2023 Class Schedule

In this class, we will make a mandala out of elements in the landscape. This is an experiment in art and ecological collaboration. Mandala making is a form of ritual practice and meditation. It is a traditional art that shifts the quality of our attention. In this class, we will explore: sacred geometry and the patterns of nature, body radar, giving thanks, asking permission, and other elements of the honorable harvest. We’ll practice teamwork and collective creative process and we will create an earth art project which will be an 8-point mandala. In the end of the class, you will know the fundamental principles to engage in mandala making as a personal practice.

Learn to make beautiful, strong, useful cordage from a variety of plant fibers. Check out the Fibrary (a study collection of amazing samples) and try out some cool traditional fiber working tools.

Materials fee: Book by instructor is available for $10 if desired

What to bring: sharp knife or scissors

From beginner to advanced, learn how to carve a spoon out of green wood. Don’t eat your soup with a fork!

Materials Fee: None

What to Bring: Sharp knife if you have one

Meet dirt (an introduction) – you already know what it is, but wait, there is more!  This is as earthy as an earthskill gets.

We’ll check out the  edible, medicinal, and otherwise useful wild plants.  We will talk about the role of these plants among traditional inhabitants of the region and how we can use them for food and medicine in our everyday lives. We will notice the animal signs, bird calls, insects and other creatures which texture our outdoor experiences.  You’ll likely hear stories, songs, and lore as well as fact stranger than fiction, about the plants and critters we encounter. 

Finger weaving of yarn into a hatband or bag strap, basic technique, as developed by the Native Americans of the north and south eastern US.

Class Size: 6 Students, Adults

Materials Fee: $5 if using hemp or waxed cotton, none if using yarn

What to Bring: Fingers!

Make your own bow drill set. Ideal materials provided. This task involves a fair amount of carving and knife work. This class will focus on bow drill design, materials, construction, etc. Technique of using the bow drill will be covered if time allows.

Materials Fee: (TBD, ~$10)

What to Bring: Sharp knife

Free for all clay spree – come work on projects and learn the earthy skill.

Beginners guide to tracking. Tracking is our ability to observe the present, tell a story about the past, and predict the future. This class will give us the context to implement tracking principles into our everyday lives, and a framework to boost our ability to stay engaged with tracking as a basic human skill; integral to all ways of living. Participants will walk through the environment, tracking the movement of energies through the ecosystem, and exploring ways to apply tracking principles to their everyday lives. Class will be very ‘hands on’ with games and practices you can share with others, and dialogue that makes tracking fun and accessible to everyone.

Learn to lay out and carve a Celtic knot on a piece of wood

Materials Fee: (TBD)

What to Bring: Tools will be provided

Small bags using the twinning (two weavers) technique, out of jute or cotton and yarn.

Materials Fee: $5 if use waxed cotton, none if using yarn

Step 1, Cleaning and Softening of hides

Class Size: <5 adults (TBD)

Materials Fee: $50-$75 (TBD)

What to Bring: Materials will be provided

Todd & Doug Elliott will lead a fun ramble focusing on the medicinal, edible, and otherwise useful and interesting wild plants and mushrooms- their botany, natural history and folklore, and their traditional and contemporary uses. We will also pay attention to the birds, insects, and other critters that texture our outdoor experiences.

Learn to move across the Earth using the suns position for guidance. Also, learn about many clues to guide you even when the sun is hidden.

Using a quart paint can and tin cans, make a small gassifier camping stove. Discuss science of gassifier stoves. Class may run into the afternoon.

Class Size: 6 Adults

Materials Fee: $10

What to Bring: Leather gloves. Cordless drill and bits, can openers, church key, punch if you have them.

Learn a new, affordable medicine that regenerate health at cellular level, so the body will restore all systems to homeostasis. One simple trick to reverse inflammation and restore gut biome. Learn about how Stealth Infection is the root of many chronic illnesses. Covid reactivates these infections so we are seeing a surge in autoimmune and neurological illness. These tools and resources shared in this workshop apply to many other conditions: ALS, Parkinson’s, Fibromyalgia. Emotional Resilience in the invisible disability and complex PTSD that is Lyme.

Don’t have enough space to haul around your primitive skills and bushcraft stuff?? A shoulder bag is the must have piece of gear for all of us bush folk. Learn how to design, size, layout, punch out and assemble your own shoulder bag from Walnut dyed Buffalo leather and buckskin.

Age: (TBD)

Materials Fee: (TBD)

What to bring: (TBD)

Practice correct form and technique while making fire with the bow drill.

Age: 10 Adults

Materials Fee: (TBD)

What to bring: (TBD)

In this class we will explore techniques to bring your baking skills to the open hearth as we work together to create delicious treats over an open flame.

These 6 knots will get the job done: tying two similar or dissimilar ropes together, tying a line to a ring or onto a post, or lashing two poles to each other, use an elegant, strong appropriate knot. We will throw in a few extra for fun!

Materials Fee: None

What to Bring: Cordage will be provided, but you can bring your own

In this arena we will learn techniques to reduce stone by percussion and pressure flaking using various tools that stone age people used like other stones, bones, antler and wood. Some copper tools will also be utilized. Shape an arrowhead, spear point or effigy out of stone using proven stone age technology!

Material fee: $5

What to bring: Safety glasses and gloves will be provided

After Classes & before Dinner- Bring items to trade or frog skins (currency)

Fur Trade Era trade blanket ceremony; bring goods to trade and have a great time!

Learn other techniques and learn to process other fiber sources into great cordage. If you took a cordage class with me in the past, you probably didn’t get this stuff! But there is no prerequisite, beginners are welcome!

Materials fee: Book by instructor is available for $10 if desired

What to bring: sharp knife or scissors

With determined focus of your mind and body attempt to coax an ember from two pieces of wood. Connect with our ancient ancestors through the practice of fire by hand drill. Bring a sharp knife and a tenacious spirit!

Age: 10 Adults

Materials Fee: None

What to bring: Sharp knife

In this class we will be taking a deep dive into the world of Theobroma cacao, i.e. the food of the gods, as we use all 5 senses to explore the journey cacao takes from its tropical origins to becoming chocolate. We will roast and process cacao beans over fire and use a dutch over to create delicious dark chocolate brownies.

Materials Fee: (TBD)

Make a beautiful and functional container from tulip poplar bark.

Class Size: (TBD)

Materials Fee: (TBD)

What to Bring: (TBD)

Drums are the oldest singular instrument known to human kind. Different cultures around the world have fashioned drums for eons and had the simple purpose of mimicking the human heart beat. For this class we will focus on the Irish Bodhran drum. Learn the up and down stroke, triplets, reels, jigs, horn pipes, musical signature or meter, timing, simple and syncopated rhythms AND how to make your own “tipper” ( the stick used to play the Bodhran). After we’ve beat on the drums for a while, we’ll use what we’ve learned about rhythm, time signature and timing and we’ll transition to the rhythm or “rattle” bones. Learn holding positions and adjustments for different sounds and different woods for different tones.

What to Bring: Drums will be provided, or you can bring your own

We will learn methods of trapping and making snares using cordage from natural fibers and wire including live traps and small game trapping tips and techniques.

Learn the process of distilling birch oil from Birch bark. While the birch bark is distilling (takes 2 hrs or so) we will work on fine tuning your hand drill technique. Body positioning, socket and notch relationship, different spindle dimensions and types, tinders, whatever you’d like to address.

Materials Fee: (TBD)

What to Bring: (TBD)

A class focused on building communications skills while creating fire with hand drills. Participants will work in groups coordinating their rhythm and teamwork to create fires. Survival is a collaborative and communicative process. Indigenous peoples often work together to make friction fires, sharing the work to make things easy.

Thai Massage is a grassroot bodywork that farmers and monks do to family members/villages in Thailand. You are fully clothed to give and receive this “Lazy Men’s Yoga”. Bring a mat/blanket to lay on. We’ll pair up and follow along.

We will learn different methods to collect pine sap and make the sap into a usable hot glue that our ancestors used for many different purposes on a daily basis. Key ingredients for different methods and uses for pine pitch will be used in this class.

Materials Fee: None