Wild Wonder Creators Camp Reflection
Wild Wonder Creators Camp is a summer break adventure in making, crafting, and creating with the natural world. Designed for kids 8-12 years old, campers learn new skills, like natural weaving, plant-based dye making, herbal remedies, and printmaking, using materials we harvest together on the farm and in nature.
This June, we hosted two sessions of Wild Wonder Creators Camp! Read below to learn more about this year’s camp from Youth Education Director Jesse Wilson.
“This year’s Wild Wonder Creators Camps were truly grounding - for adults and kids alike. It was inspiring working with kids who were able to slow down, focus, and enjoy the small acts of noticing, playing, and creating. I was inspired working alongside staff who guided that sense of wonder, sense of place, and sense of belonging.
Lia and Jenna of the Youth Education team speak to the campers
This summer we gathered at Mo’s Garden Events, which was just such a beautiful corner of Gainesville, with huge, Spanish moss cloaked oaks leaning into our group circles and birds singing through our outdoor crafts.
A camper explores the Giving Garden Farm
Each morning, we took an easy walk to the Giving Garden Farm, where we centered ourselves with yoga, breathing, stretching, and noticing.
A camper holds a small bug in their hand
We then shared a daily riddle that led campers on a treasure hunt for small hidden items in the garden (a small stone, a tiny clay mushroom, a lock, a key, etc). As the weeks went on, older campers eagerly took over the game, hiding the little treasures for the younger campers to find. Each day also included a quest to gather a particular plant or plant part that would become part of our day’s creative work and an afternoon snack.
Marigold abundance
Early in the week, we simmered marigold petals to create vibrant natural dyes, inks, and watercolor pigments. Alongside marigold, we explored the beautiful colors of roselle, butterfly pea flower, indigo, clay, and even cochineal, discovering the remarkable palette that nature provides.
We dyed cotton cloth and cord, and used these materials to weave personal story tapestries, which we added to each day alongside beautiful items we foraged throughout our days - gifts from our walks and explorations like bark, feathers, grass, and flower stems. These same foraged materials became whimsical masks, staffs, wings, hats, and costumes that invited storytelling, imagination, and endless play.
During our second week, when we took our craftwork further, we extracted pigments to make our own hand-mulled watercolors, which we set and packaged in small tins alongside hand-stitched booklets and tiny paintbrushes to make our own portable watercolor kits.
Campers watch over a marigold pigment extraction
Right now, I’m enjoying thinking of the exploration that was able to continue beyond camp!
One hope we had was that if we shared tools, materials, and expertise, campers would have the ability and excitement to choose the creative activities that brought them the most joy and focus. Some kids immersed themselves in weaving and took it farther, others created intricate and elaborate costumes with many parts - wings, masks, belts, skirts, hats, etc.
Other campers enjoyed the calm of painting, or dreamed up something entirely self-directed to make. With our high staffing ratio, we were able to meet them where they were.
Campers weave their own personal tapestries using fabrics they dyed and natural fibers they foraged
Each afternoon we enjoyed amazing snacks fresh from our Giving Garden Farm, Nicoya Farm, and Stoke Farm (thanks!) The kids were excited to try new watermelon varieties, make fresh snacking pickles, and enjoy a variety of colorful, pigment-ful teas each day. Just as at home, the kids chipped in on the daily work, from snack prep to dishes and clean-up.
We were moved by the pride with which campers showed their parents what they had made - real items, full of meaning and imbued with the place and season in which they were made.
As we often find, we were really moved by how kids found a slower pace. Without tech or screens, and with camp at a slower pace, the world right before us seemed to open up and come into focus. We danced in the rain, wrote sometimes silly and sometimes serious poems beneath the oaks, played cards in the sultry heat of summer, and were just present.
Campers dance in the rain!
It felt like what childhood summer is supposed to be!
Thanks to Monica for sharing her beautiful space with us, farmers for sharing nourishing food with us, and to all the families who trusted us with their awesome kids!”
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