Instead of groans, I got a kid who was jumping up and down at feeling so empowered to be who she is and follow her passion. It’s times like this when the incredible blessing that homeschooling is really hits me.

Our third home learner is just now consciously digging into reading. He is six years old and has picked up on quite a few letters through osmosis, but is requesting to learn the full alphabet and to read and write more readily. Having two older siblings who read to him, and who he sees dedicating time to working on the process has really helped him to recognize that it’s something he can put effort into when he is ready and he’ll see results. We’re excited to be walking a Waldorf path with him, introducing each letter through stories and illustrations, alongside the SOUNS letters we already have. He is learning the capitals and lowercase side by side. And he is over the moon to have now read the very first BOB book in the series we have had waiting in a basket for him for a while now.

I’m thankful for this multi-year lesson in trust and patience and am excited for the day when all of us will be curled up on the couch, each with our own book in hand, immersed in vastly different worlds while sitting right next to one another.

 

Chai Pumpkin Lattés

Rooibos chai tea
+
Steamed milk, maple syrup, pumpkin puree, cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg

Pumpkin Loaf

First try on both of these recipes and we loved them. A great after school snack and now the freezer s stocked with slices for later October days…

Gluten free + vegan recipe. Our 13 year old baker-cook made this batch, featured on the blue stand in the photo below!

Spelt recipe.

cozy reading

clay animal play

Reading practice is more grown up when you’re reading to a smaller one…

A little corner of our home…

Cosmic Kids Yoga is a fave.

Baking pumpkin pies.

Knitting stash.

The kids call it “the best homeschool co-op ever”.

Gorgeous new map book!

Waldorf human and animals study.

Tidying.

Mid-morning snack.

Bringing the outdoors in for some free arrangements.

Cleaning beeswax block crayons is easy with some olive oil and a cloth or paper towel.

Carrying on with our new found love for shrubs (seriously considering a soda stream for sparkling water), we decided to try making an elderberry shrub syrup. A couple (tiny) folks in our home are not huge fans of elderberry flavour, but if you like elderberry you’ll enjoy this drink. We ended up blending some elderberry with some grape for a happy compromise and some immune boosting power in our fizzy grape drinks!

To make your own elderberry shrub:

// Simmer 1/3 cup dried elderberries in 1.5 cups of water for 30-40 minutes or so (however you would normally make elderberry syrup in your home!).

// Strain the berries out of the liquid. You should have just over a cup of liquid left.

// Add 1/4 cup of apple cider vinegar and about a tablespoon or two of honey, depending on how sweet you’ll want it. If you’re using a good raw honey, I wouldn’t worry about adding too much, particularly if your kids will actually drink it if it’s on the sweeter side.

// Pour into a canning jar and keep in the fridge for up to a few months. To enjoy, pour some of the shrub syrup over ice, add any other shrub syrup or juice that you’d like to mix in to about half-way up the cup, and top off with sparkling water.

 

Fall has been so good to us, clasping the hand of summer and not letting go quite yet. The air is fall fresh, yet not biting. The leaves are underfoot and crunching. The birds and squirrels are about, preparing. And we’re out with them. Learning. Playing. Creating. Dreaming.

What’s in our outdoor classroom wagon?

// yarn + knitting needles for the older two and myself (the youngest finger knits)

// boiled water in a thermos, mugs, tea bags

// snacks

// sketch books for nature illustrations

// story book to read aloud, chapter books for quiet reading

// basketballs for playing and we also used them as a manipulative to toss back and forth while we counted and skip counted (forgot the bean bags)

// journals – Be the change you wish to see in the world is on the cover and they were purchased at Dollarama. These are for dreaming up ideas of how we can change the world, our home, our neighbourhood… with our own two hands (we listened to Ben Harper’s song with my own two hands). Part of our exploration of the Steiner/Waldorf concept of thinking, feeling, willing. 

The print below is available in the shop as a printable PDF!

 

Harvest season is probably my favourite time of year – the one where we fall back into familiar rhythms, breathe in the crisp air as we bring in the last of nature’s garden offerings. Chard, kale, borage and basil to dehydrate for green powder and pestos. Squash for baking and soups. Grapes to freeze and flavour kombucha, which gives an amazing welch’s grape burst. Honestly, though, I actually had never quite found a simple way (I almost always take the path to least resistance when preserving) to process grapes that makes me swoon. Until this week when I discovered shrubs.

Shrubs are light blends of juice, vinegar, and sugar, poured over ice and topped off with sparkling water. To make our grape shrub, I first made juice by simmering our grape harvest and running it through the vintage mill. I was left with about 1 quart (4 cups) of juice and then did this:

// 1 qt juice

// 1/2 cup organic cane sugar

// 3/4 cup apple cider vinegar

This mixture was poured into 250ml canning jars, labeled and popped in the fridge. I’ve read varying notes on expiration – that shrubs will last anywhere from a few months to a year when refrigerated.

Apple cider vinegar is such an amazing health food and I’m excited about this simple, tasty way to get more ACV into my diet to help my aching joints and for overall health. More on benefits of ACV by David Wolfe here and Wellness Mama here. Our shrub recipe was based on this one at Slow Food Seattle  – head over there for more history and recipe inspiration on shrubs!

Things slowed down quite a lot this summer as we were either busy in the garden, splashing in the kiddie pool or on a sweet summer adventure. The kids are back in action and reinvigorated to work on their project. We were all re-inspired by this video!

The other day they scored some aluminum roofing for $22 after weeks of hunting online for free roofing materials with no luck. A trip to grandpa’s work to use the angle grinder is in the works, to cut the panels to size. In the meantime, they’ve started on framing the roof.

Loads of sketching, block model building, measuring and sketch-up modeling. The kids and I just learned how to use Sketch-up today, so our model isn’t spot-on. The kids took measuring tapes around the house to measure the depth of various seats, tables, and benches, to get an idea of how deep a loft and a bench would have to be to be comfortable, while still keeping things on the smaller side so there’s plenty of room to lounge around on the playhouse area rug.

For those who are interested, the overall dimensions of the playhouse/cottage/clubhouse are 64″ x 96″ with a sloped roof just under 6’5″ at the highest point.

They’ve thought of so many fun little nooks for their space:

• Loft

• Three benches that can be used together as one long bench, or separately as table seating, or as step stools to get up into the loft or reach something down from a shelf. Each bench will open up for storage – one per child. The problem-solving process of deliberating how to have a flexible space was great

• Hooks for jackets, bags, etc.

• Mat for shoes and boots

• Kitchen sink (which will be set up with a gravity fed water supply in the spring)

• Hinged, flip up table top

• Shelves for books, personal items, and kitchen/craft equipment

Plans for decorating and art projects are in the works, so each child will feel it is their own special space.

They’re still in need of a few materials. If you happen to have anything kicking around, let us know. We’ll continue to search kijiji, the restore, and back lanes for:

• scrap wood for siding, interior wall paneling, shelving

• small window that opens

• small sink

• door with window

• tiles for floor (to provide thermal mass) (we now know we don’t have a high enough window/overall soft ratio, so the tiles won’t really help!)

 

Since we have decided not to insulate the structure, at least for now, the kids are asking to have a fire pit inside their little cottage. As a compromise, we’ve agreed to stoke the outdoor fire pit to heat up some larger stones which will be brought into the cottage in a metal pail, along with their radiating heat, or wrapped in a blanket. Plenty of tea will be sipped as well, I’m sure.

 

Aaand just like that, another teenager in our home! One who knows what she loves – animals, crafting, music and cooking to name a few. It’s a joy to spend time with her learning about animals, taking on DIY projects, singing along to favorite songs and whipping up meals in the kitchen.