Our Nature Table

We are a family of outdoor collectors. There are little spots all over our home where we keep our collections, bits and pieces of things that we pick up when we are outside. But, there is one special spot where we like to celebrate the seasons in our house and this is on our Nature Table.
This became one of our traditions when Jasper's started his Waldorf playgroup when he was 3, it is one of the many elements of the Waldorf classroom that I embraced in our home. The children love it!
Our nature table is on a shelf in our kitchen. Throughout the seasons we all bring home things to celebrate and display.
Here it is yesterday at the end of the spring season, just before we took down our springtime decorations to make way for our summertime things...

There are little friends who live on the Nature Table during certain seasons, like these bunnies that I needle felted last year for Carys's Easter basket.

At the start of each new season we pull out the box with that season's decorations. So, yesterday on the first day of summer we decorated with our summertime things. Dolphins, turtles, ladybugs and flower petals all came out in abundance.

Our summertime nature table usually celebrates our frequent trips to the ocean, along with lots of special rocks...

The real magic for me lies in placing things that the kids have made, like this mouse that Jasper made at his playgroup, so that they seem as if they are about to scamper into their own little environment.