District 214 Community Education

You will remember why you fell in love during our Connecting through Candles Date Night. Each couple will take home one 8 oz. Love Affirmation candle, which has a soy and coconut blended wax with a mix of lavender and patchouli essential oils. There will also be the option to add in flower petals and/or herbs. There will be different love affirmations to choose from to intend into the candle you get to bring home. Candles will need to cool overnight.

As the saying goes “communication is the foundation of a healthy relationship.” Communication has the power to bring partners closer together or push them away from one another. Frequent challenges when discussing important issues can lead to feelings of anxiety, disappointment, resentment, decreased trust, and sometimes a lack of desire to share parts of yourself with your partner. Mindful communication is rooted in being intentional about how you express your thoughts, feelings, and needs with your partner. This session will provide some practical strategies to use in your relationships to increase maintain an emotional connection with your partner. Incorporating greater awareness of mindful communication can make the process of repairing and resolving relationship differences less challenging, and help orient the relationship toward a stronger connection and a more satisfying relationship.

Like mushrooms? Ever thought about growing your own? This class will show you how to grow your very own mushroom harvest. It will also show you how to preserve your mushroom harvest and how to make the most of these culinary treasures.

Learn how to make creatively shaped and uniquely scented bath bombs that are made with natural ingredients. First, find out about the utensils and basic ingredients you will need and most likely already have at home. Receive a unique recipe, so you can refer to it whenever you want to make more! Along the way, be introduced to special techniques and tips and tricks for making bath bombs.

Want to learn the basics of gardening? Interested in starting small and getting practical experience? Creating a wagon wheel garden at the Forest View Garden Plots. Participate in the creation, harvesting and care of the garden, while learning gardening techniques and what to do with garden surplus. This series of classes is designed to help both beginner and intermediate gardeners to learn and perfect the art of gardening in a practical hands-on way. Participants will be asked to bring a chair and gardening gloves, as well as dress for the outdoors (rain or shine) for each session. All programs are held on Tuesdays at the Forest View Education Center Community Garden area. In series 1: Plan, prepare and plant the wheel. Discussing plant selection, design tips and planting needs and technique. Participants will get their hands dirty and learn ways to use fertilizer and compost to enhance performance, as well as companion planting and spacing techniques. Bring a pair of gloves and a gardening hand shovel. We will also discuss container and patio gardens. In series 2: Begin caring for and harvesting the garden. Learning how to use the fruits of our labor. So, if you have some clippers bring those along with your gloves and we will harvest from the garden to make a few items to preserve those fresh flavors. Participants will learn to make vinegar and craft flavored salts and sugars, butters and more. In series 3: Continue harvesting in the height of the season, learn and try out drying techniques and try a few easy recipes with our surplus. Learn to make refrigerator pickles to take home and try some quick cooking ideas. We will determine if our companion planting strategy was successful and make and sample some hot and iced tea. Bring clipper or scissors and a pair of gardening gloves. In series 4: Change to bulk harvesting and preserving the items that have grown. Participants will learn preservation techniques, like simple pickling, compound butters to freeze, and vinegar infusion. We will also learn how to put an herb garden to bed at the end of the season. Bring your gardening gloves and a paper bag to bring home some herbs. For a great savings, register for the full series!

Your garden has produced a bumper crop of herbs. What are you going to do with all of them? Mark Lyons, an experienced garden coach, will show you how to harvest and store your herbal treasures as well as how to use them to prepare butters, vinegars, oils, teas, potpourri, sachets, and other herbal delights.

This class builds on the fundamentals studied in the Introduction to Ohara Ikebana. In this class, advanced styles such as Hana-Isho and Moribana will be covered. This is a hands-on class where students learn the techniques and philosophies of Ohara Ikebana. Since this is an at-home class, participants are responsible for purchasing their own flowers and materials. A list of required materials will be provided a few days prior to the class.

Learn how to back up your documents, music and photos to online cloud solutions, many of which are cheap or free. We’ll also show the basics of onsite backup and the 3-2-1 backup strategy. Useful for safety and sharing!

Take an idea from your brain and get help putting it onto paper (or your computer screen) in this interactive workshop. Over the three 90-minute sessions, we will (i) explore elements of a successful book with Little Ambassador examples, (ii) showcase ways to find your literary voice, and (iii) provide techniques you can use to refine your ideas and characters for submission to a publisher.