The Earth Day party at Pringle Creek last Sunday was just about ideal. It was educational and thought-provoking, but best of all, it was just a really, really good time.
There were very intelligent students and teachers sharing their research on creek restoration and water quality in their local watersheds through the Adopt-a-Stream Youth Environmental Summit--their work is a beacon of light in our city.
Younger kids made newspaper pots, seed balls, and other art projects. Elementary school students with string instruments performed live with their music teacher, Diane, who also played a few songs with Blue Lightening, a Portland folk-rock group who stopped by on their way to Lefty's Sunday night.
Outside, we had several workshops throughout the day: Al gave a very entertaining and informative presentation on sustainable landscaping in his east coast straight-talk kind of way; Sally, who teaches science at Waldo Middle School, gave an excellent workshop on worm-bin composting; Mike, Kyle and Tim held a discussion on living car-free--all of them had chosen to use the bicycle as their primary (or only) means of transport for the past six months or more; 
and our final workshop was by Josh, who is a senior at North Salem High School, and Bryan, who is a Flower Power Biodiesel Co-op member. They did a live demonstration on how to make your own biodiesel. Throughout the entire day, Tim was surrounded by a crowd, as various people mixed clay, straw and water into cob and began building a beautiful bench underneath the 1,000 year old Pacific Yew.
The day was inspiring; there are a lot of people in Salem doing very good things to make Oregon safer, cleaner, and more beautiful. Earth Day at Pringle Creek was a gathering of people interested in reducing their footprint on the environment, making our places more livable, and living happier and healthier lives... not just on Earth Day, but everyday.
A special thanks to everyone who helped make it happen: Deborah at the City of Salem, Marilee, Don, Mark, Tony, Elizabeth, Trevor, Sarah, Jackie, Mary Ann, Al, Sally, Mike, Tim, Kyle, Blake, Larry, Phil, Bryan, Josh, Marie, Rachel at Public Works, 
all the dedicated students and teachers at Adopt-a-Stream, Pamela at OSU, Athena at NWEI, Blue Lightening, and Diane with her talented group of string-instrument playing kids...
--santiago
More photos to come.
