Solstice lantern

Last year, we attended the Solstice celebration organized by our local Waldorf-inspired school.  We loved the solstice spiral and all it represents.  We will not be able to attend the school's celebration so we will be creating our own special, quiet celebration in our backyard on December 21.

The solstice spiral represents several things to me.  First, it represents the return of the light on this longest night of the year.  Second, and perhaps more profound, is that it represents the light within each one of us and how it can glow and bring warmth to those we touch.

We started preparations today by making felt solstice lanterns.  I found this project in the Fall 2011 issue of Living Crafts magazine.  I found this to be a challenging project to make with little ones - I don't think I would try it with someone younger than Nicholas, unless I knew what I was doing (which I didn't).  But we did learn a couple things along the way.  Some were practical learnings - like that the lanterns felted better when all the wool roving went up-and-down as opposed to horizontal and vertical, and exactly how thin a layer of wool was needed to start off with.  We learned little life lessons too - like not giving up, patience, trying again if it didn't work out the way it was supposed to.