Rooted
Rooted is for queer, gender-awesome, non-binary, and trans youth ages 12 to 14
Cultivate nature intimacy // Practice expressive arts for healing and social justice // Offer spirals of support: intergenerational and inter-gender-ational // Foster a connection with the wheel of the year and the seasons // Offer rituals to mark important passages throughout the year // Give gender-creative youth a place of refuge
To fully experience the change of seasons together, Rooted is a year-long group meeting seasonally for field trips, campouts, and daylong gathering’s at our home base amongst the Ponderosa Pines and ancient rocks of the yellow, brown, green, and red-hued lands tied and sacred to many indigenous people, including the Arapaho, Ute, and Cheyenne (land known to us now as Lyons, Colorado). During our gatherings in nature, we will deepen our belonging to the earth and the more than human world, belonging to each other, and belonging, at root, with ourselves, as part of those larger webs of connection.
2023-2024 Dates:
Fall: October 29th 10am - 3:00pm in Lyons, Co
Winter: January 20th 10am - 3:00pm in Lyons, Co
Spring April 21st 10am - 3:00pm in Lyons, Co
Summer Pride Kick-Off Campout June 1st - 2nd
Meet the Guides
Angus, Bear, Nat and Wendy will co-lead this group, supported by Yasmin and the many eager parents, auncles, guncles, fairy godparents and queer elders who will help us weave a communal tapestry.
Angus
Angus Baguinho (they/them) is a Portuguese-American drama therapist and dance/movement facilitator focused on queer and trans collective healing. Angus recently moved here from the lands of the Ohlone people, in the San Francisco Bay Area, where they co-founded and co-led Queer World Making, a Weaving Earth nature-based rites-of-passage program for non-binary middle school students. Angus completed their M.A. in Drama Therapy at the California Institute of Integral Studies and is currently a SomaSource student with Melissa Michaels, Ed.D..
Fun facts about Angus: If they could be reborn as a more-than-human animal they would become a “cow of the sea” a.k.a. a manatee! Their favorite genres of novels are Magical Realism and Science Fiction. And nothing brings them more joy than spending time with their horde of younger siblings, ages 2 through 28.
Bear
Bear (they/them) is a trans and queer guide, trained in wilderness rites of passage, and is deeply passionate about co-building intergenerational queer community as they know that our strength is rooted in our sense of belonging. Drawn to guiding young people in community, they recently became a high school science teacher in Denver Public Schools. Before this, they worked as a somatic psychotherapist serving queer and trans young people in the Bay Area.
Nat
Nat (they/them) is dedicated to personal and collective liberation, healing and happiness for all queer and trans people. They have worked in the field of education since 2008 as a teacher and music instructor, and are deeply inspired to guide and navigate life’s wonders and challenges alongside queer youth. They are excited to follow this path through their role as a Rooted mentor, leader for the LGBTQIA+ affinity crew at Boulder County Youth Corps, and through their participation and training in Rites of Passage programs for the queer community. They are moved to share the deep sense of belonging they feel in the natural world, and to experience all of the queer and beautiful diversity that we are shown by being in relationship with one another.
Fun facts about Nat:
Nat loves to sing and make up songs! If they could be any nature being, they would be an Aspen tree, a Downy Woodpecker, or a Mountain Lion, or some combination of all three?
Wendy
Wendy (she/any pronoun) is a queer, nature-based mentor and graduate of the Buddhist Masters of Divinity program at Naropa. A nature-based youth mentor since 2010, she has led earth-connection rituals and rites of passage through Feet on the Earth, The Wildwood Path, Queer Nature and Women’s Wilderness since 2015.
Fun facts about Wendy: Wendy communicates with plants and trees! Her ancestors are elephants. She loves making up weird songs, eating as many flowers as possible, and her gender identity is a redwood tree.
Yasmin
Yasmin Suarez Shaddox (She/Her) will be supporting our community offerings for the parents/grandparents/auncles/guncles/fairy godparents/invested-loving-presences to the youth in Rooted.
Yasmin is founder and guide of Soulskin Journeys, whose soulwork nurtures a culture of connection, belonging, and rootedness through earth-based retreats, circles, and initiatory rites of passage. She also has the radical honor of being mother to two adolescent humans. She and her family's home is entangled with the wild ecosystem in which Rooted will be embedded.
Tuition for the Youth, Guardian, and Family Gatherings
Sliding Scale: $130-$300/day
In offering to pay on the higher end of our sliding scale you empower us to build out our system of financial support. Thank you for making it possible for more families to access and shape our emerging community of brilliant and creative young people!
Please email us to learn more about how we can financially support you and your family in registering for the program.
Guides Wendy and Nate introduce Rooted at Lyons Pride 2023