Be a Thingfinder

photo by m00nbugg.

When I was a kid, my mom's side of the family would, every summer, meet at our cousin Ethel's cabin in Sand Lake, Michigan. For two weeks all of the kids, grandkids, nieces, nephews, and cousins would gather - cram themselves into two cabins yelling, "I have dibs on the bed in the corner!" (as we all raced to that bed).

We would, of course, partake in all the activities that Sand Lake had to offer: sailboarding, water volleyball, swims across the lake, sun bathing, canoeing, and our daily ritual of walking around the lake.

This in particular was my, then 3 year old, cousin Matthew's favorite activity (other then, I seem to recall, eating candy). Matthew was our official "Thing Finder." And he was good at it. We'd walk around the lake, navigating marshes and wild blueberry patches, and Matthew would dart off in one direction or another, returning with a squirrel's skull, a buffalo nickel, neat looking rocks, worn bits of glass, etc. Of course, what he was really looking for were aluminum cans that he could trade in for candy at the local store, but he always came home with a bounty of "things" that we kids would always peruse and covet.

We always tried to be Thing Finders, but Matthew, since he was closer to the ground than we were, always seemed to find the best stuff.

Activity: Be a Thing Finder

On your walks or outings, as you're looking around, why not see what you can find?
Take a small bag with you, and collect objects from your walk. Bring them home and...

• Draw them
  
• Collage them into your journal
  
• write about them:
  
  • how did you found the "thing"?
    
  • What is the secret life of the thing found - where did it come from, how did it end up there...
  
  
• set up a mini-museum in which to display your best weekly finds
  
• Write descriptive tags for them & display them in your house somewhere
  
• Write descriptive or story tags for them, and leave them somewhere for someone else to find
  
  Along these same lines, there's a great movement | Web site that encourages you to leave your old books somewhere for someone else to find, adopt, read, and then leave somewhere for someone else to find, adopt, read, etc. You can go to the Web site and get a little ID code to put in your books, so that if someone else finds it, they can then go to the site, enter the ID code & you can track the journey of your released book. Kinda' fun, if you can get over the idea of letting go of your books.
  
  The Web site is Bookcrossing.com