Waldorf Nature Table-MayPole Dancing Fairies

Our Waldorf Nature Table is celebrating Spring.  The Spring flower fairies are singing and dancing around the Maypole!  We have a little Spring celebration in my home daycare on May 1st.  The children sing and dance around our life-sized Maypole.  I thought it would be fun if the flower fairies on the Nature Table had a chance to dance around their own Maypole.  This miniature Maypole was very quick and easy to make. The book All Year Round also has instructions on how to make a small Maypole.

Materials:

Six Ribbons

A wooden skewer

Cork

Two Beads (see pics below)

I stuck the wooden skewer into the wine cork.  The cork will be the base of your Maypole.  Plasticine or a small container would work as well.

I secured the top of the ribbons together by sewing a few stitches with embroidery thread.  You could also glue or tie them together with another piece of ribbon.

I used my hot glue gun to glue a wooden bead onto the bottom of the ribbons. Make sure your bead fits over your wooden skewer; this is how the ribbons will be attached to the Maypole.

Glue the bottom (pink) bead onto the wooden skewer. Glue the second bead (red) onto the top of your ribbons. This covered my stitch and gave the Maypole a finished look.

Your mini Maypole is finished!  Now all you need are some fairies or sprites to dance around it. Watch my video, Spring Fairy Tutorial if you would like to make some of your own fairies for your nature table.  Telling a story about the fairies dancing around their Maypole would be a great way to introduce the Maypole song to your children.  Here are the words to the song we use;

SONG- Here’s a branch of snowy May

Here’s a branch of snowy May,
a branch the fairies gave me.
Would you like to dance today,
with a branch the fairies gave me?
Dance away, dance away,
holding high the branch of May.
Dance away, dance away,
holding high the branch of May.

I explain to the children that the branch of snowy May is not really snow.  We are lucky to live close to an apple tree and we watch how the apple blossoms bloom each spring and the white blossoms look like snow from a distance.  The nature table is an excellent way to bring the wonder of nature inside to your home daycare.