wishtree – Car Full of Harmony

I have to brag a little about Squid. Both of my girls have big hearts, but Squid is now to the age to show hers on a bigger scale.

It all started with her school’s “One School, One Book” program. Squid’s elementary school has K-6 in it, and every student gets a copy of the same book. They read it in class and do various activities that are linked to the book. The program started in January, and this year’s book was K. A. Applegate’s “The Wishtree.” Squid loved this book, and from a few pages into it, she had decided she wanted to create her own wish tree.

As her mom, I am used to ideas she has. She is sometimes like me, in that she comes up with many ideas, but not all of them ever make it past the idea phase. I wasn’t sure how serious she was until she mentioned it more frequently.

Then, coronavirus entered the picture. With how different things were, and how much the girls missed their friends and school, Squid decided this Wish tree was exactly what needed to happen.

Around the same time, a friend of mine posted on facebook that she had seen a wish tree on a walk in a nearby town. Squid, Wormy, and I took a field trip during an online learning day to check it out. It was so exciting to see someone else sharing the same idea Squid had. We took note of how they did things, and Squid made modifications based off of making things a little more environmentally friendly for the area around the tree. The tree we visited had wishes attached to it that were made of paper. And, although some people tried to place them in bags to protect them a bit more from the weather, the wishes still weren’t holding up as well as Squid was hoping. We liked how the organizers had left out supplies so people could create their wishes onsite, but we got there after a rain, so the crate of supplies were wet.

It was so exciting to see a real wish tree! Now I understood Squid’s mission!

After seeing the wish tree in action, I understood a bit more about Squid’s idea. We talked through what we saw and how she wanted hers to be. She did not want the wishes to fall off of the tree, so she suggested doing what the characters in the book had done – using ribbons and scraps of fabric to make the wishes hold up against the elements. My husband thought we should have a collection of supplies out for people to make their own items, but with the virus around, Squid didn’t think that was a good idea. We got to pick up Squid’s book from school, and I read it. Now Squid’s idea made even more sense to me. I suggested we tie a rope around the tree to make it easier to take the wishes down when we get to winter, and to hopefully not hurt the tree from growing or cover up any of its leaves for photosynthesis.

I encouraged Squid to go about this the right way. I had her draft an email to the town supervisor asking permission for her idea. I told her that otherwise we did not truly have permission to take over a tree on public land (she picked a nearby park for her tree, as it is used for a lot of summer events). And, I didn’t want anyone to think her work was vandalism. The town supervisor liked the idea and passed it on to the director of Parks and Rec. He met with Squid and talked over what he could offer as far as taking care of the area (mowing, trimming, etc) and getting the local newspaper involved. Squid then said we could share the news on the school’s facebook page as well. She also said we can put it up and take it down each year, as the Parks and Rec Director suggested this could be a reoccurring event.

After my husband and I helped her put the rope up, we put our family wishes on. Squid visited the tree every single day watching for people to put wishes on. She was getting pretty bummed out, because people weren’t visiting it. However, we started it on a very rainy week, and it was on a weekday that I advertised it on the facebook page. Since then, luckily, it has really taken off. We counted about 2 weeks ago (before she was the front page story in the local newspaper, and a feature section in the area newspapers), and there were 38 wishes on the tree. We can’t wait to get over to the park again and count now that she’s been in the news!

I am so ridiculously proud of this girl. She did such a cool thing from start to finish and she didn’t cut any corners along the way. I hope her tree really takes off for years to come!

I know I haven’t blogged in a little while. We’ve just been struggling with the realization that every day is the same. It’s not that we’re bored – we have plenty to do between cleaning, crafting, walking, appreciating live streaming of free releases of content every day. It’s just the difficulty that every day feels like the one that came before it….and the one before that….and the one before that. At least when you have to leave the house to go to work or school, there are differences between your Monday and your Thursday. I miss those differences.

Luckily, when the weather’s nice, we’ve been outside and that helps. However, on school days we have done such a good job keeping a routine that I have grown to dislike it. Yes, there’s still a routine in our ‘normal’ lives, too, but it’s still got it’s differences. For example, I teach on Mondays and Wednesdays. I can tell the difference between these two days easily, however, because I teach different things on those days. I see different students and have a different schedule, despite being at the same location. The girls have differences in schedules day-to-day at school, too. One day they have art class, the next music, Fridays are spelling tests, etc. I know these seem like small differences, but it’s these things we are lacking in our online life. I no longer just teach on Mondays and Wednesdays. If a student or a parent has a question on a Thursday, I’m not going to make them wait all of the way to Monday to get an answer. That’s silly!

So, today, I’ve vowed to make differences in our days. Even when we are on summer vacation, there are certain differences in our days (Wednesdays and Fridays are for community band!). I don’t know if we’ll do something crazy to set each day apart, but we are making modifications.

Today was field trip day. We went to the Fox River Park in Waukesha. A friend and colleague of mine posted on Facebook that she found a wishtree this last weekend. Squid has been working on setting one up in our town, and I thought this was the perfect opportunity to do a little research. We walked around the park (3 miles!) and giggled while picking up caterpillars. We read the signs people made on the wishtree. We enjoyed ourselves before the rain hit. It was nice to go for a walk somewhere other than our neighborhood. Afterwards, Squid got to work emailing the Town Supervisors to ask permission to go ahead with her Wishtree project. I am excited to see what happens (and hopefully someone responds to her).

We also are working to make weekends screen-free. With all of the chromebook/computer time the girls need for school, and the same for my husband & I, we need a break. It’s hard, as I feel like I am addicted to checking my email every ten minutes during the week. The break felt weird this weekend, but my days actually felt longer (in a good way), and my stress was significantly better.

I’m still working my way through how our days will be different. Maybe we’ll go back to Family Game Nights on Fridays (as opposed to sporadically throughout the whole week), or Crafting Wednesdays. Who knows. It will take us awhile to figure it out, but hopefully this tip fills in the void that you may have been experiencing as well.

Tag: wishtree

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