Tag: community

Posted on

Slice of Life Challenge – March 2 – Pop-Up Fairy Gardens

I was listening to Jennifer Serravallo speak at a conference in Savannah, Georgia over the weekend when she asked us to turn and talk to our neighbor about something we’ve recently taken interest in or want to learn more about. My colleague didn’t have to think long.

“Building fairy gardens,” she said.

She and her five year old daughter recently started building one and are finding joy in spending time together designing and curating their garden while talking about fairies and other important matters of life.

“What a coincidence!” I shared. “My father was my guest blogger last month for a post on brownies. His writing inspired me to create pop-up fairy gardens in some areas of our county and invite people to add to the gardens. Do you think people would enjoy contributing to a fairy garden expansion, especially now that it’s practically spring?”

She did.

Jennifer Serravallo redirected us into the next segment of her presentation (which was ah-mayz-ing, by the way), but my colleague and I picked up our fairy garden conversation at the next break. Talking over the restroom stall doors, while washing our hands at the sink, and in the snack line to get one of those fudgy, nut-laced brownies and a cup of coffee, we chatted up the possibilities…..

I couldn’t stop imagining….what if we really did plant the seeds of fairy garden starter kits with a note inviting families to add to the fairy wonderland worlds?

On Wednesday morning, back home from our conference, I texted her: Want to go on a fairy garden dash at lunch?

Yes, she texted back.

We grabbed our protein bars and skipped the sandwiches, heading out instead to search for fairy houses, miniature chairs and benches, the tiniest wishing wells and birdbaths, and even itty-bitty garden paths leading to the fairy houses. We wrote invitations on laminated notecards and affixed them to metal proclamation frogs introducing the fairy gardens and welcoming the addition of more fairies and creative enchantments – and not missing the opportunity to suggest that families read more about fairies!

Fairy garden finds from our mad dash at lunchtime

And then……we waited for businesses to close and went on the fairy garden pop-up mission after obtaining permission from the managers of a few of our chosen establishments! We arranged the first three fairy gardens under the cover of semi-darkness outside two libraries and one local coffee shop.

Pop-up fairy garden outside the window of the children’s section of our county library

We can’t wait to see if the fairy gardens grow…..and if so, how they grow and change through the springtime. It is our hope that families wonder, create, admire, design, plan, talk, and spend time working together with others in our community having fun….that perhaps we, too, will bloom and grow.

Welcome, fairies!

Pop-up fairy garden in the outdoor seating area of our local coffee shop on the town square
Pop-up fairy garden outside the window of the children’s section of a library in one of our towns

A blog post by Leigh Ann Eck yesterday about looking for the unexpected inspired me to change the idea I had for today’s post – since the gardens are kind of….well, unexpected. Thanks, Leigh Ann!

Special thanks to Two Writing Teachers for giving writers space and voice!
Posted on

Preparing for This Weekend’s Great Backyard Bird Count

The Great Backyard Bird Count kicks off this weekend (February 17-20), and I’ll be counting the birds that come to visit the Johnson Funny Farm in Williamson, Georgia – partly because I love birds, but partly too in memory of my mother, Miriam Haynes, who adored them and worked hard to establish a nature-loving legacy that she would be proud to know lives on in ways that continue to make a difference.

Here is everything you need to know to prepare and to participate this weekend. I’d love to invite you to participate and to share your findings and photos on your blog post next week. It takes as little as 15 minutes to observe and only a few minutes to report.

The Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) started in 1998 when the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society collaborated to create the first online citizen-science project. In 2009, Birds Canada joined forces to expand the geographic data collection points. Its goal is to encourage people from all over the world to spend time watching and counting as many birds as they can, and then reporting their observations – which helps scientists better understand global bird populations and their migratory patterns.

To take part in the Great Backyard Bird Count, you can visit this link to learn more – but to make it quicker and easier, I’ve pasted this information from the link:

Step 1: Decide where you will watch birds.

Step 2: Watch birds for 15 minutes or more, at least once over the four days, February 17-20, 2023.

Step 3: Identify all the birds you see or hear within your planned time/location and use the best tool for sharing your bird sightings.

How to Share Your Observations:

  • If you are a beginning bird admirer and new to bird identification, try using the Merlin Bird ID app to share what birds you are seeing or hearing.
  • If you have participated in the count before and want to record numbers of birds, try the eBird Mobile app or enter your bird list on the eBird website (desktop/laptop).

Here’s a link about the Great Backyard Bird Count from a former edition of Georgia Magazine.

We have two Great Horned Owls that I hope will make an appearance – or at least be heard – during the GBBC Weekend! Listen closely and you can hear them exchanging their innermost thoughts.
Special thanks to Two Writing Teachers at Slice of Life
Posted on

Pet Rock Relationships

Have patience with everything that is unsolved in your heart and try to cherish the questions themselves. – Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

In 2006 when I was going through a divorce, I did a lot of self-help reading as I climbed out of the rubble to begin a new life. Somewhere in all of those books, I came across a line that still causes me to stop and reflect: Trust is more important than love.

Apparently, several different authors have used the line, because it’s attributed to a list of names on a Google search. For nearly 20 years now, I have wondered about ways that the trust vs. love question could be true.

The Aha! moment came in a conference on building community partnerships that are categorized as connecting, cooperating, and collaborative. The speaker said, “Collaboration is built at the speed of trust.”

I’d never really considered the foundational position of the trust factor. A roof is as important as a foundation of a house, but without the foundation, the roof cannot stand. The Faith, Hope, and Love Bible verse tells us the greatest of these is love. I’ve returned again and again to this thought-gnawing statement about trust and love. But being the greatest, being the most important, and being the most foundational are pivotal superlatives.

So when the speaker explained the development of community partner relationships, the importance of trust became clear all at once. Trust is foundational. It happens first. It’s the prerequisite for relationships to grow. If there is ever a chance for love to bloom, it must first be rooted in trust.

No marriage, no friendship, no partnership will ever be anything more than a pet rock relationship without trust.

Finally. Finally, I have chewed long enough to reach the marrow of truth. I’ve grappled long enough to be satisfied that trust is more foundational than love, but that love is in fact the greatest of these. And that the importance of each may simply remain a matter of perspective.