Ideas For You
The Guerrilla Success Book is out!
I was fortunate to be asked to write a chapter for a book by my hero by
Jay Conrad and Jeannie Levinson, were the creators of the term Guerrilla Entrepreneur. They described them as men and women who think outside-the-box. In their words: He’s embraced new ways of thinking, new ways of working, new ways of living. He well knows that he’s left behind an age characterized by a worship of profits, a surfeit of working hours, and a neglect of family and self.
I am thrilled that the book is out and my essay is included. Here is the link to grab a copy for yourself:
Guerrilla Success
This week we celebrate all things local! Get in on the action and spend your money on your local economy this week. Laboratory5 Inc is a locally owned business so naturally it is important to us to promote and celebrate all of our localists in AZ and around the country.
Join Local First Arizona in celebrating locally owned and independent businesses across the state for Independents Week
Saturday, June 25, through Monday, July 4.
Check out some of your favorite local shops and business this week and get in on some great deals. Grab your golden ticket and get to shopping!
Unsupervised play in nature – Leave them alone!
Why have kids play and explore in nature? Because they already know what to do there – not instructions required. Kids are hard wired to know how to play outside, it is only we adults who interrupt their potential while they are explore. We do this out of our own fears but what if we allow these young explores to take over and investigate all on their own? Just think of what they might come up with. Beyond playing out in a natural environment what if you are interested in building a playground in the back yard for the kids? consider building one out of natural materials. You can keep it simple and put up a few tree stumps to offer space for imaginative play.
You could create structures that are more complex and offer a fort like set ups so kids feel like they are in their own land and are able to invent new games with new rules. They can build characters and use their imaginations to create whole new worlds.
Mix nature with richer character development and storytelling by creating an outdoor structure that is a puppet theater combined with a beverage stand or Lucy from Peanut’s Advise stall. Let kids decide how they want to incorporate nature into the story they tell and how they see the world.
Next time you think “should I let the kids play an hour more on their tech or should I take them to a nearby playground?” consider how healthy it is for kids to have unsupervised, creative outdoor play. Leave them alone because they know what to do out there, just like you did when you where a kid.
Every summer we go camping and spend days, weeks and even months outside playing in nature. And every summer my girls and their friends build outdoor habitats for the magical, mysterious creatures known as fairies. They will spend hours find items in nature that can serve as ‘beds’, ‘tables’ and ‘food’.
We encourage magic and mystery with the kids while they are in their natural surroundings. Imaginative play through constructing outdoor fairy houses from natural materials such as bark, sticks, stones, flowers, grasses, acorns and pine cones; along with small pieces of trash they find around the camp site like bottle caps, broken sunglasses, pieces of plastic. We use this collection time to have conversations with our mini architects to talk about preserving nature and not littering. We talk about how harmful it is to birds and water life when people don’t properly dispose of their garbage.
When building a fairy house think about all of the possibilities: such as creating a pebble path, making a fence out of sticks, a walnut-shell bathtub, leaf hammock, a bark bed or a stone table.
You can do this in your own back yard, at a playground or even in a container filled with dirt on a balcony of an apartment. You need only to get outside, take a walk, carry a bag or a bucket and collect things. Bring back the found goodies to the place you will construct and begin the process to create a welcoming home for fairies.
Want more ideas? Check out these books – they are some of our favorites:
Fairy House: How to Make Amazing Fairy Furniture, Miniatures, and More from Natural Materials
Today, June 4, 2016 is American Hiking Society’s National Trails Day®
Get out to a nearby trail, wherever you are, and get a hike in this weekend. National Trails Day events will take place in every state across the country and will include hikes, biking and horseback rides, paddling trips, birdwatching, geocaching, gear demonstrations, stewardship projects and more. If you are interested in leading or organizing an event, click on the host materials tab to the left for host guides and prep materials.
We are looking at temps of 115 degrees today so that means heading north where is is easily 25 to 30 degrees cooler. No Excuses!
