Day 4 at the Steiner Institute, Summer

I know I haven't really shared much of the experience of being here at the institute this week outside of my class. Uploading pictures from here has really turned out to be a pain because of the computer I brought with me so I've been documenting my class as best I can and just skipping the rest. I just wanted to briefly mention the event last night though, just in case anyone is considering coming in the future. Last night was the weekly "coffeehouse" event, which is basically an open mic night, and it was such an amazing experience. We were treated to singing from a local singer/songwriter (whose CD I bought), singing in French, poetry, spinning tops in candlelight, a silly song about Rudolph Steiner, a group singing a beautiful hymn, poetry in Spanish, and many other lovely, funny, touching events. I'm so glad I was able to be a part of this sweet and wonderful community for a week.

The discussion on summer was the least developed of the week, probably because of the ending of the school year. We did talk about a sweet (and out of print) Japanese story called The Moon Maiden, that I will probably try to find a used copy of. For felt projects today, we just worked on anything that we hadn't yet tried and finished up projects from earlier days. I started off making a summer sunset picture. It's not yet dry, which is where the wrinkly look is coming from, but I love the effect that the mica has in the descending night sky.

Late yesterday, I decided to make a pumpkin and a mouse, which is hiding inside the pumpkin, to go along with the verse from autumn. The pumpkin isn't quite big enough to cut holes into so I might need to make a bigger one for the mouse, but I love how the top comes off and treasures, or mice, can hide inside.

The Easter eggs are now cracked as well.

And I thought a story mat to use for both Peter in Blueberry Land and Blueberries for Sal might be a fun summer activity. I'll have to make Peter and Sal later.

Today was our last day for felting. Tomorrow we'll be moving on to sewing as we talk about birthdays. I had an inspiration at some point today to make Finn a felted birthday crown, so this is the beginning. I'm planning to put a star of some variety on his crown each year for his birthday so that the stars number his age. I also made a star out of the same wool, which has sparkles that are hard to see in this photo, that I'll likely make into an ornament for Finn to hang on the tree since he's a Christmas baby.

Tonight's song:

See how the bee with busy wings,

Home to the hive, the sweets doth bring.

He gathers from the flowers of spring.