Thank you to all our participants!
In Carver’s words. (5 years old)
The Fort has lights in it. It has decorations on it, like birds at the front door, hats, measuring tape, and cool sheets. We built one wall out of cardboard boxes. The boxes are also shelves with books and toys. THE END
What is HOME? What people live in. Everyone’s toys live there. Home makes me feel happy because everyone is home.
Randine Mañach
Our family put our tents up as our forts. They have been great fun to camp in and read in. While it wasn’t the most creative use of materials, it did offer the opportunity for collaboration and participation during the rainy weather! It reminded us about the homeless tent camps we see in San Francisco and sometimes on the side of the highways in Santa Barbara. We were reminded how lucky we are to have a home! And how hard it would be to only have a tent. No bathroom. No ability to run in for extra blankets. No hot cocoa in the morning. It is fun to camp in a tent when it is by choice and you can laugh when you discover that your rain fly has a leak. But it would be terribly difficult to not have a secure home that you can depend on for safety and comfort. Thanks for this opportunity of reflection and for the work you do to build homes.
Amanda Allen
I would like to submit a fort on behalf of my children who are 7 and 10 years old. My husband and I let them freely decide how they wanted to build it.
Both passionately took on the task of building a fort together over the last 2 weeks. This ranged from cheerfully collecting just about every single blanket, sleeping bag, book, string of lights and clip they could find to vehemently disagreeing about the structure of the fort. In the end, they turned both of their bedrooms entirely into forts, connected to each other with a tunnel. (Over these 2 weeks, they made MANY iterations of forts and have slept each night in each other’s rooms together under whatever they built that day.)
What we learned about home through all of this is that it resonates deeply with every single person, no matter who you are. Although home may be unique to an individual, our homes together make a community, and everyone should have the opportunity for that.
Thank you for the important work you do in giving everyone a chance to be a part of our community.
Michelle Yee
Many thanks to our 20th Anniversary sponsors.
