Earth Day 2023 - BONUS edition

 Last Saturday we had our big CELEBRATION at Lake Tomahawk, hosted by the Climate Conversation Group of the Unitarian Universalist Church.

I've already posted some of the photos I took while we were setting up. HERE.

The SWAN Action Network display with some of the members, Carlos, Barbara. Hannah, and Robertson.

First some appreciation for background music, from Annelinde Metzner, Bill Altork and Sue Stone.

Linda plays many instruments! She is also the Music Director at the UU Church in Black Mountain.

Bill Altork was our strolling guitarist. He also writes his own songs for YouTube recordings.

Linda playing the recorder. She shared that when the wind was blowing (it started coming off the mountains (very cold) around noon.)

Sue Stone sang tunes and played her guitar. She is the pianist often at the UU Church.

I doubt that Bette is signaling a "stop" to Bill, more likely expressing something about the display.

The conversation starter...Climate Disruption, Human Displacement. This is just a small sample of the 300 figures in the original installation. 

Kate shows Anna how a rain garden works...a display that included take-home information that was popular.

Some of the participants looking at each other's displays. The free seeds and plant starts were popular. 

As the woman in the foreground considers a packett of free seeds, in the background Kerrigan Monk from the Black Mountain News interviews one of the participants.

Susan Moore brought a lot of free seeds, here she's talking with Bette Bates.

Linda Tatsapaugh discusses her display about Plastic-Free Buncombe County with Larry Pearlman.

A petition for (our county) Buncombe County to be plastic free...with lots of information on the dangers of plastic in our own lives (we each probably consume a credit card's worth of micro-plastic-fibres every week.) This display included a place to sign the petition to limit single-use plastics in our county!

R. J. and Helen Bell discuss the plant-based foods display.

This display focused on the industries' pollution in raising animals, and the animal rights hurt by meat based diets, as environmental impacts.

Two artists discuss making small paper books, Suzanne Ziglar on the left, and Jean who demonstrated her techniques on right. I missed seeing if anyone else came over to make a paper book, but it was a great idea.

Some of the SWAN members who put together today's "action" - Barbara and Hannah seated, R.J. and Kevin standing.

Interested couple looking at the Swannanoa Watershed Action Network display

Here Carlos explains the "Save the Planet" game to Kate. It came originally from a double spread page in the New York Times last August. 

I was surprised when I asked Kerrigan if she wanted to play it and she said "Yes."

Barbara, Kerrigan, Hannah and Carlos played the game, a cooperation between players to reach a certain score in so many turns. We were just 5 points short of saving the planet...it only takes about 15 minutes, and is educational. I think school age children would enjoy it, but we didn't have many children come through our Celebration.

Hannah explains something about the watershed, just west of the Continental Divide and flowing along the drainage through the Swannanoa River to the French Broad River in Asheville. Sue Ellen is signing up to get more information from SWAN.

After a rainy night, blue skies were welcome. This was my view from the picnic shelter.

The inside view of the banner.

Bette strolled her grandson outside the shelter, perhaps inviting other young families to come explore our displays.

We all felt the event was a good use of time and energies, and were happy with the outcome for our first try at this. 

When I asked these triplet girls if I could take their pictures (later when they came to the SWAN exhibit) they said "no." So I'm glad we had this one. Photo by Susan Moore.

Dealing with that north wind coming off the heights (we're just 15 miles south of Mt. Mitchell here!) we all cleaned up pretty fast. 

And by 1:10 we had left the tables to the next people (and ducks and geese) who wanted to use them!

Deepest thanks to all the participants who brought their displays to make this event successful. We all went home with a sense of learning from each other, and having shared with the public our hopes in dealing with climate change.