Guardian Guild Session 3 Day 4

After Gratitude Circle, we went to Grandmother Tree to see if we had any more pieces of the Great Map or clues to help us get the Beaver King's Flute and defeat The Winter King. We got a note from GT telling us we helped save Beatrice Bird's life and she gave us the Southern part of the Great Map. We also got a bag from Beatrice Bird with 3 coded scrolls to help us on our quest. The Guardians broke off into 3 teams to decode the messages. The messages from Beatrice told us that the last piece of the West is guarded by the Earth/Soil spirits and we would need to create an original song for the Earth. We were given instruments(a kalimba, dulcimer, drum and maracas) and the message told us to say what we are grateful for on Earth during the song. We went to the Gratitude Circle with thankful thoughts in our hearts. Then we passed the instruments around the circle as we took turns saying what we love about Earth. We hope our song was good enough to get the last part of the Great Map but won't know until tomorrow.

Then we practiced the play they wrote, produced and directed and went to the white house to learn about native trees and plants. We talked about how to identify various common trees and plants here in Northeast Georgia (Eastern Red Cedar, Sweet Gum, Virginia Creeper, Muscadine, Dandelion, etc). We also talked about their importance to woodland critters and humans. Did you know every part of the dandelion is edible and was used as medicine by Native Americans for upset stomach as well as other ailments? Then we went on a scavenger hunt to find the trees and plants we had just learned about.

Afterwards, we ate lunch and went to the "waterfall" creek to play and explore. We saw 2 little water snakes this time under the main waterfall rock! Can you spot both of them in the picture below?