first annual arrow art show

we recently had our first annual arrow art show at ATHICA. it was a one night only event, but was so fun and inspiring. every child that attends our sprouts and seedlings classes had at least one piece in the show and we even auctioned off a collaborative piece, which was won by local artist, Lou Kregel. we had snacks & finished off the evening with bubbles on the patio! it was a great way to finish our school year.

many thanks to all who came to support the children's art and to our wonderful staff for pulling it all together....it was a lovely night....

natalie chanin at arrow

in late january, our friend natalie chanin of alabama chanin was in athens to give a talk at ugh and she generously offered to lead a parent and child workshop at arrow as a fundraiser...a group of us gathered at arrow on a saturday morning and learned from her. we all brought old t shirts and a few scraps to work with; she brought a large pile of scraps of alabama chanin fabric and stencils, as well as needles and thread. after a brief intro to the basics of sewing we all went to work, deconstructing and constructing, until by the end of the morning, many of us had reworked and stitched our own special thing. it was so much fun and everyone left inspired! our friends from home.made contributed snacks and refreshments that kept us fueled as we sewed. thanks to all who came!

upon a recent nightnight....

our sweet friend, Hope Hilton, took these cute pictures from a recent nightnight session & we thought we would share them with you....enjoy!

thanks to Hope, Mary Catherine, & Magali for showing these littles a fun time so their parents could get a much-deserved break....it was a fun night...

our annual holiday open house...

every year we look forward to our holiday open house. we open up our doors the same evenings that the Athens Holiday Market is held in our courtyard and it is always so magical. we offer a few fun seasonal crafts for families to make together and hot cider. We also always have a nice selection of our "made by arrow" items available to purchase. they make great gifts all year round, and can be found online here.
This year our Seedling Class made lots of special winter snowflakes and a special snowman to display in our large window to the delight of passersby. and if you looked closely, you may have even spotted the pocket lady for a special surprise!
 

prince avenue art crawl

we were so excited to participate in this year's prince avenue art crawl! our seedling class worked diligently for weeks to create the pieces for an amazing underwater scene complete with a school of jellyfish! we even used a fan to create movement....it was magical.
 

our annual lantern walk

we had our annual lantern walk to celebrate Martinmas....

rinne made us little cards with this sweet verse to recite:

the Sunlight fast is dwindling 
my little lamp needs kindling
its spark shines bright in darkest night...
dear lantern guide me with your light.

our seedling class made their own little lanterns.....

other friends brought their handmade lanterns as well...they were so very pretty....

we began our walk right before dusk.....

took a group photo in one of our favorite spots.....

and returned to find some surprise luminaries lit for us!

 we shared some warm cider.....

it was a lovely walk.....

4th annual apple festival!

we recently had our annual apple festival...our fourth one!
it was a gorgeous fall day and lots of folks came out...we saw lots of old friends and new ones too!

earlier that week, we took a trip up to ellijay to gather the apples for everyone who had purchased them through our fundraiser- thank you to those of you who bought apples this year!

we also want to thank everyone who gave something for our raffle- this, too, is another way for arrow to raise funds for our special projects, and we thank all of those who participated! so many special, handmade items...

we want to thank susan hable and her daughter bird for carving another block for us this year! bird was on hand to help with printing and she helped so many of you print your block...we are so proud of you, bird!

we also had an apple tasting and apple cider too...and this year, we had a record number of pies in our pie contest! the branded butcher took home the blue ribbon, and we love that an arrow dad won second place- it was his first time making a pie, too! many thanks to our guest judge, gena knox, and an arrow dad, don young, for helping judge the pies this year!

and we also want to thank amanda and jeremy for the music again this year- it wouldn't be the same without your fiddle tunes!

and a big thanks to Melissa & Hip Pops for coming out to celebrate with us...

and thanks to Mimi & her Home.made crew for providing us with the most delicious apple butter to try!

and last, but certainly not least, thank you to the arrow community for supporting this fun event...happy fall, everyone!

arrow explores: hableland

in august, our arrow explores group took a field trip to the design studio of hable construction, aka hableland! designer susan hable and studio manager hope hilton showed the children different paintings and textiles and talked to them about exploring the world of color. then, they handed over paper, paint and brushes and everyone got to make their own wet-on-wet watercolor creation! the results were beautiful. thank you, habel construction!

come together: athens maker fest!

we love our come together events!
this one was super fun, as we teamed up with our friends from athica at the lyndon house for the athens maker fest!

the event hosted makers of all types...lace makers and spinners on up to people working with 3-d printers and robotics...a little something for everyone!

inspired by some of rinne's photography projects, all 3 of our activites had to do with light and optics, but in a very fundamental way. we made sun prints with found objects outside on the sidewalk. we also created a walk-in camera obscura room where the walls were filled with images projected from the outside. and, last but not least, there were 10 portable camera obscura that folks could put on their head to learn how a camera works (thanks to our friends janelle & ryan who fabricated them for us!).

it was great to see so many people out enjoying all types of making, and we thank the lyndon house for hosting such a great event, and thanks to hatch athens for putting it all together!

inside the camera obscura room:

arrow explores: west broad market garden

we hope everyone has had a good summer!

we recently took a field trip to the west broad market garden, on the ground of the former west broad school...we had such a great visit...so inspiring!

rebecca ennis, farm manager, led our crew on a tour of the farm...we tasted tomatillos, planted fava beans and even played with their maypole. we also got to meet ms. ethel, who is a longtime garden volunteer...what a great day we had!

we also made a donation to the garden as a thank you for letting us come visit! consider supporting them, by volunteering or making other donations...

come together @ the library!!

we were recently invited, along with our other "Come Together" friends (ATHICA & Treehouse Kid+Craft) to participate in the public library's Family Fun Day Event. the theme was Books! of course & the Friends of the Library provided plenty of decomissioned library books for inspiration and to use for the projects and lots of volunteers to help with our projects.

We chose origami book folding, ATHICA chose relief prints on old children's book pages & Treehouse made a large cloth book sculpture from canvas that everyone could contribute a drawing or passage to. we were really inspired by all of the art that surrounded us on that sunny day.

The library also recently received a new outdoor mural by Nick Napoletano and outdoor metal sculpture by Robert Clements in conjunction with the Athens Cultural Affairs Commission and both were dedicated at the event with a ribbon cutting. There was music courtesy of local duo, Hawk Proof Rooster & a petting zoo full of fun animals provided by Sam's Path & Sandy Creek Nature Center. And the fun day ended with a lovely puppet show with Peter Hart of Puppet Atlanta sponsored by the Friends of the Library.

we are so very lucky to have such a great public library & we reccomend everyone visit it!

arrow explores: r. wood studio

we had another great excursion as part of our ongoing arrow explores series, this time to r.wood studio. the littles had so much fun making clay beads with rebecca at our spring party, we decided to continue the fun at her studio...they first toured us around the studio and showed us each step of the process of making their beautiful handmade dishes: rolling out the clay, firing, then glazing them. then, everyone was able to make whatever creation they could dream up: tiny plates, more beads, a dragon, and even a shipwrecked boat. we finished the day with a refreshing honeypop! fun indeed!

community egg hunt

thanks to everyone who came out to our 5th annual community egg hunt! what a fun day! it was grey and chilly, but that did not stop the littles from having fun looking for colorful eggs. held in the beautiful garden behind the cobb house across the street from arrow, it was fun to watch the children navigate the tiny paths and find little treasures: blueberries and strawberries, shells and acorns filled their eggs. even the tiniest of arrow friends was able to find something special, and we were extra happy to see some of our older arrow friends return for this special day...thanks, everyone!

 

spring garden party

what a fun spring party we had! we loved seeing the little ones of this community come together! thank you to all those who came, as we know it was a busy spring day in athens! and thank you to those who helped with the day's activities: tin cup for the fiddle tunes and to rebecca wood, sarah lowing, rinne allen, ike & jane, and of course rachel, the arrow helpers, and our volunteers who pulled the details together!

spring garden workday

We had another great garden workday last week...sunshine and sunny helpers...thanks to everyone who spent their Saturday morning with us- we know how busy everyone is so we really, really appreciate your help...so do the little ones!

We were able to freshen up our mulch and put in some fresh herbs, flowers, and veggies in the front bed- thanks, lauren stubbs, for heading that up! and also to wilson's parents and tyler's parents and grandmother for their help! And, thank you to our friends at 3 porch farm for donating plants to us, and to the parents who dropped some off too!

and kevin yates- from hungry gnome gardenscapes, and dad to jonah & roscoe- cleared out the bed near the seedling classroom and installed 5 donated thornless blackberries- thanks, kevin!

And, don young, aka sophia's dad, built us a little playhouse made from recycled pallets....don, thank you! We love it!

And, lastly, we refilled our sandbox with donated sand and painted the whole length of concrete wall with a fresh coat of paint...perfect for drawing!

The arrow children spent alot of time outside this week enjoying the fresh air, new picnic tables, and their beautified garden space...

Enjoy Spring, everyone!

arrow explores: double dutch

continuing our fun exploration of great things in athens through our 'arrow explores' series, the arrow kids spent a recent afternoon at double dutch press in normaltown...they practiced all types of printing techniques and came away with colorful printed tote bags and little arrow bookmarks that they printed themselves with the help of the kind folks at double dutch. it was a great afternoon, full of color and hands-on fun! thanks to everyone who came, and also to double dutch!

from our caregivers

over the last few months we have shared some tips from some of our caregivers in our newsletter for our shared nanny families...we thought we should share them here, too, as they are great- ideas for things to do in winter...

the first little note is from ann turner, one of our caregeivers who also works with wild intelligence.
ann writes:

"One of the many beautiful things about winter is that the trees are missing their leaves and you can see unimpeded through the canopy. It's a ton of fun to play "I Spy" and try to trace the sound of the bird call to the creature in the tree. Also you can get great visuals of bird and squirrel nests and build replicas.

Also, talk with your children about what its like to live in the winter without warm coats and heaters and puzzle over how birds might survive. Here are some ideas for creating cozy winter homes for birds to use.

Another fun activity is to build little peanut butter pine cone feeders to hang outside to help the little ones pack on extra fat to get through the cold months.

While working at Arrow, I will sometimes pick up a child who is having a tough day and take them to the window or out in the yard and point out the birds... each time they are instantly fascinated and tears are quickly replaced with smiles. "

and,
marijke, mother to Luuk and also an arrow caregiver, writes this month about heading to the bot gardens for some fun:

"a great way to get the little ones out of the house even when it's cold/rainy is the Botanical Gardens. their green house is cozy and warm and it is fun to look at all the plants, walk/run around a bit (there is space for that and until now nobody complains about Luuk) and it has Dondero's cafe with coffee and lunch items for moms, dads or whoever is on kid duty. We often combine a little hike outside with some warm up time afterwards and a coffee for me.

also, all sorts of water play are great - if you are not too worried about making a mess, play sand in a big plastic box (those under bed storage ones are great) and a bucket of water make a great baby/toddler sensory activity. You can hide stones in the sand, to dig for, explain what wet feels like, that dry sand runs through your fingers while wet sand sticks together, build tunnels and let water float through...It will keep them busy for a while and can be done even if you don't have a big back yard."

thanks, ann & marijke!

and arrow families,
we will continue to share these little ideas with you all...
have a good day!

celebrating another trip around the sun...

in celebration of our fourth birthday here at Arrow, we would like to share some thoughts on the subject from our dear friend, tabatha tucker.

please enjoy!

I love my birthday. I tell my friends when it is; I make sure I have something special to do that day. A few years ago, I was very pregnant with my second child on my birthday and I spent that birthday feeling very close to giving birth and thinking about when the baby would come. The next day, my daughter was born and my birthday was forever changed.

I now spend my birthday preparing for my child’s birthday. Her anticipation for her birthday is infectious and outshines my own, by far.  Children grow and change so quickly that each birthday marks mountains of progress and miles of achievement. The joy and pride that children feel at becoming a new “number” is simply magical.  They are eager to greet the next year with all the powers of the new age.

We adults create celebrations to express the magnitude and wonder of children’s birthdays but most importantly, we bring significance to our children for each change of age. Within that, we are blessed with the opportunity to celebrate the changes in us.  The change in our lives brought forth by the birth of our children, from the selves we were as individuals into the selves we are as parents. My greatest birthday gift is to be a part of this special moment of hers and to look forward to all of the 364 other days along her next journey around the sun.

A birthday poem for the night before, a “verse of anticipation” 

When I have said my evening prayer,

And my clothes are folded on the chair,

And mother switches off the light,

I’ll still be 2 years old tonight.

But, from the very break of day,

Before the children rise and play,

Before the darkness turns to gold,

Tomorrow, I’ll be 3 years old.

3 kisses when I wake,

3 candles on my cake.

{ A special birthday crown }

{ A verse to sing to mark each year of the child }

The earth goes around the sun, the sun

The earth goes around the sun

12 months, 52 weeks, 365 days