Sunrise Off-Grid Festival

(Very late publishing of this post I drafted after getting back - was waiting to put photos in but had to learn how to get them off my phone first, and now I have done so but onto my laptop so will have to go and do that separately.)

We've just had a really interesting and fun few days away at the Sunrise Off-Grid Festival in Somerset. I was asked to go and help in the 'Sustainable Communities' area, issuing the first local/temporary currency issued for a Festival, the SOL (Symbol of Life). I went with my ex-work colleague and friend, Kate, and her 3 daughters who are good friends with my 2. We took it in turns to be on the stand issuing SOLs, and looking after the girls.

The kids had an absolute blast. There was 'Forest School' every morning from 10-12 which I went along to to help Jade be there. The first morning covered 'Nature Crafts' including making your chosen animal in clay using leaves, twigs or anything else as facial or bodily features, making a nest from straw for your animal, using mud and crushed berries to decorate banners, a nature scavenger hunt, and decorating the whole area with whatever could be found nearby. The second morning was about 'story-telling', during which the kids picked a soft-toy animal from a big sack, and then built/made a home for their animal. Willow stems could be used to make a 'tree' into which you could put a nest for a bird or squirrel, holes dug in the ground for rabbits and hedgehogs, a blue fabric 'pond' for the frogs and Shannon's lobster. The kids were amazingly creative and fantastic, and even more so when, once all the homes were built, we went round and the kids told a story about their animal. Shannon was so cute talking about her lobster's day!

That afternoon, Jade spent a lot of time with H and D, Kate's elder two girls, and really bonded with them again. They spent a lot of time kite-flying, and then went off round the festival together, arm-in-arm. Jade was able to go off without me, spend her money at some stalls on her own, and generally participant and have a fab time. So much so that on the Sunday morning when Kate and I were busy packing up the tents, she and the other girls went off to Forest School without me!! I was so thrilled! There they did campfire cooking, and I think she said they cooked some apples (baked, maybe?) and made 'bread' which wrapped round the end of a stick to cook over the fire, although when I was in the Guides we used to call it 'damper'.

There was so much of interest to see and do, although I missed most of it due to being at Forest School in the mornings and on the SOL stand in the afternoon, but I did join in with Melissa Corkhill's (Editor of Green Parent magazine) talk about home education and a workshop with Mark Boyle on the Freeconomy and his experiment on living completely without money for a year. All very thought-provoking and interesting stuff. I also discovered activist folk band Seize the Day who are fantastic!

I wish I had taken a picture of the toilets. I thought the old Greenbelt toilets were rather basic in the days when they were just a hole in a piece of wood over a big hole in the ground, but at least they had doors. These were composting toilets, aka a big hole in the ground, a plank of wood over with holes cut in, and walls and doors made of a big sheet of plastic. The sheet was cut with a knife at one side of each doorway so you could push it aside to go in. But what does sheet plastic do when cut? It curls up at the edges. And it was quite windy. So one had to develop gymnastic techniques in getting ones clothes out of the way with one hand, while pulling and holding the plastic sheet across the open doorway to avoid one's ablutions being watched by the rest of the campsite. Once finished, you chucked a cup of sawdust down the hole. It was an .... interesting experience!