Do your shopping in West Bank Park!

This time of year is really when there is the most tempting array of colourful berries, crab-apples, nuts, acorns and conkers on display. So we went a-gathering them in the old-fashioned way. Each child had their own little basket (made out of old Shreddies boxes mostly) which they decorated themselves. Gathering was great, except that it has been a good year for mushrooms and the children were most interested in these - wouldn't it be great to know which ones were edible, then we wouldn't need to scare them away from them all! Once we had enough we headed for a bench in the woods and set up our shop. Rusty old weighing scales came into their own, as did egg-boxes (conkers make great shiny eggs), and of course the littler ones did their usual thing of tipping over boxes of produce, then racing off to run up and down hills/bash their heads on branches/get lost.

Next week Bryony will be in charge! I can't wait!

Bringing in the sheaves!

This week we were playing with straw - this time it was not pinched from any nearby field, but legitimately bought in Acomb Pets (which I would recommend as a morning outing for a boisterous preschooler - watching the lizards being fed with live locusts will shut them up). The task: to make a corn dolly!

We started with the story of corn dollies: for centuries, people have worried as they cut down the last sheaf of their crops - leaving the fields desolate and lifeless - would nature help them again next year? It must have been very sad to look out on the stubbly, empty fields all winter. So they took that last sheaf and made it into a corn dolly to hang over their fireplace all through the winter.

Well, ours were a bit smaller. And held together with string. And for the younger members of the group, it was more practical and fun to stuff a piece of cloth with straw and draw the dolly's face on instead. And to be honest, the kids were in a running-around mood. So we took our dollies with us and headed for the Story Trees to risk life and limb climbing up and down the roots instead.

Newsflash: we have got our funding!

We (and the Friends of Rowntree Park, and Pine Trees Day Care Centre) have received some good news: we have been granted the £1500 we asked the council's Active Arts Team for to do Community Mapping projects in each of our parks! We will work with an artist to produce beautiful maps, containing all our individual knowledge of the parks, that will stay on display as a record and to guide new visitors to the parks. What is the next step? We have to choose an artist! Anyone interested in sharing their ideas about the project, or just hearing more about it, is invited to a planning meeting with the council officers involved on Monday 29th Sept at 10am in the park cafe.

Another bit of breaking news: every year the Friends of West Bank Park ask a wood-carver to carve a tree in the Park - in previous years it's been a Green Man, a nymph, a lion, a totem pole...this year they have asked him to carve something low-down that even toddlers will be able to reach. He will be doing it on Sunday 5th October, 10am-4pm approx, near the New Lane entrance to the Park. Events like a Tree Walk, some live music, storytelling and refreshments are planned for those who come to watch him carve. So keep the date free to pop by!

The past two weeks have been fairly low-key at Very Young Friends. On 11th Sept we gathered some windfall apples and went to the cafe to - rather cheekily - cook our own lunch! We made couscous salad with fruit and cheese, and ate it all up (or most of it anyway). The children managed the hot water very well. The following week, my dear husband Andreas met a few of you in the playground for some good traditional swings-and-slides action.

Hope to see you this week!

Harvest time continues...

It hasn't been such a good year for blackberries, but the zealous Very Young Friends found an incredible number in the Park this week. The difficult part is deciding whether to eat them yourself, contribute them to the shared pot of blackberry yoghurt, or put them in the mashing pan to make dye. Even more difficult is keeping little hands out of the yoghurt pot! But it was very impressive how even the smallest children managed not to touch the hot dye pan, but instead helped to blow on it and cool it down, hands carefully tucked behind their backs.

It was nice to watch bits of fleece turn pinky-purple in the dye, and hang them up on the line. We followed it up with the story of Tom Badger collecting paints from the end of a rainbow, and using them to transform all the houses in his village. Our rendition of 'I Can Sing A Rainbow' afterwards was (I thought, anyway) actually quite moving!

On another note, we are making an application for funding from the council for an arts project in the Park, along with the Friends of Rowntree Park and the Pine Trees day care centre. It would be something everyone, of all ages, could get involved in - not just the making of it, but also the design. The idea is to make a 'community map' of the park that would show everyone's favourite corners of it, where people used to play as kids, what their private names for this clearing or that mound are....if you are interested get in touch with me (catherine.heinemeyer@barkmail.com). We should find out by the end of September whether we have the funding.

All the best,

Summer goodbye

Well, it seems that summer has got bored of us and decided to leave early this year. So we made the best of it by having our 'harvest'. We threshed wheat (thank-you to the farmer who incompletely cut his field on the way to Bishopthorpe) on a picnic blanket, and shelled lots of peas from my allotment, only some of which had maggots in them! Then we ground them into flour, made them into soup, bashed them with sticks, rolled them down hills and generally investigated them thoroughly! Of course this was followed by the story of the Little Red Hen and her farming adventures, ending with some REAL cake.

Otherwise this summer, some of us went on a trip to the Murton Farming Museum and enjoyed - I hear, I wasn't there - more real cake as part of a story by Rosemary.

For next week, my thoughts are turning to blackberries....what do you think?

Play Day: Wild Camp in the Woods!

We are absolutely delighted with our 'Play Day', jointly run with City of York Council (that is, with our Parks Officer Stephen Whittaker and his van-full of equipment and tools!) which took place on Wednesday 6th August. The theme set for Play Days around the country was "Give us a go!" or 'Risk in Play'. We are good at risk, much better than we are at safety in fact, and did indeed give it a go.

We had a 'wild camp', with shelter building, tipis, assault course, bow-and-arrow making, natural dyes and foraging for food. An incredible number of children turned up - perhaps 100, aged from 0 up to about 13. It was great seeing all the kids and their parents throwing themselves into all the low-tech, down-and-dirty activities. The only shame was having to take down the wonderful swings, rope ladders, shelters and tunnels afterwards.

Thanks to Phil and Bryony, Rosemary, and Stephen Whittaker for all their hard work and enthusiasm! And now have a look at the pictures!

What's inside this....?

At this time of year many plants are producing their berries, fruits and seeds and this week we had a look inside some of them to see what they are like. Sycamore 'helicopters' have a funny fluffy stuff in them, for example, and the 'bumpy bits' of blackberries have a lovely teardrop shape if you cut right inside them. It is hard work to pull pinecones right to bits but it can be done.

Then we made some little gathering pots out of air-drying clay, some of us imprinting them with berries and twigs, for future gathering expeditions - we are keeping an eye on those blackberries as they ripen!

NEXT WEEK, the day after our PLAY DAY on the 6th, there will be no group. The following week, the 14th, there will be a group - meet as usual at the bench - I won't be there but others will. Then, on the 21st, it will be our trip to Murton Park Farming Museum, for tractor and steam train rides, talking to their animals, and storytime in a Celtic village. Please write to me (catherine.heinemeyer@barkmail.com) if you are coming - I need to book the minibus!