Medicine Club Trek 11-22-15

It was SO wonderful to spend the day with the Trilliums! These girls brought their adventurous spirits armed with their abundant nature knowledge to successfully lead us on our off-trek journey  to Teddy Bear Cove, braving the cold and the dark, smiling all the way.

There is a reason this is one of our favorite outings: it's jam-packed with all the best elements of an Explorers' Day: route-finding, reasonable risks, the need for collaborative decision-making, unexpected encounters with natural elements (wind, fields and trails, water, mud, dense forest, etc...), a walk through a beautiful old farm, vistas of islands, and more.

Highlights of our day:

• Spending an hour in our gathering meeting, checking in with one another about how our life is changing as summer turns into fall.

• Collaboratively deciding on the "challenge by choice" of route-finding our way to the Mud Bay trail through dense forest (there was an option to take the more direct route of the Interurban Trail, but no one voted for that!). Using our safety awareness to move cautiously off trail, avoiding the the spikes of Devil's Club as we walked through the forest.

• Immersing ourselves in the earth skill of Navigation all along our journey, pausing to establish cardinal directions, and repeatedly check in with them ("Where do you think we'll end up if we keep going this way?" "Which way is the sea, and what direction is that?" "Which way is Teddy Bear Cove and what direction is that?" "Which way do you think we should turn to get to Teddy Bear Cove", etc...), helping the girls practice navigational awareness all along the way. Later in EC, we'll tie this in to an awareness of life direction, paying attention to the choices we make that determine where we're headed.

• Learning about the wonders of Devil's Club (and renaming it Medicine Club, due to its innumerable uses): as blood sugar regulator, skin infection fighter, addiction destroyer, energy giver, and much, much more. Like nettle, misunderstood Medicine Club has a bad reputation solely due to its effective defense mechanism. It asks for respect, and in return offers many methods of healing and support. 

• Doing S.T.O.P. risk assessments all along the way, traveling slowly and with awareness as we navigated through salmonberry, nettle, and "medicine club". This practice and habit of awareness is an important skill to cultivate, in forest travel and in life.

• Had lunch at Woodstock Farm, embracing the wind and the rain. Played Skunk and Spray to warm up our chilled bodies.

• Making collaborative decisions all along the way, practicing the art of listening to everyone's opinion, then coming to consensus about what can work for all.

• Enjoying the pastoral peace at Woodstock Farm, and learning about the generosity of its founder, Cyrus Gates, who donated land for Larrabee, Arroyo, and Fairhaven Parks, Chuckanut Island, and many other green spaces in Whatcom County.

• Peaceful Place on a bluff above Woodstock Farm, watching the eagles soar above the bay.

• Thoroughly enjoying each other's company, stretching our edges, collaborating and compromising, and, at the end of the day, enthusiastically appreciating one another.

EC Mottos especially alive today:

* Safety First

* Be Prepared

* It's About the Journey, Not the Destination

* Leave No Trace

* We're All Teachers

* You See It, You Own It

* Collaborate and Compromise

* Stretch Your Edge

* Challenge By Choice

Photo album from our day can be found here!

* Expect the Unexpected

Veteran's Day Service: Trail Maintenance at Agate Bay Preserve

After an exceptionally blustery and rainy evening, the weather cleared for the Trilliums to complete their service project at the Agate Bay Preserve.

We arrived at Patricia Otto's house on Agate Bay Rd and immediately dove into our day. We started with an opening circle talking about our service project and the impressiveness of Tricia's stewardship. From there, we met up with Tricia, and she showed us around her property, gave us some background on the space (100 acres!), and took us on a tour of the beaver family that resides on her property. We learned about beaver families, thought about how they change the landscape, and got to see the tunnels this particular beaver family is working on.

It was impressive to hear how things had changed in the thirty years since Tricia has owned and worked on preserving her property. We learned that before Tricia arrived, the land was used for cattle, and instead of the slow creek that currently meanders through the front of property, there was simply a culvert for cows to drink from. As Tricia began transitioning the land from grass and pasture to a more hospitable ecosystem for native plants and animals, a beaver family damned up the culvert and created the creek as it is now. On our tour of the property, we were able to see all of the work the beavers had done. In addition to this, we got a glimpse at the impressive work Tricia has done to provide birds, bats, and ducks with habitat. There are countless bird boxes, bat houses, and man-made cavities for wood ducks.

After our tour, we learned about our service project for the day: our job was simple, clear the trails on Tricia's preserve to ensure they continue to be accessible. We grabbed tools and hit the trail, and soon broke into two groups the Cougar Lookout group and the Chantrelle Hunters. Each group was to take on different trails and do trail maintenance along the way. We spent the majority of our day in these two teams. We worked, laughed, imagined, and ate.

We came back together at the bridge on Tricia's property to recap our day, swap stories, and finish with an attitude of gratitude. One group had found sticks in the woods and decided to have a stick wedding. Weddings are a Trillium tradition. To honor this creativity, we had an impromptu wedding on the bridge leading up to Tricia's house. We quickly made an aisle, selected flower girls, put together bouquets, and elected an officiant. The wedding was quick, but as always, awesome!

From there, we sat in a circle and shared our gratitude from the day. Girls were thankful for Tricia and all the work she has done, sticks, veterans, and team work.

Photo album: https://goo.gl/photos/7CTGvN8pZVeeLpkt6

Racehorse Falls 6/11/15

Woowee! What a wonderful day with these lively, joyous, thoughtful, adventurous girls! From fossils to the creek, we explored it all. We traversed, we attempted to cross creeks, we sang; it was day full of exploration and camaraderie as the Trilliums reconnected with old friends and Widened Their Circle to welcome new ones.  Here are some highlights from the day:

• Singing songs as we traveled in our beloved Stubbs, watching the landscape change from city scape to country forest. Learning all about the monumental landslide that occurred at Racehorse Falls a couple years back, the damage that it wrought as well as the Problems Turned into Possibilities of epic fossils uncovered. 
• Testing our northwest nature knowledge with a forest pop quiz.
• Traversing a jumble of logs to reach the creek! We were greeted by the sunshine as we ate lunch next to the bubbling waters of Racehorse Creek. Looking around us we began to spot the fossils that frequent this beautiful place. Much of the rock is shale, which some girls kindly represented, its layers breaking apart easily to unearth hidden leaves, ferns, needles, and even palm fronds from long, long, ago. 
• Journeying down the creek, using our nimble feet to carry us safely over rock and water.  
• Finding a Peaceful Place along the creek side to sit in the stillness of nature, connecting to the sounds, sights, and smells around us. 

Mottoes in Use Today:

Safety First

Widen Your Circle

Problems into Possibilities

You See It You Own It

Leave No Trace

To see a link to our photo album, click here!

-Isabel

Service Project with Mollywood Avian Sanctuary: 9-12-15

Welcome to the Trilliums' new blog! GEC is on the move to switch to a google-based system, and we've therefore switched to this new blogging system. Each blog post will include a link to the photo album from that day. Any feedback you have is much appreciated!

Mollywood Avian Sanctuary has been described in the past as: “A place with its own world of sounds.” A world of sounds indeed! Imagine over 150 parrots, mostly cockatoos, squawking and screeching for your attention, and you have some idea of the loveable chaos that we were fortunate to take part in on Satruday afternoon.

Mollywood was founded by Betsy and Nate Lott, whose love of the companion birds led to their unforeseen caretaking of hundreds of birds who have been abandoned, abused, or neglected by their owners. Parrots are the third most popular pet in the U.S. and can be found in 17.3 million homes. Unfortunately most parrot owners aren’t aware of the effort and  commitment needed to effectively care for these birds (parrots can live to be 80 years old!), resulting in 85% of them being given away within the first 2 years. This highlights the need for committed and compassionate people such as Betsy, who tirelessly work to provide shelter and sanctuary for these lively and loveable birds. Betsy volunteers day in and day out to care for these birds, forsaking a paying job and virtually all of her free time. She relies on other volunteers, such as the energetic and enthusiastic Trilliums, to help maintain the sanctuary and ensure a healthy and hospitable environment for the birds.

The Trilliums really lived up to the EC mottos of Our Cups Overflow, Everyone Helps, Walk Your Talk and Get Dirty as they ambitiously and diligently cleaned out the debris and food discards from under the cages and swept up huge, heaping piles of wood pieces, bird seeds, paper scraps - you name it - and put them into the garbage. Imagine a room packed with 100 birds, all in their separate cages, and now imagine the collective mess these birds make over the week (we ended up with 13 huge bags of garbage!). The girls tackled this mess with enthusiasm and a bright positive attitude, not letting the hard work dampen their spirits or weaken their efforts. The Trilliums filled the room with smiles and laughter as they cleaned and swept, all the while talking to the birds, who were whistling at them, vying for their attention with nonstop "Hello! Hello!" asking "How Are You?", bouncing up and down. Soon the girls had transformed the room into a clean, spotless sanctuary. 

We came to Mollywood committed to serving and making a small difference in the lives of these birds and their caretakers, but walked away with so much more. We spent the day basking in the love and joy that these birds carry with them and truly felt the pleasure that comes from sharing our work, time, and effort with those that deserve it the most.  For more information about this wonderful organization, please visit their website at:www.mollywood.org

EC Mottos especially alive today: 

Be Prepared

Safety First

Walk Your Talk

Get Dirty!

Expect the Unexpected

Our Cups Overflow...

LIBK

You See It, You Own It

Everyone Helps

We're All Teachers

Collaborate and Compromise