Study on Creation Spirituality at The Land, Week 4

At the study I am leading at The Land, a church without walls in Aurora, Colorado, we focused this week on chapter 4. Here are my notes from class.

Cosmology, Liberation & Wisdom

Fox makes the case that these are all aspects of the unified God, expressed in different ways, and with which we can participate.

Trinity: Creator (God)

“God the Creator is the Heart behind the heart that is opened by awe and by suffering to infinite compassion.” – p57

God is an artist.

Liberator (Jesus)

Richard Rohr - : “Jesus is a map for the time-bound and personal level of life; Christ is the blueprint for all time and space and life itself.” https://cac.org/another-name-for-every-thing-2019-02-12/

“Before the world was made, we have been chosen in Christ . . . claimed as God’s own and chosen from the very beginning . . . so that God could bring everything together under the headship of Christ” (Ephesians 1:3, 10, 11)

What is Jesus liberating us from? If not from sin – in the theology of original blessing – then from the darkness discussed in the Beatitudes. P60-61

Jesus is a guide, a prophet, who shows us how to live, how to evolve closer to God.

Luke 4:18 18 "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives And recovery of sight to the blind, To set at liberty those who are oppressed;

Wisdom/Sophia/Inspiration (Holy Spirit)

Grace of Wisdom

The grace of Wisdom also expresses itself through the experience of personal revelation. The grace of Wisdom comes to everyone, not only to highly evolved souls with big followings. Wisdom dictates that the more you are seen, the less noise you should make.

Wisdom is the choice that recognizes pain and suffering as part of the human experience. It is inevitable that we will cause each other to suffer in some way. It is wise to recognize yourself in everyone else. Seek the wise response in all events in your life. – Carolyn Myss https://www.myss.com/the-seven-graces-knowledge-2/

Proverbs 3:18 Wisdom is a tree of life to those who embrace her; happy are those who hold her tightly.

An undivided unity; the feminine face of God

From the word “womb” (rehem) comes the verb “to have compassion” (raham).

– Deuteronomy 32:18 You neglected the Rock who begot you, And forgot the God who gave you birth.

Closing prayer: Thank you God, for guiding us to understand your great mystery a little better, to grapple together with these deep questions, to not assume we know you, but to help us be open to what you reveal to us. Help us to bring wisdom into our own lives and into this community to live ever whole and closer to our divine selves.

Study on Creation Spirituality at The Land: Part Two

I've recently found a faith community called The Land,  a Methodist-based outdoor church dedicated to social justice and the Earth.

I have been leading the morning study using Matthew Fox's book Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth. I am sharing the class curriculum plus a few notes here. Read class one here.

Here is class two.

Creation Spirituality at The Land, Class Two

In the beginning was the gift.

…All shall be called children of the gift,

Sons and daughters of grace,

For all generations. (from pages 1, 4 of Creation Spirituality by Matthew Fox)

The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night declares knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard; yet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. (Psalm 19:1-4)

Essential question: How would we behave differently if we regarded life and the Earth as a gift? Why don’t we?

Definitions:

Mystic: One who responds with joy and awe to the Universe, who finds God through and in all things – not pantheistic but panentheistic. One who sees the Christ in all and seeks to awaken the Christ in themselves. 

Part of the reason mysticism is seen as "crazy" in Western mainstream society is that we have what is known in psychology as an intensity tolerance. Our culture often scorns a sense of wonder. It's just "too much."

Panentheism: We are in God, and God is in us.

Theologically, God is understood to be both “transcendent” and “immanent”—transcendent, meaning above and beyond all that is, but also immanent, meaning “indwelling” or abiding within and pervading all of creation. Some people may feel uneasy about thinking of God as being present in all creation. However, such an awareness of God’s presence is not to be confused with “pantheism”—the worship of natural items or entities as God, or gods. Another term that some have used in recent years to help make that distinction, is “pan-en-theism,” an understanding that God is in (“en”) all that is, as well as above and beyond all that is. God’s indwelling love and grace inspires and calls forth what we might think of as the “hymn of all creation.” (from “Awakening to God’s Call to Earthkeeping,” session 2)

Cosmic Christ: The archetype of Christ – God’s love, the Christ in all – found in all of Creation. The sense that the Universe is an expression of the Christ. The Christ was present in the Universe before the Big Bang, and was expressed through Jesus.

We are God’s work of art, created in Christ Jesus to live the good life as from the beginning God had meant us to live it.”–Ephesians 2:10 (92 of CC) (for other translations, see https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Ephesians%202:10)

He is the image of the unseen God, and the firstborn of all Creation. In Christ were created all things in heaven and on earth: everything visible and invisible… before anything was created, Christ existed, and Christ holds all things in unity. – Col. 1:15-17   

“a pattern that connects.” – subatomic particles…..

Prophet: the prophet is the mystic in action – they struggle with inertia and injustice. They act, teach, bring their compassion into the world.

The Four Paths (to God, to awakening)

Via Positiva – awe, falling in love

Via Negativa – darkness, suffering, letting go – Dark Night of the Soul

Via Creativa – joyful co-creation with God

Via Tranformativa – justice and action as praise, compassion

“An impoverishment of the soul exists within ‘First World’ countries: the means for a just existence are within our grasp, but our wills, our social structures, and our imagination have yet proven adequate for that struggle.” – xiii

What does a just existence look like? Why do we struggle to create that for all? What can we do individually or as a community to promote that?

“We cannot have authentic human justice without engaging equally in the struggle for justice toward our home, the planet earth. There is no need to choose… we are too interdependent for that.” (35)

“Compassion is the working out of our interconnectedness; it is the [action taking, practice of] our interconnectedness.” (36)

-         What about when the wolf eats the deer? Is that compassionate? What about when we extend that argument to humans? (timescale – the deer is the mountain)

People will not say, ‘Look, God’s kingdom is here!’ or, ‘There it is!’ No, God’s kingdom is within you.” – Luke 17:21

If the kingdom of God, or the Cosmic Christ, is within us, and we are within it, and all things are held in unity through Christ – not because we believe or “accept” anything but because it is just SO – and all things are interdependent, then God’s Kingdom is all of Creation, including us, the land, the geese, the beetles, the snakes, etc. How does or could this inspire our choices, our actions?

Closing scripture:

For what can be known about God is plain to [humanity], because God has shown it to them. Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. --Romans 1:19-20

Study on Creation Spirituality at The Land: Class One

I've recently found a faith community that fits me like a gloves. That has always seemed impossible, as I practice what Matthew Fox calls deep ecumenism. I am primarily a mystical Christian, with a heavy dose of Pagan, and a healthy dash of Buddhist. This community is called The Land, and they are a Methodist-based outdoor church dedicated to social justice and the Earth.

I have been leading the morning study using Matthew Fox's book Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth. I am sharing the class curriculum plus a few notes here.

Class One of Creation Spirituality

I borrowed some of the material from ELCA's Awakening to God’s call to Earthkeeping. 

Read: The universe had been developing for some 8-10 billion years prior to Earth’s appearing.

The Earth was “born” nearly 5 billion years ago. It is part of a solar system, that is itself part of the Milky Way galaxy; and our solar system is in what you might call the “backwaters”—an outer arm— of our spiral galaxy.

Our Milky Way galaxy contains about 300-400 billion stars, many similar to our Sun, with planetary bodies of their own. Our home galaxy moves in relationship to a group of some 26 other galaxies, known as a “cluster;” ours is called the “Local Group.”

This so named Local Group cluster of galaxies is, itself, part of a group of over 1000 clusters, making up what is called the Virgo Supercluster.

Now try to imagine a single supercluster as a white dot—remember that it contains hundreds, if not thousands, of galaxies, themselves containing billions of stars …there are estimated to be something on the order of 10 million such “dots,” such superclusters, spread across the vast expanse of space.

[pause] It’s about more than our human minds can conceive of, isn’t it? Does this sort of knowledge shake our faith, or fill us with awe and wonder, or a sense of humility and gratitude?

We discussed our responses, and then read scripture that applied. I am new to using scripture to back up what I say, but I feel if I can find Bible passages that support what I am teaching, then it is less likely to be met with suspicion.

Scripture

Romans 8:38-39

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Ephesians 3:18-19

I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may filled with all the fullness of God.

Psalm 104: 30

When you send forth your Spirit, they [the creatures, the earth, the heavens] are created; and you renew the face of the ground.

Psalm 8:1, 3-6a.

O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the Earth!

When we look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established, we cannot help but wonder: what are human beings that you are even mindful of them, mortals that you so care for them? Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor. You have placed us on this Earth and given us dominion over the work of your hands.

Questions

Read poem at beginning of book and discuss how society might be different if this was taught from the beginning.

·         When you consider our physical location within the universe, do you find it humbling? Frightening? Exciting? Other feelings?

·         How does your consideration of the vastness, mystery, and wonder of our universe influence your sense of the immensity of God’s love for us?

·         Knowing what we do of the universe, does it increase or decrease the significance of humans? Does it, should it, affect how we relate to one another and the natural world around us? How we relate to God?

·         What is your hopeful vision, as a child of God, for how humans should live on the Earth in connection with the rest of creation?

Step One to Responding to Climate Change is to Learn What is Really Going On

"We need the deniers to get out of the way. They are risking everyone's future.... The Koch Brothers are criminals.... They should be charged with criminal activity because they're putting the profits of their business ahead of the livelihoods of millions of people, and even life on earth." - Jason Box, in "When the End of Human Civilization is Your Day Job," Esquire


Read the above article. If you're reading my blog, you probably already know that Climate Change, aka Global Warming, is a real thing. You may have posted similar articles on Facebook, and gotten "likes" from other people who also get that it's real, and snarky comments from your two friends who think it's just liberal hogwash. But you know it's not just real, it's here, now, and it's speeding up.

You probably feel a sense of dread and hopelessness, because you also know that there is no way to "go back" to where we were, to a not totally destabilized planet. You just hope that grassroots organizations can do enough to help us deal with the changes underway, providing solutions like floating houses run by solar energy for the billions of people displaced by rising seas. You sense that governments aren't going to do enough.

You know why they aren't? Because they are in too deep in the bullshit of running the world.

I'm reading Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong by James W. Loewen. One thing Loewen returns to repeatedly, an invisible theme of public school history education, is that the mythologies of our nation holds more credence than actual fact, especially if that fact flies in the face of said mythology. One of the United State's sacred mythologies is that our nation is a peace-keeping good guy that steps in like a kind big brother to fix the world's ills. The fact is, however, that "the United States now spends more on its armed forces than all other nations combined and has them stationed in 144 different countries," (222) and while many of these stations are in the name of "peace keeping," much of them are actually in support of the financial growth of multinational corporations like ITT and Monsanto. Some of these multinationals have budgets larger than those of most governments. And if those companies want something from foreign soil, our federal government is more than happy to step in and push things around until they get what they want. Like deposing Prime Minister Mossadegh in Iran in 1953, bringing down the elected government of Guatemala in 1954, rigging the 1957 election in Lebanon, repeated attempts to kill Fidel Castro, and I'm sure many other and more recent (in the book he gives these older examples to make sure textbooks had time to include them) examples of ways the US takes over other countries in the interest of economic gain.

A huge part of this economically-motivated international bullying is, of course, about oil. "In Equatorial Guinea, for example, oil companies pay millions of dollars to the regime's leaders for the privilege of taking the country's oil... [T]hey pay royalties of only about 10 percent for taking Equatorial Guinea's oil -- far less than they would pay in a justly run nation." (225) While oil companies and the federal government are paying "far less than they would," however, they are paying insane amounts of money to extract oil around the world. In the article "The New Abolitionism," Christopher Hayes writes,

Fossil fuel extraction is one of the most capital-intensive industries in the world. While it is immensely, unfathomably profitable, it requires ungodly amounts of money to dig and drill the earth, money to pump and refine and transport the fuel so that it can go from the fossilized plant matter thousands of feet beneath the earth’s surface into your Honda. And that constant need for billions of new dollars in investment capital is the industry’s Achilles’ heel.

 He doesn't mention to cost spent on the armed forces used to occupy the countries we get oil from.

So here is where I suggest we put our efforts in attempts to slow Climate Change (in addition to efforts to mediate its effects on us humans, like the floating houses and local, organic farming): Pull out of other countries. Stop spending money on creating corrupt governments. Stop spending money on digging, drilling, and surveying for oil. Put those billions of dollars into expanding renewable energy, building renewable energy sources in other countries (that actually would be a Good Guy move), and reducing poverty at home and abroad. Not because we want to control other countries but because we humans are in this together and its the right thing to do.

Naive? Simplistic? Probably. But also our only real chance for our grandchildren and children to not go extinct, and it's our imperative as members of a sacred and dynamic earth.

Sitting Dragonfly Vigil

Yesterday I stepped out back to pick a green onion for my breakfast, and discovered a dead dragonfly on the patio. I knelt down to pick him up and he began whirring his wings; he wasn't dead, just dying. I shooed the cat away and brought the beautiful blue and black creature into the house. I gave him a drop of water, which made his wings beat and his legs move. Clearly he couldn't fly anymore. I couldn't think of how to help him, and recalled that dragonflies don't live very long in their adult form. I could, however, make him safe from cats and other predators and give him a place of honor on my kitchen counter, holding the space for him as he passed into Light.

His eyes were like geometric blue opals. They had a depth to them, like a glass gem or a bead of water. My four-year-old remarked that the dragonfly's patterns on his body reminded him of a totem pole. I covered him with a bug-box lid so the cat wouldn't get him but he could breathe, and we left for our trip to the science museum.

When we returned, I thought he had passed, but when I touched him one leg moved. His opalescent eyes had turned a dull black from the top down, with just a crescent of blue at the bottom. I gave him Reiki, hoping it would ease his transition. While he was "just" a bug, he was fierce and beautiful, and I at least wanted to honor his slow death.

When he died, his eyes were completely black. You could literally see the life force leave him through his eyes.

I set him on my altar. Dragonfly is about illusion, and I am writing a book about Zen right now, which is all about the illusions we carry in our heads about life, about each and every thing we encounter. The problem is not that we live in illusion, it is that we think the illusion is "real." Dragonfly teaches us to hold the dichotomy of illusion and what we call reality. He teaches us about the illusion of life and death, and the dichotomy of death being real and final, and not.

I give thanks to the Universe for gifting me this honor of holding vigil while a beautiful Blue Eyed Darner. Aho.













~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For more ways to live in harmony with the living earth,
check out my book Living Earth Devotional by Clea Danaan

The Simple Life

Sustainable Living

Here's a great resource for spring:

The Simple Life Forum at Daedalus Books Ideas to Nourish & Sustain Growing Your Own, Preserving Your Own

"In its broadest sense, the idea of sustainability covers a lot of ground, from growing our own produce in a kitchen garden to finding responsible land and water management practices that we can sustain far into the future. Sustainability and preservation are also at the heart of what we do at Daedalus Books, which was founded to find a second life for remainders—good books that might otherwise be destroyed simply because publishers can't afford to keep them in stock."

Submit your favorite farmers' market via email on their site!

The Way of the Hen: Zen and the Art of Raising Chickens

Daedalus is featuring, among other fabulous books for living simply, my own book, The Way of the Hen. It's only $3.98 right now! Perfect gift for anyone who loves chickens.

Announcing Living Earth Devotional by Clea Danaan

Bees Can Teach Us About Strong Community

http://www.themelissagarden.com/beekeeping.html

"There is no single bee – as there is no single human being. It’s a product of a limited world view. The single bee is only one individual part of the bigger entity of the entire bee hive....This can serve as a beautiful metaphor or mirror for our own existence: That we are just one individual part of a bigger entity: The earth’s ecosystem and the entire universe." - From themelissagarden.com

I took my first beekeeping class this morning. I've been stung by bee fever! I hope to get a hive next spring, spending the year learning more about bee guardianship, figuring out where to put my top bar hive, and reading reading reading all I can get my hands on.


At the same time, a group of friends and I are ready to take real steps towards a homeschooling community center. In the next month we will start writing our non-profit document and making it real.

I'm working with another group of people to get chickens legal in Aurora, Colorado.

It occurred to me the other day that all these projects express the energy of building strong
community. Bees are all about community. We all know a hive to be the quintessential community, with the queen, workers and drones each fulfilling their purpose being - ahem - busy bees. But honey bees and other pollinators also teach us about the health of our own human communities. We've seen this recently with hive collapse and other bee diseases that have been created by humanity's obsession with monetary wealth. Monsanto and Bayer focus so exclusively on making more money that they are not considering the health of bees, the soil, water, or people, and bee colonies are suffering. Climate change is causing or contributing to droughts around the world that is making bee keeping near impossible. Without water, you can't have bees. This is a global phenomenon affecting the price of honey, small business, and large commercial beekeepers. Then there is the way we grow food in most industrialized nations, namely in monocrops like acres and acres of only almond trees. In a normal ecosystem, there would be other flowers providing bees with nectar throughout the year, and bees wouldn't have to be trucked around (the process of which kills millions of bees each year) to follow the flowers. Our money-obsessed and "efficiency" obsessed society has created a culture of insanity, and the bees cannot or will not put up with it.

I wrote a blog post a while back about how backyard chicken ownership helps build strong communities. And homeschooling is, despite the stereotype, very much about community.

So I'm sitting with this energy of community, and contemplating how humanity (at least in industrialized nations) is having to rethink what community means to us. For many people it no longer means the local church of your chosen denomination, the office, and the neighborhood school. Or if your community does include one or more of these, I would guess that there is some aspect of those communities that are stretching or which you question. You don't have to be a homesteading hippie to be part of this shift, either. Our fears about safety in schools, the debate about same-sex marriage, a Jesuit pope, Facebook, and working from home are all examples of how the idea of community is evolving.

I wonder how bees might teach us about community. Not just in an old-school way, where each has her own place in the hive and it's all about the safety of the hive, but in an evolving way, involving sacred geometry, transformation, and the dialectic of hive versus individual. As we humans evolve, let us call on these higher levels of hive expression as guides. And let us not forget to hum as we create a new world!

I just watched PBS's Secrets Beneath the Ice, a report of research in Antarctica examining what our world will look like when the planet's temperature rises the predicted five degrees over the next hundred years. Scientists are finding strong evidence that sea levels will rise in the neighborhood of sixty feet as the ice shelves of  Antarctica and their sister glaciers melt. Which means our coastal cities will be partially submerged. It means the salinity of the sea will change drastically. The higher temperatures will also mean changes in vegetation, summer temperatures, and other habitat changes.

Global Warming is real, but still unpredictable. We don't know for sure what is going to happen. And since it's probably totally out of our control (if we were to stop pumping CO2 into the atmosphere the temperatures will still rise at this point) and we fear what we can't control, we just act like it isn't happening. But it is. And it will change the face of the earth in my children's lifetime.

Climate change is not a new topic for me. Trying to live in a way that mitigates its effects, like riding my bike and turning off the lights and hanging clothes out to dry, are not new behaviors. They feel neither wholly effective nor foolish, just part of being a responsible human being. But after watching this documentary (having also recently read most of The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery) I'm left with two unanswered questions: What does global change mean to me as I try to live a meaningful life? And what does it mean in terms of how I raise my children?

If rising sea levels is a given, for instance, what do I want to do with my life? What gifts and tools do I want my children to have given that this world now and the world to come in their lifetimes will be totally different than the world throughout human history? Surely the basics remain the same: love, compassion, understanding of interconnections, responsibility. But do those basics change in the face of a different planet? If, for instance, the world is as warm as it was during the age of dinosaurs yet contains nearly nine billion people, how will that change the way humans live? How can I raise my children to be wise, loving, calm, yet prepared?

I don't know. No conclusions. Just thoughts and questions. I'm curious what you think.

Urban Farmer Seeds

I just discovered a cool idea: Urban Farmer Seeds (ufseeds.com)  "uses recycled magazines to package all of it's seeds.  Our eco-friendly seed packets are made using old magazines and catalogs that would otherwise go to a landfill.  We separate these catalogs by paper strength and size and then turn them into seed packets for our seeds!" They sell organic and heirloom seed packs and gardening products geared towards a small carbon footprint at reasonable prices. If you sign up for their newsletter you get a $5 off coupon of a $25 purchase that is good 24 hours from entering your email. Nice work!

Who Will Pay for Environmental Clean-Up?

I'm reeling a little thinking about environmental ethics.

There is a company, Abtech Industries, that has created a Smart Sponge that cleans up oil and bacteria into a stable state that can then be recycled or burned to create electricity. How cool is that?!

The technology is NOT being used to clean up the gulf oil spill or pollution in Puget Sound (where the orcas are the most toxic marine mammals on earth) or anywhere but the test sites (as far as I know) in California, Connecticut, and North Carolina. See the pdf with more info here.

Why not, you ask? Because no one can figure out how to pay for it - or WHO should pay for it. Alabama ABC news said, "BP hasn't placed any orders." See the videos (which are several months old) here under Abtech Videos. I don't know if further talks in order, but it brings up a huge question for me.

If we humans possess the technologies to fix our environmental crisis, solutions like the Smart Sponge, solar panels and hydrogen cars, but we won't implement them because we're looking at the bottom line, at money, then where does that leave us? Pretty screwed, I think.

Obviously it takes money to manufacture sponges and cars and solar panels, and money to implement them. But it takes money to fight wars, too. It takes money to do anything. So why are we not spending it on healing and cleaning up pollution and preventing our children's cancers and saving wildlife?

Who will pay for it all? And what is stopping them?

Hope for the Healing of the Earth

Ecologists are discovering that when wetland areas are restored, having been used for nearly 100 years for agricultural purposes, that the land bounces back amazingly quickly. While some native species are reintroduced, many spring back to life on their own, having waited all this time in the soil seed banks.

This shows us the wisdom of the planet. She can bounce back - if (a big if) we can follow her ways and let a wetland be a wetland, she can gracefully and fairly quickly restore balance. The question, of course, is how to let a wetland be a wetland when we need to grow food, build houses, and pave streets. We - and she - have to share.

Providing habitat for native species in yards is key. Get rid of lawns, plant native plants, provide water features and shelter. Building paths for wildlife where there are freeways helps, too. Urban permaculture offers exciting opportunities for integrating food with everyday life and reducing our impact. Of course green building, habitat restoration, and simple things like riding bikes all helps.

Finally, for those of us who honor the earth as sacred and alive, prayer, ritual, and attunement with non-humans also helps heal our relationship with the planet. In conversation with the earth we can be given ideas and tools for sharing and balance. Right now, as you read this, look out the window. Rest your eyes on a tree or another natural being. Let your mind relax. Let your energy and attention reach out to the tree. Sit with that feeling for as long as you like. What happens in your body? What might happen in the world were we all to relate to non-humans this way?


For further reading:

The Playful Garden Art and Decor

A fabulous artist friend of mine told me about her sister's store, The Playful Garden, in Napa, California. Their mission is "to bring laughter and playfulness into the home, garden and workplace through the sales of garden decor, as well as garden related products and services." They feature fabulous artwork and whimsical garden decor, some of which is featured for sale online. While shopping for Yule gifts for the gardeners in your life, check out The Playful Garden!

Green Gifts for Less: Christmas or Yule from the (Green) Heart for Kids and Adults

This Christmas, make a statement about your love of the earth and your love for friends and family without spending much money. This article includes many ideas for beginner and advanced crafters, plus a few more eco-friendly gifts that do not require any “making” on your part.

First, you probably have more cards to send than gifts to buy. You can save green - cash and the planet – by either writing a blog as your card and emailing a link to everyone on your list, or make your own cards. Here are ideas for both.

Holiday Cards

•Write a blog: Check out blogger.com to set up a family blog. If you have basic computer skills (you’re reading this, aren’t you?), you can set up a blog. You can upload photos and videos and write out your annual letter all in the same blog. It costs nothing (unless you scan pictures at a copy center), and once you set it up, you have it there forever. You can update on other holidays, or just reserve for Yule.

•Make your own: Use last year’s cards cut up, craft paper, pressed flowers and leaves, stencils, stamps, stickers, paint, glitter… you name it! Buy recycled cardstock, fold in half, and cut down the middle to make two small cards (or cut the whole sheet in fourths for less bulk – decorate one side and write on the other). This is a great family activity for a snowy day or even on Thanksgiving afternoon. Take turns addressing envelopes or use your computer to print out labels. Even easier, but possibly more expensive, you can make one card and take it to a copy center to duplicate as many times as you need.

Now on to home-made gifts. Here are some ideas for earth-friendly gifts you can make, organized by age group.

For Infants

•Organic cotton chew toys like simple dolls – Purchase organic cotton (may have to order online) in bright primary colors. Wash once. Then fold in half, and cut out simple shapes of fruits, veggies, animals, or people. Stitch around the edges by hand or with a machine, leaving a small opening. Stuff tightly with organic batting. Stitch up the hole.

•Knitted toy fruits and veggies – if you know how to knit, try making fruits and veggies! These knitted veggies are really cool.

•Bum salve – Good for a baby or new parent, bum salve is really easy to make. Pour four tablespoons of organic olive oil into a double boiler (a bowl over a pot of water is fine) over medium low heat. Add a tablespoon each of dried calendula leaves and lavender leaves. A tablespoon of comfrey leaf is nice, too. Let sit on low-ish heat for twenty minutes. Strain the oil and put it back on the double boiler. Grate a tablespoon and a half to two tablespoons of beeswax into the oil and stir till the wax is melted. Remove from heat. Let cool, stirring occasionally for even consistency. Put into a sterilized (with boiling water) little jar.

Here are ideas for gifts for kids.

•Knitted scarves, mittens, or even sweaters – If you already knit, this a an easy choice. Try some new wools, add in sparkly wools for kids, and go for their favorite colors. If you can’t knit, check out a local class for beginners. Knitting has become very big lately, and is a great way to work with your hands.

•Fleece (buy recycled at http://www.wildrosefarm.com/) scarves, blankets – If you don’t knit and don’t want to, fleece blankets are easy to make. Cut a rectangle of desired size – small for babies, larger for kids. Hem the edges, or just leave plain. Or, cut one-inch wide fringe all around the edge, or on two opposite ends. Leave it just like this, or for an even fancier blanket, choose two complementary fabrics and tie the fringe together. See here for more instructions and pictures.

Kids love to make things themselves. What about assembling them a kit for something they can make, like

•Kits for musical instruments out of recycled materials: Shakers can be made out of paper mâche and used light bulbs or out of clean empty containers filled with beans, for instance. For some really great ideas, check out bashthetrash.

•Kits for fleece blanket – you cut, they assemble (see above link for instructions).

•Garden kit – a little ceramic or peat pot, a little bag of soil, and seeds. Write a little poem about planting seeds and include it.

If you’re looking for a nice gift a child can make, what about:

•Salt dough ornaments or figurines – Mix one cup salt with two cups white flour. Slowly knead in one cup water. Leave plain or color with a few drops of tempera paint. Cut with cookie cutters and make a whole in the top with a toothpick to make an ornament, or mold into figurines. Cook at 250 degrees for 2 hours. Let cool, and protect with gel medium if desired. What about a chess set, chunky beads, favorite characters, or little charms?

•Knitted scarves – Kids can learn to knit at about age five or six. Take a class together or learn from an elder!

•Paint a t-shirt – Wrap a plain t-shirt around a 8-10 piece of cardboard and tape on the back so that the area you want painted is showing. Give your kids fabric paints to decorate. I did this with my two-year old last year with an old white t-shirt for Dad.

•Glittery eggs – Poke holes in the ends of an egg and blow out the insides. Rinse clean with hot water. Glue glitter and gems to the egg, and attach a gold wire to hang on a tree.


Alright, now onto home-made gifts for the adults in your life.

•Knit a sweater or sew a robe or other clothing

•Homemade natural cleaners – Mix a tablespoon of white vinegar and a teaspoon of rubbing alcohol into a 1.5 pint mixing bottle of water. Add five to ten drops of a favorite essential oil, like pine, lavender, thyme or orange.

•Homemade tea blends – The possibilities are endless. For a nice soothing tea, blend equal parts dried lemon balm and chamomile with a pinch of valerian.

•Bath bombs, salt scrubs, salves, or bath salts – see
http://www.teachsoap.com/index.html
http://www.essortment.com/family/homemadebathsa_saej.htm
http://www.glenbrookfarm.com/herbs/saltscrubs.html

•Garden kits – A pretty pot, soil, and collection of seeds. Herbs are good, as are annual flowers. They are usually pretty cheap this time of year, too!

•Handmade Christmas ornaments: quilled paper, decorated pine cones, dried orange slices, painted nuts; there are a ton of ideas here.

•Sachets – sew up a little baggie out of pretty fabric scraps, fill with a blend of dried lavender, rose petals, cloves, or patchouli


So – what if you don’t have time or aren’t feeling crafty or there is a person on your list who is just not into crafted items? Don’t despair! You can still send an eco-friendly gift by giving:

•Money donated to Heifer International or another charity: http://www.heifer.org/
These gifts are in all denominations of money, and help a person, family, or community in need. You purchase an animal or share of an animal or care (like midwifery care or a well) in a loved one’s name, and they get a card thanking them for their help.

•Money into a college savings fund – Have any kids on your list? Ask their parents if they have a college fund like a 529 and offer to put money into it.

•Gift certificate for massage or spa day – This supports small business and healers while offering the gift of joy and relaxation.

And of course an eco-friendly book is always a great idea, like Sacred Land or Voices of the Earth! For more on these titles, check out my website, intuitivegardening.net.

I hope you found some ideas here! Please feel free to post some of your own. This is just a beginning of suggested eco-friendly gifts to make or give. What if we all stopped gifting plastic toys and unwanted chachkas! We could change the world!

Happy happy holidays!





Wreath image from http://giftideas357.com/2008/01/homemade-christmas-gift-ideas-come-from.html