Spring Break and new inspiration!

Well, I've had several "aha" moments while working on the playscape over the break.  Sometimes I need a change in pace, a release from the ordinary tasks to dream up the really big stuff.

Future "Elm Tree-House Stage"

The first inspiration came when I was trying to come up with a design for the Treehouse, and suddenly thought how cool it would be to make it so it was "convertible", and able to transform into a stage for occasions when having a live, kid-friendly venue is beneficial.  Fundraisers, community meetings, parent meetings, family events, workshops, classes, community theater, open mics, the list is endless!

Stay tuned for sketches and a master supply list 

and please keep your ear to the ground for a good source of LOGS! We'll need a few. 

The second idea has do with the open grassy area just north of the sandbox.  It sits between two sidewalks and as of now, has no function, but I've carried around this idea that "something" wants to be there.  So I sat looking at it yesterday and it came to me!   I've decided to call the feature the center for "Mixology Studies" and create a permanent, circular area for water, sand, rocks, etc to be mixed in various combinations and cleaned up easily.  Kind of like a sensory table meets nature/science discovery table.  I will also work on preliminary sketches to post later.










Meanwhile, I have my work cut out for me finishing the dirt digging area storage, the greenhouse interior, decking out the art area and completing a mural for the "parking garage"!

Storage for Dirt Digging Feature

I'll be painting the chalkboard with purple chalkboard paint and hopefully acquiring some strong plexiglass to put up along the right side for painting on (easy clean-up) and a shelf for drying artwork above the chalkboard.  

And hopefully, keep your fingers crossed for me, I like to finish planting the slide in the big hill and building the platform for the top.

Work in progress

We are in need of ornamental grass donations to complete the slide hill/river bed feature, as soon as the last frost is passed, we will need to plant 10 ornamental grasses total of various sizes so if you are interested in purchasing them for the center as a donation or requesting donations of the plants from local growers please send us an email and we'll get you all the info for specific plant needs!

Happy gardening!

Neighborhood Concert & Artwalk

Let the fundraising begin!!!

We've booked some really great musicians to come play for our fundraiser next Sunday, the 18th!

At 2:00 Mutt & Pug Dog will start things off with their mandolin/guitar duo.  

At 3:00 will are fortunate to welcome The Magpies Duo who bring the element of bluegrass, country and old-time Appalachian fiddle tunes.  

4:00 will begin with the local band Pot O' Gold featuring skilled guitar playing and tight harmonies in the folk and celtic genre.

5:00 will bring us the fabulous children's musicians and performers Jeff Kagan & Paige Doughty, who are entertaining for all ages and write really wonderful songs with an earth-friendly message.

And at 6:00 we will welcome K.C. Groves and her band The Jaspers.  K.C. has been part of the local music scene for many years, she puts on the Bluegrass Jam at Oskar Blues every Tuesday night and was a founding member of the internationally-known band Uncle Earl.  She has generously agreed to come play at our fundraiser and you will be blown away by how amazing these women sound when they sing and play together, like angels, truly.

Lauren Dartt

We also have some great artists coming to share their work at the event.  Lauren Dartt will have her paintings on display, Dorje Dolma will bring mixed media, pen and ink and also some jewelry that she makes and Laurie Dallenbach is going to share her sculptures.  Also part of the artwalk will be the eight mosaic murals that have been made entirely by the Elm Tree teachers.   Each piece represents something the children experience when they are in our playscape, and include the four elements: water, earth, air and fire.

Laurie Dallenbach

Dorje Dolma

Other fun things to do at the event include getting your face painted (thank you Samantha Cole-Johnson!!), making art in the Children's Nature Art Zone, participating in painting a mural for our playscape, snacking on some hors d'ourves or sipping a drink while listening to some great music, taking a tour of our playscape, enjoying the art on display, bidding in our silent auction or buying a CD or two to take home!

No need to RSVP, unless you want to volunteer for the event!  Just show up at 1330 Alpine Ave on Sunday anytime between 2 and 7pm, parking is extremely limited and alternative transportation highly encouraged!

Next Steps - Sound and Sensory Garden, Fundraising and More!!!!!

Enjoying the outdoor art area

The Art Area

Our project is nearing completion, though we still have a few key features to install.  Already the yard is looking quite fantastic!  The garden is really taking off and we look forward to getting to use our greenhouse this fall!  If anyone has ideas how to heat it using active or passive solar energy we could even manage to use it through the winter for year-round growing.

We also still need shelving and a drip irrigation system in the greenhouse.  We'd like to get these items second-hand if possible the reduce the overall cost.  Let us know if you have any leads on where to get these last few things!

Tomatoes are ripening

An inviting path

The pumpkins are happy and getting huge!!

Strawberry Hill is cascading into the walkway

Beans galore!!!

Ripe with potential

The next phase will be digging up our pea gravel river and making a hill complete with slide.  We have lined up a fantastic bobcat operator, a grandfather of one of our little ones, who has volunteered his services for a day.  We're also speaking with a local landscaper who is possibly interested in helping us once the excavating has been done.  The slide is probably the most expensive element of this entire project, outdoor play equipment is quite expensive but for safety reasons, it's probably best to purchase this one new.  They cost around $900 to get the size and style that we need!

Checking out one of the new murals!

The layout of the remaining projects will probably look something like this:
Day 1:  Dig up the pea gravel area and make the river, hill and place boulders.
Day 2:  Using clay mixed with a binder, make a circular patio for our group area and install the benches and redwood bridge
Day 3: Put in sprinkler system, lay sod and stepping stones, plant herbs, flowers, grasses and groundcovers
Day 4: Put in the musical instruments and sound installations
Day 5: Create the circular cob structure for our resting area

All of these elements will also come with a price tag.  We've have nearly depleted the playscape funds from the fundraiser we held in April, putting in the garden and building the greenhouse took the majority of the funds with the mosaics using up the rest.

The water play area

Now we have to think of one final way to raise funds for our remaining projects.  Since we have some volunteer help promised and materials that we've already purchased such as the redwood bridge and boulders, we believe that between $2000-$2500 would be all we need to finish this!  Anyone interested in donating funds or materials or volunteer their help please contact us, we won't say no to anyone!  Also, we'd love some creative input for ideas on ways to raise these funds.

Some ideas we've had include:

1) Holding an art show in our backyard and inviting the community to see what we've done and what we plan to do.  Many of our teachers and staff members are artists, and some of our parents too!  Maybe we could collaborate and hold a fun joint artist's show!

2) A carnival or fair in our backyard, this would require a lot of volunteer help, but could be a lot of fun to have games, bouncy castle, face-painting, etc.

3) Yard sale - we typically do hold a yard sale in late August or early September, but this year we don't have as many donations as usual and wonder if the interest in this is waning or if enough people are interested in donating items and helping set this up, it could be exactly what we need to finish.

4) Seeking donations from funds or businesses who support this type of project.  This is made more difficult by the fact that we are not a non-profit, but not impossible.

5) Ask local bands if they would be willing to come play a couple of songs and set up another music-type fundraiser, maybe with grown-up music this time...

Other ideas are welcomed too, and anyone interested in helping with one or more of these please contact Sarah so we can start planning and dreaming!

Willows are leafing out

Soon to be our dirt-digging area, already the kids have started making that happen though!

Everything is looking so beautiful!

Building the Shade Structure

Phase I - Part III

For the building of the pergola I was fortunate to have the help of my friend, Richard Jones, who has a large collection of tools and the know-how to use them.  He also helped build the structure over the sandbox, so it was easy to construct a similar structure for the art area.  In "real life" he is a software engineer, so you just never know what kinds of hidden talents are out there.

We started and finished the project in one weekend.  On Saturday we purchased the materials and got the basic structure assembled.  The weather cooperated nicely and actually turned out to be hot, but we weren't complaining!  Once things started to come together, we could see how nice it was going to look and how well it was going to fit in with the other shade structure.

 On Sunday we put up the cross-pieces and finished the tricky, angled section of the pergola.  It was another couple of weeks before we could come back with the stain and paint it.  Once again, mother nature cooperated and kept the snow at bay until we could finish the structure and make it weather-proof. 

 We used the same color of stain as the sandbox shade structure to give the yard continuity.  When all was said and done, you could hardly even notice that the pergola was there, which means it fits in nicely and doesn't "stick out".  Success!



Halfway there



 



The Finished Product!



Assembling the Outdoor Art Area

Phase 1 - Part II

Before



Now that our concrete has been poured, we can dive into part two of this project: the outdoor art area.  We're so excited to have a place that is out of the weather to work on art and fine motor activities year round.  It will also be nice to have storage for our art supplies where they can't be blown away, rained/snowed on or taken captive by squirrels! 

 

We're working with an extremely tight budget so we'll need to find "previously loved" items for our art area if possible.  The items we need for this project are:

 

Getting There



1. Outdoor art storage that is weather, wind and squirrel proof, child-proof locks would be nice for some of the storage too, so we can keep "supervisable" materials outside and get them out as needed.

***Update***  We were able to sell a $65 backpack from our unsold yard sale items on craigslist and the same day pick up these nice metal shelves, also on craigslist, for $65!  We took the doors off of one of them so they could be kid accessible, the second one we left the doors on for storing outdoor art supplies.

2.  Art tables, weather proof, kid-art-proof and sturdy.  It would be great if they could be easily cleanable so they could double as outdoor snack and lunch tables.



Outdoor art chairs



3.  Chairs small enough for toddlers, and weather proof.

***Update***  We sold another yard sale item, a carseat for $35 and received an additional $30 in yard sale funds still owed to us, with this we were able to purchase 12 nice preschool-style chairs for $50 on craigslist, they normally sell for $30 each, and put the remaining $15 towards art tables!

4.  Chalkboard and easels - we already have these, but the chalkboards need a new coat of chalkboard paint and some buckets for chalk and erasers mounted on the wall for easy access. 

5. Planters to enclose the art area and protect it from "car traffic".  They will also extend our gardening options so in the spring and summer we can have flowers and veggies growing at kid height!  It would be ideal to find some that are already made, but we do have some extra lumber lying around and could try to make our own!

Pouring the concrete!

 Phase 1 - Part I

My son, Rowan, posing for the 'before' shot.



With a little over $1300 in the bank from our fundraiser-yard sale, we jumped right into phase one of the natural playscape project.  So on a warm Tuesday evening in late September I rented a sod-cutter and ripped out about 200 square feet of sod.  With the sod gone, the ground was ready for the new concrete that would extend our porch and be used for an outdoor art area as well as track for children to ride and drive their cars and riding toys. 

We were so very fortunate to have Jon Edwards, my father, volunteer to come from Utah and help with the pouring of the cement.  He arrived Wednesday afternoon and promptly went to work building the concrete forms.

Thursday morning he finished prepping the area--drilling in rebar, leveling it out with pea gravel (good thing we have lots of extra gravel lying around).  Then he compacted the area with a soil compactor that he brought with him! 

The cement truck arrived in the afternoon and was it ever exciting for the kids to watch that giant thing come backing down the driveway!  But the time-crunch of getting the concrete unloaded from the truck and finished off before it dried was on.  We worked until dark that night finishing the surface and edges. 

 

The next morning we took off the forms and could walk on it!  Monday morning the kids got to see it for the first time.  No one had to explain to them what it was for.  They raced up one sidewalk and down the other exactly as it was intended and clearly loved every inch of it! 

Ready to roll!

Final Cost Tally:

Sod Cutter rental: $70

Temp labor: $60
Lumber: $35

Concrete: $395

Sprinkler adjustments: $65

Total: $625
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