Hello Cascadian Regenerators!
Very happy spring and (occasional) sunshine! Today, we’re happy to share several updates, an upcoming information session tonight, and that it’s our (*roughly) one-year anniversary since Regenerate Cascadia grew from the Salmon Nation Edgeprize! We are so delighted at how this idea has started to take root, and we can’t wait to see how it continues to grow in the upcoming years.
“What is Spring? It is the sun shining on the rain and the rain falling on the sunshine…”
― Frances Hodgson Burnett
One Year Anniversary! – Info Session & Envisioning
Very happy one-year anniversary! Regenerate Cascadia celebrates its first anniversary today, April 18th. As we celebrate our first year and how far we’ve come since last April and the activation tour in October and November, we would love to invite all of you to join us in imagining what the next year could look like and tell us what you think is important.
Where would you like to see Regenerate Cascadia in one year? What supports would you like to ensure are built in and offered?
Below are details for the next:
- Info Session & Updates Thursday, April 18th from 6-7:30pm, which will share a bit about what we’ve been up to.
- Regenerate Cascadia Envisioning Session Sunday, April 21th 10am-2pm.
The sessions will be on the primary zoom link, which can be accessed from the main menu or side bar “Zoom Link” on the https://regeneratecascadia.org website.
Join the Birthing Bioregional Learning Centers Cascadia Cohort!
We’ve just finished the first month of the Birthing BLC’s Learning Journey, being hosted by Joe Brewer and the Design School for Regenerating Earth, but there’s still plenty of room! You are invited! Regenerate Cascadia is proud to partner with the Design School for Regenerating Earth to help host a “Cascadia Cohort” – specfically for folks in Cascadia to connect with each other, help us develop what a “Landscape Hub” is, organize Bioregional Learning Centers and sites – and simply to begin meeting each other, having coffee, and exploring what our next steps will be. This will be done in parallel with local groups around North America and the world as we manifest this platform in our local bioregions.
So far, more than 200 people have signed up for the Learning Journey, and more than 50 are from the Cascadia cohort, and we’d love to grow this number. If you are already a member of the Design School for Regenerating Earth, the program is already offered free. Otherwise, we are covering the full cost a one year membership for people signing up as part of the Cascadia Cohort. To receive the free membership, please sign up at the link below, and we will send you a registration link.
Sign up for the Cascadia Cohort:
https://regeneratecascadia.org/birthing-blc-cascadia/
First Webinar from the Birthing BLC Learning Journey:
Joe has shared the first webinar here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiHkChcVwx4
If you’d like to get up to speed on some of the things that people (and us!) have been up to – feel free to check out our recent news section here: https://regeneratecascadia.org/news/
Cascadia Bioregional Learning Stewards Group: An Invitation
Dear colleagues, a group of eight from different watersheds in Oregon, Washington and British Columbia have gathered to develop an integrated program to support the formation of something we are calling a “Bioregional Learning Guild”. We envision a system of processes and infrastructures that strengthens our shared work, and accelerates the development and embodiment of bioregional thought. We are looking for a few committed individuals that are attracted to this kind of regional community development work, to help us design and construct this system. Our aim is to operate in service and to strengthen individuals and communities that are working on-the-ground to teach and learn. We aspire to encourage the integration, application and evolution of bioregional knowledge in our communities. We plan to work creatively as part of the Regenerate Cascadia network to evaluate the needs of groups, map our shared assets, expand our communication networks, publish materials, and host bioregional learning and networking opportunities. We each bring resources to the table, plot our course by mutual consent, and meet fortnightly to plan to coordinate our work between conversations.
Please reach out to education@regeneratecascadia.org if you’d like to join us.
Upcoming Events!
April 19 & 20: Ecopoetics of Cascadia on Orcas Islands, Salish Sea
Each Earth Day, the San Juan Islands Makers Guild hosts a beautiful reading with esteemed poets who are guides for their listeners, pulling aside a fern or branch to help enter a trail where moss, river rocks, and the hover of a Kingfisher transports us to the Wild. This year, they convene this year’s trio of authors, Jill McCabe Johnson, Quinn Bailey, and Derek Sheffield, one of the authors of the Cascadia Field Guide. Following the poetry reading, there will be a luminaria lighting at the labyrinth and a book signing with the authors. Ecopoetry is a precious walk through natural spaces that evokes the sounds of the wind, lapping shores, bird calls, and the haunting howl of a wolf. Bringing those wild spaces inside, through the spoken or written word, can resonate with a wild aspect of ourselves we have long tamed and yearn to reacquaint. On April 19, 2024 Earth Day Celebration on the Salish Sea on Orcas Island
6:30 PM to 8:00 PM and April 20, 2024, The Ecopoetry of Cascadia, 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM.-at the Orcas Island Library.
April 20: Join the 2024 Connectivity Fair:
You are welcome to join the 2nd annual community wide Connectivity Fair on April 20th 10am-4pm at the Chimacum School in Jefferson County. This will give you an opportunity to see how the event unfolds and hopefully encourage you to do something similar in your community. An Invitation from Rose! As many of you may remember, Rose Madrone, creator of the Connectivity Project, invited anyone interested to connect around the idea of sharing a Connectivity Fair in their area. They’ve been working on creating a guide or kit for folks, and if you might like to host a similar event in your area, stop into the 2024 event, or send her an email and let her know!
April 20th: Food Waste – The Two Ends – Discarded Cooked/Fresh Food & Unplanted Seeds.
There is growing awareness around food wastage, which is great of course, may this continue to evolve. Much less thought about is older-discarded seeds which often get thrown away. This is because there are established seed-life lists out there and of course often this is on the seed packets themselves. In our experience over the last 11 years, these seed-life numbers are usually too strict-short. In this meeting we will be discussing ways to ensure that viable seeds not to get discarded.
April 26: Eugene Potluck & Presentation! Explore the Eugene Tapestry in Regenerate Cascadia
A call to climate activists, land regenerators, educators, permaculturists, wisdom holders, social justice lovers, and heart-centered folks of all ages. You are invited to a potluck and an imagining gathering.
What does the Eugene area tapestry look like? What story does it tell?
- Friday April 26 at 356 Horn Lane.
- 5-6 PM Vegetarian potluck (bring your own plates/utensils)
- 6 PM-Short Video on Regenerate Cascadia
- 6:30- 7:15 Small group discussion
- 7:15-8 Whole group debrief and self-organizing to next steps.
Hosted by the PROUT Institute. for more info email clarestrawn@gmail.com
Even if you don’t sign up – expect local updates soon! So far, we have people in Victoria, Whidbey, Whatcom, San Juans, Seattle, Eastern Washington, Portland, Eugene, and Northern California interested in hosting local campfires, bioregional salons, or just a cup of coffee.
May 10-12 Ongoing Opportunity! Salish Sea Restoration Platform
The Salish Sea Restoration Platform is a peer-to-peer learning platform to support Salish Sea stewardship. Information is stored in cross-linked and Categorized pages. Registered users create and revise pages using the Platform Style Guide under a shared Social Contract. We teach what we know. Anyone can read our shared reservoir of knowledge. We aim to accelerate our ability to effectively and efficiently regenerate ecosystems. We invite you to join in our effort.
The 13-year-old wiki-based project is being developed by government and non-profit volunteers to build a mechanism for place-based knowledge building that is independent of institutional interests and behaviors, and reflects the needs of a community of practice focused on land stewardship. The wiki is a project of the Society for Ecological Restoration Global.
June 20: Permaculture Design Course June 20-July 4 at the Whidbey Institute
June 20-July 4th at the Whidbey Institute. With Penny Livingston & World Class Instructors! Pamela SeaMonster, Doug Bullock, Michael Pilarski, Brian Kerkvliet, Dave Boehnlen, & other special guests!
June 20: Summer Solstice – Cascadia NW Music & Arts Festival in Darrington in the Salish Sea
The CascadiaNW Arts and Music Festival returns at the Darrington Bluegrass Music Park this year. Join hundreds of others for a weekend of music, camping, and fun. Join us for a weekend gathering in the lush forests of Cascadia, as we celebrate the longest day of the year! This will be the first public event in almost six years!
June 23: Echoes in Time June 23–June 29 in the Willamette Valley
Echoes in Time is a week-long ancestral skills conference held every June in Oregon’s Willamette Valley and the traditional territory of the Kalapuya near Monmouth. They aim to unite people from different demographics, communities, and backgrounds by sharing common traditions of place-based ancestral living skills. Participants camp out on private property and enjoy five days of learning various skills from the “stone age” to the “iron age” (basketry, bows and arrows, wild edible plants, pottery, blacksmithing, stone tools, felting, animal tracking, and more). Families are welcome, and no previous experience is required. In this age of ever-increasing technology and globalization, the skills of place-based, preindustrial people are being forgotten. Remember them with us! Echoes is a program of Rewild Portland, a nonprofit organization. As part of this, you can join Regenerator Paule` for a campfire talk on Rewilding Loneliness. It’s like the most amazing summer camp ever… for adults and kids!
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Monthly Email Newsletter Updates & Invitation
Each month, we’ll be in touch with updates, stories, and insights from the Regenerate Cascadia community.
As we continue to grow and evolve, we will also work with specific Guilds and Hubs so they are able to maintain their own updates, and also would love to invite community members doing amazing Regenerative projects if they would like something included. This expansion reflects our commitment to fostering collaboration and amplifying voices within the bioregional movement.
If you would like to include an update or invitation for a regenerative project, community or group, feel free to let us know by replying to this email, on the website, or telegram. In the future we will have a form people can use, but don’t have this accessible yet.
Website Updates
For those who haven’t seen the updates or follow along on the Telegram channel, we’ve been hard at work creating a website and digital platform for Regenerate Cascadia at https://regeneratecascadia.org. The goal of this is to share information to the general world, to provide spaces to get active and involved, a backend with nonprofit tools for organizers, and lastly, a social network for groups, guilds, hubs, projects and regenerators within Cascadia to be able to share and connect with each other. While we have a long ways to go, there are some great groups who have been meeting regularly, and a lovely, informal way that people can learn more, is to join one of the weekly online Campfires that happen each Friday at 10am.
This is solidly “under construction”, and very much still in a “early adopter” phase, but we are excited to keep puttering away on this, and to share updates in the future as this grows and develops.
As always, behind the scenes, there’s been a whirlwind of activity, and we are so thankful for the amazing group of people who have been working with us, to cocreate this organization, movement and what comes next. As many know, we still have so far to go, but we are excited to begin sharing this journey with you.
And that’s about it for now. Very happy sunny weekend.
All the best, and very bioregionally yours,
Brandon Letsinger & Clare Attwell
