Moss Garden.

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Every year, at the start of December, we make a moss garden.  For each of the four weeks of the month we add some little treasure to it representing the mineral kingdom, the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom and then, human kind.  It is so nice, as the days get more and more blustery, and we spend more and more time indoors, to have some time to think of these grand kingdoms of nature.  Like forcing bulbs, it is another wonderful way of bringing a lush, green, living thing into the home. It is also nice to know, that at the end of the month, the moss can be brought back outside and planted once again onto a rock, even under the cool snow.  We are just borrowing it for a time.

So, a few days ago, after a heavy night of wind and rain, my son and I slid into our rain boots and headed into the forest in search of our moss.

Before we left, I readied a container to hold the moss once we got it back home.  This year, I decided to make a smaller garden than I have in the past, and used a lovely, blue pie plate gifted to me by a dear family friend.  I put a thin layer of sand on the bottom to help a bit with drainage and then covered it with some moist garden soil.

Then we picked up our big, red bucket and headed into the forest.

Soon, we came upon this magical, mossy rock.  Amongst the muted color of fallen leaves and gray branches, it shone the most brilliant green.

I gathered some moss and put it in our bucket as my son splashed in rain puddles and investigated some mushrooms.

With a bucket full of moss, muddy boots and pant hems, we walked back home silently, stopping only to throw pebbles into the brook.  We held our dirty hands with one another and I felt quite blissful as they stuck together with sweet-smelling pine cone sap.

When we arrived home, I pressed the moss into the soil and gave it a good misting of water.  We put in two stones to celebrate the mineral kingdom.  One, a pebble from our land and the other a special, healing crystal that had been gifted to me.

Then, my son fell asleep.

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