[photo credit: Arlington Garden in Pasadena]
The Shadow Hills Nature Journal Club meets at Arlington Garden in Pasadena once a month to practice nature journaling a structured method of observing and recording the natural world through words, pictures, and numbers. The practice, coordinated by Terri Mando and grounded in the methodology of naturalist, artist, and educator John Muir Laws, requires no artistic background. The next session runs Thursday, June 4, from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. RSVP is requested; information is at shadowhillsnjc.blogspot.com.
Mando, a certified Wild Wonder Foundation Nature Journaling Educator, iNaturalist Ambassador, and UC ANR Certified California Naturalist, hosts nature journaling meetups at multiple locations across the San Fernando Valley and West San Gabriel Valley. She has served as a docent at the LA Arboretum and Botanical Garden since 2011. The Arlington Garden session is among her monthly meetups across the region. According to the Arlington Garden event listing, the sessions “explore nature through creativity and curiosity, look closely, and record observations.”
The methodology behind the sessions comes from John Muir Laws, an author, naturalist, artist, and principal innovator of what has become a worldwide nature journaling movement. Laws has written that the goal “is not to create a portfolio of pretty pictures but to develop a tool to help you see, wonder, and remember your experiences.” His approach holds that the skills are learnable by anyone, at any level.
Arlington Garden itself is a distinctive Pasadena institution. Operated by the nonprofit Arlington Garden in Pasadena, a 501(c)(3), the three-acre site sits on Caltrans-owned land leased to the City of Pasadena. It was developed in collaboration with the City of Pasadena, Pasadena Department of Public Works, and Pasadena Water & Power, with support from the Pasadena Beautiful Foundation and the Mediterranean Garden Society. It is open 365 days a year, free to the public, and accessible by public transit. The garden was first planted in 2005 on land that had sat vacant since Caltrans acquired it for the never-completed 710 Freeway extension.
The Shadow Hills Nature Journal Club is dedicated, according to its organizer materials, to developing “artistic and naturalist skills” and connecting people “to explore nature through curiosity.” The club operates at locations across Los Angeles, the San Fernando Valley, and the West San Gabriel Valley. A weather-dependent go/no-go notice is posted on the club’s website ahead of each session.
For the June 4 session: Arlington Garden, 275 Arlington Drive, Pasadena. 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. Free; RSVP requested at shadowhillsnjc.blogspot.com. Arlington Garden can be reached at (626) 578-5434 or info@arlingtongardenpasadena.org.
The garden opens at 8 a.m. every day. The notebooks open at 9:30. The freeway never came. The poppies did.
