With the weather turning towards spring and summer, I’ve been taking my students outdoors. Last week I took my teen students to Bothell Landing Park, a great park about one mile from Cloud 9 Art School.

I’m sharing my love for nature journaling with the teens: nature journaling as a path into the exploration of the natural world around us. Sketching is a way to develop a personal connection with our world.

To keep a nature sketchbook, all we need are some art supplies and to ask ourselves “What is happening outdoors, this particular season, day, time of day, and in this particular place?”

Here are a few photos from our evening at the park. Despite the challenges of finding comfortable seating, figuring out what to sketch in a park full of beautiful sketch worthy moments, and so many distractions, everyone wants to head out again next week. Weather permitting, we will be sketching nature outdoors again next week.

As one teen discovered… “this is so relaxing.” Yes, yes it is.