Snow Day! In the middle of March no less…One of the things I was dreading about our move back to DC was the propensity to cancel school and any number of things at the mere hint of snow here. Being from North Dakota, I poo-pooed these rash reactions, and I loved the more Danish approach to snow days, remembering them something closer to my own.
Back when I first started working, I enjoyed the occasional snow day as a day as basically a day off or a day to catch up, but anyone who’s tried to work a snow day with kids in the house knows that you’re always half a step short of becoming that BBC guy (btw, how adorable is the follow up interview).
Well the time has finally come for our first real snow day this year, when it should be nearly our first real spring day. And to the DC school’s credit, they didn’t actually cancel school – they only did a two hour delay. And despite having a school day, our tot remained a forest schooler at heart, getting dressed after her day to head outside with the sled, even taking her little brother along for the ride for his first real go at a slope.
As it turns out, DC snow days aren’t bad at all! We’ll take another please!
A casualty of moving around a lot is losing track of seemingly just about everything that you need for everyday life right at the time that you actually need it. Of course, you find it again once you cease needing it. It’s just one of those things that always seems to happen no matter how much you manage around it. Most recently, I can’t seem to find anything related to mail, thank you cards, postage or getting anything by post to anyone of note on time. And we’ve been lucky – friends and family have been good to us so it’s reminded me to get our tot set up with a little thank you stationery kit of her own. And since the forest is still near and dear to her, I thought this would be a fun little theme:
Forest Creature Personalized Thank You Cards
We go to Minted a lot for all sorts of holiday cards, but I’ve also ordered personalized stationery cards for the kids from here as well. You have the option of adding a print or a photo on the back of the card so if you order them small batches at a time, it’s a nice way to have both card and photo all in one go.
Wooden Twig Colored Pencils
I mean, does it get more forest school than pencils that look like twigs? I don’t know if these are the most practical of pencils, given that they require full on whittling to sharpen them once they run down but if you read anything about the wet saw and the knives, you know a little recreational whittling won’t scare this former forest schooler!
Truffle Case Bag
In forest school, pouches and boxes that keep things that go together actually together are life savers, and for all sorts of small sundries for travel and backpacks I love the Truffle clear plastic, but heavy-duty, cases. Thought these fun colors would be great for keeping all the card writing goods together in one spot!
Critter Stickers!
We are just getting into stickers as decoration here although sticker books have been a long time travel fave of hers. Lately, she’s been liking stickers as a quick way to decorate letters and crafts and projects. It’s nice when you get a few large sheets or bulk sets (Mrs. Grossman are a favorite and they bundle them together in a local toy store here for a great price) so that they’re not too precious when they start getting enthusiastic.
Coastal Bird Stamps
They always said that Denmark would turn us into birdwatchers. And despite me laughing when they said they were a little right…so much so that when I saw these coastal bird stamps at the post office, I thought of them for her. Only after did I see that they’re $0.34 of face value so for a card in an envelope, you have to use too but it just makes the envelope prettier (for a postcard, go for one!). I remember going to the post office with both my grandparents and my parents and them letting me pick out stamps for my own letters so I love that we get to do that here as well too. Who knows, stamps and letters might not be around forever but it won’t be because we didn’t go to the post office!
As a family, one of our favorite trips hands down is to the Salzburg area in Austria and the bordering German Berchtesgaden area, mostly due to its “something for everyone” nature that we’ve grown to love.
In the days long before our post in Denmark, we actually lived in Vienna for three years and so the alpine area became a favorite, even for a weekend trip. We first started going as a couple, then with an infant, then with a toddler and now with two. Each trip leads us to a new discovery or two, like the Haus der Berge Nature Center and Nature Playground in the town of Berchtesgaden. We no longer live in Vienna of course, but this area of Austria and Germany keeps us coming back. We could even say they were the precursor to forest school.
I had actually forgotten that we had gone on a trip there last year, but one of the benefits of strolling down memory lane, is going through the photos from the year past and realizing how much I hadn’t gotten a chance to write about! Haus der Berge ended up a highlight of our trip, for us and for the kids so I thought I could still share here, especially as we were there almost a year ago exactly.
Haus der Berge translates into “house of the mountains” and serves as a visitor center of sorts for those coming to see the Berchtesgaden alps (more on that adventure on our other blog and our absolutely favorite place to stay, btw they are awesome with kids). It only opened in 2013 so it’s rather new on the scene as far as the town goes, but it filled a much-needed gap.
The inside of the center itself has great and interactive exhibits on the wildlife and seasons of the surrounding alps, featuring lots of local taxidermy. Our daughter was going through a major raptor/birds of prey phase at the time (um, thank you Wild Kratts?) so the various stuffed hawks and falcons suspended in flight from the ceiling were a highlight for her. As were the displays detailing how the animals live throughout the year.
But for kids, the major highlights start once you work your way through to the outside. These guys really deserve some kudos for playground design as it teaches you about the alpine area at the same time that you play in it. Case in point, all of the climbing structures and enclosures actually are built in various traditional styles of fences and ramparts used throughout the mountains to protect land, prevent erosion, or contain livestock. Little signs detail how each is built and the major advantages and disadvantages – you wouldn’t think you would learn that much but I certainly did and we ended spending a lot of time talking about the differences of the various builds.
The play area itself was a treat with plenty of places to climb, and balance. The structures are low enough to be doable, but complicated enough to require kids to do some thinking. At the time, our youngest was just figuring out the joys of a playground so many of the structures were too big for him but he enjoyed following around his big sister and throwing a rock or two all the same.
The tree house at the top of the structure and climbing with the aid of rope holds were here favorite!
Between the actual nature center and the playground, we ended up spending the better part of the afternoon there and only left because we got hungry (the few tiny packs of gummy bears didn’t quite cut it and we missed last call at the little cafe they have on the premises). The center is open year-round, and it would easy be great in the summer and fall, as well as on those days that end up a little too warm for spring skiing. I don’t know what the winter days would be like but my guess is that if you dress appropriately, it’s fair game!
The climbing wall was the feature we couldn’t pry her off in the end. Unlike most practice rock climbing walls with different color holds attached to an otherwise flat surface, this one was built to look and feel like a natural mountain face. Children had to actually find holds and navigate their way up. Again, like the playground, it was low enough that a fall would be safe but tall enough to make kids feel accomplished. If the goal of the wall was to inspire kids to eventually take a stab at the real thing that surrounds this area everywhere you turn, I’d say that that mission was accomplished!
Once we really got into the swing of things in our Danish forest school, there was part of me that started to worry that perhaps we might not ever make the switch back to normal school. I mean, fresh air every day? outside play every day? the opportunity to explore every day? The best friends of her life, every day? Our last months in Denmark I was dreading, for many reasons, when our last day of this freedom would come, worried that our daughter might react poorly to what might seem an abrupt clipping of her wings.
As usual, I shouldn’t have worried. Because as usual, the Danish system had more built in than I knew about at the beginning.
When students are in their last year of forest school, usually the year they turn 5 or 6, depending on their age and readiness, after the winter holidays, the school separates out those children into a skolegruppe, or, “school group”. Once a week those children get together as a cohort in those last months to start preparing for their transition into a more traditional schooling environment. Just as for us, forest school, as wonderful as it is, doesn’t go on forever for any of the children. There does come an end, which they work through and prepare for together.
During the skolegruppe, the children will break off and start to get exposure to letters and numbers, perhaps even doing a bit of writing and drawing. They talk about what the expectations of them will be, how much fun they will have and the adventures that await them in their new schools. In fact, the group goes on field trips to visit the three or four elementary schools were most of the kids will end up as students, so that their first exposure to it is with the friends they feel closest to, in the environment they know best. They talk about which students will go where, so already build a sense of having friends and continuing along the path together.
For our daughter, as we knew she wouldn’t be attending a Danish school because of our move, this was bittersweet. There was something comforting in knowing that everyone in her age group was going through a transition, but she was nervous that her path wouldn’t be like the others. In the spirit of skolegruppe, we found and shared a video of her elementary school here in DC, which she showed to the group and translated for the kids on a day dedicated to talking about the transitions that she would make. She told them all about the wonderful playground that she would have, and they cheered her on and supported her, students and teachers behind her all the way. Her first day here in DC, she walked in with such confidence as if they were all right behind her, cheering for her still, and it made all the difference in the world.
