(Painting by Bruce Steinhoff)
"
A truly good book teaches me better than to read it. I must soon lay it down, and commence living on its hint. What I began by reading, I must finish by acting."
~ Henry David Thoreau
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Grandfather Stone
Another season of creative and community-oriented activity has long-since unfurled at Sticks & Stones Wilderness School, as we welcomed in this beautiful green summer, with its cool wet start, its heat waves, the sound of its 17-year old cicadas. Stepping outside, the warm breeze hits our faces every morning, and our noses are met with the fresh smells of damp soil and dew-covered greenery.
Most recently at the workshop we ran our Flint-knapping course-- the art of making stone tools: arrowheads, spearheads, knives, etc. Looking ahead to the approaching deer, bear, moose and elk seasons, it's time to pull out our sticks and stones to prepare our tools for the sacred harvest. Participants worked to develop and hone their relationship with the ancient material, "Mother Earth's Bones," our local stone.
How many strikes of the hammerstone does it take for this tool to feel like an extension of your own hand, so that the shards flaking off your project piece are deliberate? So that the direction you send your energy flowing through the homogenous material actually leaves the track we intended? At what point does the hard stone begin to feel fluid in your fingers, maleable, shapable?
It must not be control over the stone that we seek, control is not the aim-- indeed, how could we ever be so bold as to claim we are able to reign in and harness the wisened stone, whose transient formation was millions of years ago? Instead, we embark on a dynamic conversation with this elder of ours, we accept it as our teacher, our mentor. If you speak to an expert flint-knapper whose finished pieces are true works of utilitarian art, she or he will tell you that the journey of learning never ends. Sometimes that final little ridge you raise your antler pressure-flaker to humbles you entirely, and you witness the symmetry you so carefully coaxed of the stone become thrown off entirely. And so it's time to find a new rock on the beach, strike it, listen for that glass-like clinking tone that indicates the desired finest-grain... and begin the lesson anew.
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What's Happening at Sticks & Stones:
Upcoming Courses
Empowering Ancient Ways: September 4-11
Deepen your connection to nature through Ancient Wilderness Living Skills. As you explore and practice a broad set of ancient and universal skills, you will begin the journey of integrating nature connection and stewardship into your daily life, and learn how to turn the impact of your human footprint into something truly positive and fulfilling. Read more...
Stick Bow Building:
Sept. 15 - 18, 2011
How about harvesting a deer or a turkey this season with a tool you've made with your own two hands? Students spend time shaping, tillering, bending and finally shooting their own bows. This course is the journey of the wood from the forest to the hand-tailored bow, in 4 days. Read more...
 The Art of Felting:
September 16-18, 2011
An ancient and practical art form. Felting has traditionally provided many cultures with the warm clothes and shelter-building materials necessary for survival. It involves understanding the properties of natural fibre and working with the nature of the material to matte and build individual strands into a sturdy, strong material that has an endless possibility of uses. Read more...
For later in the season, check out:
Ancient Art History - October 7-9, 2011
Cordage, Fibre & Containers - October 28-30, 2011
Hide Tanning -November 3-6, 2011
Using the Whole Animal - November 19-20, 2011
Way of the Hunt - November 21-27, 2011
Winter Tracking - December 8-11, 2011
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Wilderness First Aid Training
Saving Lives in the Woods
As part of the ongoing support training with the Apprenticeship Program, we invited Carl Chambers of School in the Woods- A Red Cross First Aid Instructor to provide a 40 hour course on Advanced Wilderness and Remote First Aid. The course ran from Monday August 8th through Thursday the 11th, 2011 at our workshop and property in the Hills of Headwaters. Training was intense and the scenarios were very life like.(below Doug Getgood (assisting student) acts out a severe puncture wound while Duncan Clark (apprentice) holds traction on the potential fatal wound) The course was a great way for our apprentice's and long time students to get the emergency medical certificate training, giving them the opportunity to prepare for future employment with the various wilderness guiding and instructor positions they will be involved with next year.
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Sticks & Stones and HERBS!
Winter on the Mind?? By Kate Sutherland
I know, we don't want to imagine all that beautiful luscious green covered in white stuff-- but it may be time to do just that. The more our family lives and eats according to the seasons, the more we must look ahead and plan for the months when the world of green is but a pleasant memory and a sweet anticipation...
Time seems to be speeding up-- are any of you feeling that? Sometimes I get out of bed early in the morning and it feels like five minutes later I'm watching the sun set over the hills, silhouetting the sunflowers and corn stalks in the garden, which peak just above the horizon line. I'm on my feet all day, trying to make the most of these so called "lazy-hazy-crazy days of summer" (who has time to be lazy right now? There is just so much life around us, so much opportunity for learning and growth... even as I sit here typing, the blue sky and wildflowers-- heck, even the mosquitos and earwigs-- are calling me to get out into the sun).
Harvesting in Cycles
Staying on top of herb and vegetable and wild harvesting has been a large goal of mine for the summer. As I mentioned in our spring edition, I made lists of wild edibles and medicinals that I wanted to harvest this season, and did some preliminary research as to what needed harvesting when. I've had my eye on various plants over the course of spring and summer, watching them grow, noticing where the magic, dynamic growth energy of the plant was being held at various stages of their development...
The fresh, shocking green of watercress caught my eye very early on, as one of the earliest spring emergers. Imagine how beautiful and appealing that plant would have looked to our ancestors, who hadn't seen the colour green for upwards of six months... Just try to visualize how drawn to the cold-water spring they would have been, how tender the tiny leaves would have felt in their dry, winter-roughened fingers, how that sharp-tasting, crispy vegetation would have made their mouths water, delicious and energizing, how every cell in their bodies would have been crying out for its long-absent nutrients...
This is how I'm looking at the world around me, more and more. And so, now is the time to be harvesting that sage, thyme, rosemary from the garden. Half for today, half dried and/or frozen for the winter of tomorrow. Wild raspberries drip from overladen branches down the back hill-- they too are picked carefully and dehydrated or frozen, half for this week, half for the cold frozen winter of tomorrow. Next week, I will pick a few more handfuls of kale from the garden, and dehydrate it, to add to our January stews. The mullein and St. John's Wort flowers called to me, bright and yellow, just last week, and are now slowly infusing into oils on the windowsill, and alcohols in the cupboards... And I have my eye on those first-year burdock plants, as well as the purple chicory flowers, whose roots I will harvest once the vibrancy begins to fade from the foliage and flowers....
As I learn to read the energy of the plant world around me, I am doing what I can to maximize my family's health and wellbeing into the future. I like to make as few trips to the grocery store as possible, not just in these abundant months of summer, but all year round.
Next project: building a cold-cellar for all those beautiful roots, tubers and squashes, which are oh-so-slowly fattening up beneath the soil and on the vines....
The journey continues.
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Tracking Club
Join us for a day of exploring the natural mysteries of our local ecosystems through tracking and wilderness awareness skills. Our meetings are open to anyone of any age.
Next Meeting: Sept 2011; exact date TBD
We will meet at 10 am sharp at the Sticks & Stones workshop. Dress warmly and bring yourself a lunch or some snacks, and water. Email us to let us know you're coming, and for directions:
info@wildernessschool.ca
Headwaters Gathering
Fall gathering Postponed until spring 2012.
A traditional & ancient earth-based skills gathering, people of all ages and experience converge for a weekend of workshops, story telling, trading goods, sharing knowledge, stewardship projects and celebrating life. It's a wonderful place to gather and reconnect with each other, the earth and the natural world.
Link: http://www.earthmentorship.com/Headwaters/index.html
Next Gathering: The first weekend in May, 2012
Stewardship
We welcome your support whether through your energy or by way of financial or equipment donations. Please contact us if you wish to take part in any project or would like to make a financial contribution. If you would like to donate equipment, please visit our "Wish List" to see where our needs lie.
If you have a stewardship project in mind or have access to land that is need of rehabilitation, please feel free to contact us, we'd love to talk with you about it.
Community News - August Events
The Art of Mentoring is fast approaching! This inter-generational nature connection workshop runs for one week at the end of the month, and is a life-changing experience for many of the attendees as they learn the value and potential of their essential roles in a healthy balanced community.
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