Hello! It’s been another action packed month in Bristol. Spring has arrived and the Tree Life Centre has sprung into life with leaves starting to appear on our trees and flowers popping up in our forest school area. Our pond is full of tadpoles, bees and butterflies are flying round the site, Great Tits are calling noisily and Jays are flying round collecting nesting material.
Comma butterfly
In the last month I have been busy leading volunteer tasks at the Tree Life Centre. We have been improving our food growing area, by replacing the old beds with large new raised beds and constructing a living willow fence. We were awarded funding from the council to run the Grow Wild project for another year which will see us teaching food growing skills to adults with special needs. The volunteers and I have sown a variety of fruit and vegetable seeds ready for the project to begin.
The new food growing area.
I have also been assisting with the family nature sessions that we have been running every other Saturday. I have been doing bush craft activities such as fire lighting and campfire cooking with the families as well as shelter building and tree planting. The families have also been helping with tasks on site such as watering our plants and helping to create sections of willow fencing.
I have continued to work with a group of young carers who have been coming to the Tree Life Centre on alternate Saturdays, playing games, building raised beds, whittling spoons and Kazoo’s and cooking delicious food on the campfire, including toasted cheese baguettes, banana splits and strawberry and marshmallow kebabs, YUM!
A Kazoo (you blow through the gap in the middle and it makes a sound)
Strawberry and marshmallow kebabs!
I also was very excited to start my forest schools training. I attended an initial 5 day training course In Tintern, Monmouthshire, a beautiful part of the world! I learnt about the forest school ethos, learning and development theory and lots of practical skills including safe tool use, fire lighting skills, woodland ecology and lots of fun games and craft activities. I was particularly proud of the clay face I made to guard my special tree! To gain the qualification I will be leading a series of forest school sessions at the Tree Life Centre and will have a year to complete lots of coursework!
My creativity surprised me!
So it’s been a busy but enjoyable month! Will update you again in May!