Dancing Moonlight

Dancing Moonlight Dancing Moonlight is a retreat centre and nature sanctuary in Co.Galway.

Facilities include the earthen round DreamLodge, a hand-crafted 20 ft yurt 'SkyLodge' built from the surrounding woodlands, a large greenhouse, glamping and catering.

We have a last few places left for our Village Hearth Gathering at Gort na nDarach in Galway, Sept 5th-7th (or 4th-8th)....
01/08/2025

We have a last few places left for our Village Hearth Gathering at Gort na nDarach in Galway, Sept 5th-7th (or 4th-8th). This will be an inter-generational community experience of deep nature connection and nature-centered culture. We also have 1 place left on our 'acorn leadership' training pathway for how to create these experiences within your home-based communities.

- experience deep restoration
- find belonging in shared values and intimate experiences
- feel the vitality of nature moving through your body, and open to what it's sharing with you
- experience a powerful elegant model of culture regeneration

If you would like to find out more about the 8 Shields model we will be sharing, and embodying together, you can listen to me being interviewed by the founder Jon Young, and his partner Sarah Fontaine and son Aidan, where we share personal stories of the experience of 'Ecological Homecoming':

https://rss.com/podcasts/trackingconnections/1893143/

Or you can watch the powerful film L'Aure Connexion. This film presents this model of education in nature based on indigenous cultures, at The Wolf School in British Columbia, It interviews the children, their parents, educators and young adults who have grown up through this program, which meets the need for a deep connection, essential to our balance. It reminds us that everything is connected, that true joy lies in realizing one's potential, in service to one's community and nature:

https://troisiemeoption.mykajabi.com/.../zrCKs2on/checkout

Warmly,

Sky



We have a last few places left for our Village Hearth Gathering in the West of Ireland 5th-7th (or 4th-8th). This will b...
01/08/2025

We have a last few places left for our Village Hearth Gathering in the West of Ireland 5th-7th (or 4th-8th). This will be an inter-generational community experience of deep nature connection and nature-centered culture. We also have 1 place left on our 'acorn leadership' training pathway for how to create these experiences within your home-based communities.
If you would like to find out more about the 8 Shields model we will be sharing, and embodying together, you can listen to me being interviewed by the founder Jon Young, and his partner Sarah Fontaine and son Aidan, where we share personal stories of the experience of 'Ecological Homecoming':
https://rss.com/podcasts/trackingconnections/1893143/
Or you can watch the powerful film L'Aure Connexion. This film presents this model of education in nature based on indigenous cultures, at The Wolf School in British Columbia, It interviews the children, their parents, educators and young adults who have grown up through this program, which meets the need for a deep connection, essential to our balance. It reminds us that everything is connected, that true joy lies in realizing one's potential, in service to one's community and nature:
https://troisiemeoption.mykajabi.com/.../zrCKs2on/checkout
Warmly,
Sky 💚

I'm really looking forward to hosting and joining this workshop in August, exploring the magic of the colours of the pla...
07/07/2025

I'm really looking forward to hosting and joining this workshop in August, exploring the magic of the colours of the plants growing here 💜

Hello all,After 3 years I'm excited to be offering another 8 Shields gathering, sharing a nature-centred village experie...
27/05/2025

Hello all,

After 3 years I'm excited to be offering another 8 Shields gathering, sharing a nature-centred village experience with everyone.

This will be a powerful weekend where we will be collectively exploring what emerges when we centre nature connection in our human culture.

Village Hearth will be a nature centred, family-friendly, gathering exploring regenerative culture, Sept 5th-7th, at my home place in Galway.

Join us for late summer abundance, beautiful & deep nature connection practices, a supportive and deepening 8 Shields village experience, and songs & stories around the fire.

Visit https://bringingithome.life/village-nature-gathering/ for more information

Sky 🌿

Yesterday, I spent most of the day in the woods here, finding whole new parts I still haven't ventured through before.At...
18/04/2025

Yesterday, I spent most of the day in the woods here, finding whole new parts I still haven't ventured through before.

At first in the morning, coming across the newly opening luminescent bluebells....the smell was so fragrant in the cold morning air. And the bumblebees were enjoying them too, making the flowers bounce with their furry bodies.

Just before we left the woods in the morning we were truely gifted, finding the rare Model mushrooms. We harvested just a couple, and sauteed them with shallots, garlic, white wine and red Russian kale, on rye bread toast, yum! It was my first time trying them and they were sooo delicious!.

In the afternoon and evening I was wandering around thick woodland, literally getting dizzy, tracking old walls now immersed, doing my best to locate the best areas for future Hazel coppice coupes.

I feel so blessed to have this woodland under my care and stewardship 💚

Jo is offering this beautiful day a second time as it was so well received ❤webb
11/04/2025

Jo is offering this beautiful day a second time as it was so well received ❤
webb

This outdoor classroom all ready and waiting lifted my heart this morning....waiting for participants to arrive for roun...
22/02/2025

This outdoor classroom all ready and waiting lifted my heart this morning....waiting for participants to arrive for round two of the weekend workshop introducing people to Hazel coppicing....more stories to follow!💚

I have been teaching and guiding nature connection work for over ten years and am giving away a place on my yearlong onl...
09/01/2025

I have been teaching and guiding nature connection work for over ten years and am giving away a place on my yearlong online (and in person in your local ecology) until January 31st!
I co-guide this course with Peter Cow .life

The phrase ‘Ecological Homecoming’ came to me when I was looking to describe the journey of returning home to nature, when we find a felt sense of belonging to this incredible biosphere we call home….this emerges out of repeated deep nature connection experiences where we have a sense of two way communication with other-than-human-beings. When I had this experience it healed me of a deep loneliness I had, which I hadn’t identified but had felt throughout my life until then.

To enter into this seasonal giveaway we ask you to do just one action:
Somewhere on either instagram or facebook create a post sharing the story of an experience or moment where you felt a sense of Ecological Homecoming, and share a link to our course saying that you are hoping to join. Tag us so we can read and receive your story, and tag three friends you'd like to share your story with who you feel would appreciate it and receive it with care 💚
https://bringingithome.life/ecological-homecoming/

If there is someone you know who you feel would like this opportunity and is not on either of these social platforms we are very open to other creative ways they can share with their community : )

On instagram we are bringingithome.life and on facebook we are Bringing It Home.

Then we will be asking the great mystery (via a hat with names!) to pick someone for us….

Sky 💚

I will be selling my handgrown, hand harvested and handmade natural skincare products for the first time today at the wo...
19/12/2024

I will be selling my handgrown, hand harvested and handmade natural skincare products for the first time today at the wonderful

Come get some
✨ Winter Glow Serum - apricot kernel oil infused with rosehip fruit & seed and calendula, blended with cold-pressed rosehip seed oil and essential oils of Frankincence and Rose Geranium.
And pair your serum with one of my 🌸 hydrosol flower waters 🌸 distilled from my garden and the wild - choose from Rose, Rose Geranium, Tulsi Holy Basil, German Chamomile or Bog Myrtle.
💆🏼‍♀️Or treat yourself to some deep nourishment whipped Shea butter cream - with cold-pressed rosehip seed oil, Rose Otto & Bettroot in my night cream, or with wild-harvested St.Johns Wort, Lavender & Frankincence in my hand & body cream.

All my ingredients are naturally or wild grown, organic and unrefined 💯percent natural and pure.

Come check out this lovely new eco-market this evening from 5-8pm and get some yummy food and drinks too served up by the talented crave kitchen ❤

The Celtic Wheel of the YearAn offering for women 🌓 Women's Embodiment Collective, Yoga Moves, Gort.Thursday 12th & 19th...
09/12/2024

The Celtic Wheel of the Year
An offering for women 🌓

Women's Embodiment Collective, Yoga Moves, Gort.
Thursday 12th & 19th, 6-7:30pm.
Cost: donation €12-15

I'm feeling all warm at the thought of returning to the wonderful , after guiding The Menarche Journey there last year in November.

I'll be offering two sessions on the Celtic Wheel of the Year. We will be exploring the archetypal energy of each of the 8 directions on the compass, both from a pan cultural perspective and an Irish indigenous perspective. I will be offering invitations and resources for the week between the two sessions, to support you to align with the specific opportunities & gifts of the Mid-Winter time.

The cycles of nature are core to every life form on Earth, including us. Each of the stages in the wheel of the year carries a particular energy essential for life to regenerate, and when we consciously move through these stages we can find our wholeness. The 8 directions are a compass home.

I will be offering some teachings at the beginning and then there will be time for sharing, personal reflection time, and an imaginal meditative journey.

You are welcome to come to either or both but ofcourse you will get the most out of it if you come to both.

With gratitude for the crystal clear blue sky today, and the brightness of the Winter sun,

Maria 💛

It's hard to believe it was a Winter wonderland here just a few days ago...I'm most grateful for the moment of waking up...
25/11/2024

It's hard to believe it was a Winter wonderland here just a few days ago...

I'm most grateful for the moment of waking up with a thick blanket of snow, the soft thuds as it slided off high places, the electricity being out....and all three sources of internet unavailable.
And nothing left to do but stay in bed and feel the quietness if a world slowed down.

For me this is the most precious thing, when nature steps in in this way we can't control. Everything stops, and I didn't have to choose for it, it just happens.

I know slowing down is a choice, but I also live within a world that makes that choice a difficult one to make.

Thank you mother nature for the gift of beauty and slowness 🤲🏼❄💙

Learning to split Hazel is such a beautiful and versatile craft.....and can be very frustrating to learn, and equally re...
13/11/2024

Learning to split Hazel is such a beautiful and versatile craft.....and can be very frustrating to learn, and equally rewarding when you get that split right down the pith!

Last week I hosted a very inspiring and connective 2 day course in learning all about how to restore Hazel coppice, grade the material and work with Hazel, thought by my friend and very knowledge teacher Mike Carswell.

Hazel will split and twist like Willow, but is stronger so can be used for projects that need that increased robustness. Traditionally used for making portable sheep hurdles to corral sheep, and for many other items such as hatching spars, hedgelaying posts and pegs, and baskets of different descriptions and uses.

I look forward to trying my hand at making a Hazel creel basket, more to come!

With a heart full.of gratitude for this incredible tree and all the wisdom they hold, and the beautiful native woodland I am lucky enough to steward 💚

Address

Rosscahill
Galway

Telephone

+353852223108

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The joy of creating

Dancing Moonlight is a retreat centre and nature sanctuary, located a 30 min. drive North-West of Galway city. Dancing Moonlight is located in a hundreds of years old stone built village, Oakfield (translated from the Irish Gort Na Darragh). Oakfield is part of a gentle mosiac landscape of native Hazel woodlands and cow pastures, near the shores of Lough Corrib in the Southern wooded fringes of Connemara.

The facilities at Dancing Moonlight include the DreamLodge, a hand-crafted 20 ft yurt built from the surrounding woodlands (built by Sky), a green house teaching and living space, glamping accomodation and camping facilities all held in the loving embrace of the surrounding woodlands, wildlands and fields. Dancing Moonlight is also available for rental as a workshop venue.

The DreamLodge is for dreaming... personal and collective. It is for all activities that enter the dreamtime, that place that exists beyond time and the physical, be it meditation, story-telling, dancing, ceremony or other practices of deep listening.

The Yurt could also be called the SkyLodge as with its white canvas, beautiful natural Hazel & Ash frame, and octagonal wooden floor of light coloured pine, it is bright and light and compliments the earthen womb space of the DreamLodge.