Reflections on 20 Years of Oak Hill

 Around February of 2006, Deirdre Harris, my mentor and then boss, and director of The Rose Garden Nursery School in Cooperstown, announced that at the end of the current school year she would be closing her school and moving with her family to Cleveland, Ohio. Deirdre's school was in its 13th year, and I had been working there on and off for most of that time, when I wasn't busy at home raising future students! All 5 of my children attended The Rose Garden, and hold fond memories of the magic to this day.

My youngest son, Tobias, along with several of his friends, had one more year of preschool left, and it quickly occurred to me, that I could continue their beloved nursery school traditions and familiar format in my home, to bridge the final year before they could enter Kindergarten. 

After a quick survey of parents, it became clear that this was a popular plan, and a small group of 6 nursery school friends joined me that September in our newly painted and lovingly yet simply appointed classroom connected to my home. The space was formerly a 'mudroom', home to sleds, bikes and recycling bins, not to mention a rough, home built 'quarter pipe' skateboard ramp, where my sons Dominic and Sebastian had taken turns bruising, breaking and spraining various body parts on the concrete floor. Once we started the renovations in the spring of 2006 the ramp was relegated to the backyard and quickly promoted to bike ramp!

So on September 6th, 2006, Oak Hill Nursery School welcomed its first class of little guinea pigs! Colorfully clad in our favorite 'Muddy Buddies', they ran around the fields, pathways and wooded areas here, picking armloads of goldenrod, freeing every single milkweed seed into the air from atop the MayPole Hill, and playing hourlong games of 'lions and tigers' as they crawled through the meadow grasses.  For snack, they prepared and ate an endless supply of homemade scones, nursery school bread, yogurt and berries over fresh waffles, warm, fresh apple sauce from apples just plucked from the tree, and our famous Harvest Soup. This soup, prepared by the children after a whole morning of chopping and peeling veggies at the little nursery school tables,  is best remembered by the parent who discovered an entire celery stalk in their serving! Or by the lucky friend who ladled half a sweet potato into their bowl...  You never know what will be served up when you come to our Harvest Festival! 

To stand back and observe a group of Oak Hill littles in the Spring of 2026, 20 years on, one of my most compelling observations is that very little has changed! Our current group of friends have more choices for play areas, but the games are the same. The pretend phone had changed from a curved stick or a wooden banana from the play kitchen to a flat piece of bark or an old rectangular cedar shingle fragment, but the phone calls are still wonderfully sweet to eves-drop on, and the imaginations still soar higher, the further we take the children away from all the 'stuff'. 

So now I sit here and I reflect on what has changed, on how the past 20 years have shaped me, my family, our children, my marriage; and I get a little weak-kneed as I realize the profound way in which the two entities are simultaneously writing the narrative for each other, and have been since Day 1. 

Through the years so many changes have happened in my family, so many moments and phases as my family history unfolded in the background, during which so many Oak Hill families tirelessly supported us, stepped in, helped out and turned so many blind eyes to our messy process as we worked it all out:

5 children have started school, worked their way through the grades, finished high school, grown up, left for college, moved out and on with their lives, picking up a wide range of talents and skills as they go, and expressing their rootedness in the natural world in almost every facet of their lives;

Oak Hill contended with trunks, laundry baskets and duffle bags spilling over with their books and other belongings in the bootroom and among our play spaces, as my own children moved in and out of all their various situations; 

My 5 high school soccer playing kids participated in so many games, necessitating early Oak Hill pick-ups or a parent substitute stepping in so we could be at all 'The Big Games' and not risk missing those crucial moments of glory (hehe!); 

My children have moved along, and now span the country, making their homes from Portland Me. to Oakland Ca. and all points between; 

Nick and I spent almost a decade nursing both his parents through their final years of homebound, round the clock nursing needs; 

COVID upended our routine, and became the catalyst for our move to all outdoor school; 

Two of my children have children of their own, making us grandparents to two babies in one year with a 3rd on the way; 

Pets, so many sweet pets have joined our family and many sadly departed over the years, from anoles, guinea pigs and bunnies, to our cats and of course our sweet extended family of dogs. Merlin, Max, Minnow, Mowgli, Franklin, Charlie, Kipper and Daisy! Only Kipper and Daisy still play alongside the children, since Charlie and Franklin have moved away with Toby and Zoe. The muddy footprints of all our 'M' Dogs are all over the memories and hearts of so many of your children. A bunch of awesome, loving, patient and long suffering fur babies, ever watchful from the side of the sand play area, or from the base of the back hill, where several of them have found their final resting place, forever overlooking their home. 

The biggest point of reflection here, is simply this. In living and working in the same place, our family affairs, our messiness, our anxieties and problems, our mourning, but also our celebrations, most exciting moments and biggest news headlines have spilled over into the world of Oak Hill. And our community, (not least of all including an exceptional line up of amazing staff) have therefore been inextricably bound to our history. You all have hugged us, high fived us, handed me tissues, celebrated and mourned alongside us. You have supported us, rallied behind us through all of it, and by virtue of this proximity, through the tricky and happy absence of the option to compartmentalize, you have taken on the role of extended family! 

In love and gratitude for your trust, for bringing your most treasured possessions to us, and placing them in our care, for your support and enthusiasm through the years, for throwing yourselves into just about any program we have dreamed up, and for always having a smile and a delightful wave, wherever we run into each other! 

I am so eternally grateful for this community! xx