Located among pristine woodlands in the Ryerson historic home in Riverwoods, Il., Brushwood Center at Ryerson Woods promotes the importance of nature for nurturing personal and community wellbeing, cultivating creativity, and inspiring learning.
Waukegan Dunes Guided Walking Tour for Veterans & Families
Come and enjoy comradery with your fellow veterans and family members while learning about the unique Waukegan Dunes habitat that is home to a large diversity of plants and wildlife. The Waukegan Dunes are some of the only natural sand dunes that are left in the area. Our guides are from the Lake County Audubon Society, Sharing Our Shore – Waukegan (SOS-W) program that was created as a response to a pair of endangered piping plovers that attempted to nest in a gravel parking lot at the Waukegan Municipal Beach in 2018. Today volunteers continue to monitor the species to ensure their survival. Learn more about the Share our Shores program here.
Join Brushwood Center at Ryerson Woods for the final gathering in our Radical Hope in the Woods series as we honor Juneteenth through reflection, movement, storytelling, and collective imagination.
Together, we will walk the trails of Ryerson Woods and explore what freedom has meant across generations—and what freedom can become. Grounded in the histories of resistance, survival, and joy carried by our ancestors, this experience invites participants to reconnect with the land while reimagining Black futures through the lens of Afrofuturism, healing, and radical possibility.
This special gathering will also serve as a birthday celebration for the facilitator—an intentional honoring of life, legacy, and community.
Through guided conversation, moments of stillness, and community connection, we will ask:
What does freedom feel like in our bodies?
What dreams did our ancestors carry for us?
What future are we brave enough to imagine together?
This is more than a walk. It is a remembering. A reclaiming.A celebration of life. A collective act of hope.
All are welcome to gather, reflect, and dream forward in community.
Please note: This month we’re meeting at Mellody Farm Nature Preserve, not Brushwood Center.
The Brushwood Nature Book Club is a space to talk about and explore nature literature in a friendly environment. Each meeting includes discussion, creative writing, and/or art activities to engage with the themes of the chosen book, led by Brushwood’s Poet-in-Residence Kathryn Haydon, and writer-artist Megan Donahue.
This summer, we’re revisiting some of the classics of American nature literature and exploring how they resonate today.
Our August book is My First Summer in the Sierra, by John Muir. It was published in 1911, based on field notes from an 1869 trip Muir made to the Sierra Nevada, traveling with a shepherd and flock of sheep. The book was influential in popularizing the (complicated) idea of an American wilderness, and was crucial in building public support for the preservation of Yosemite National Park.
Please note: This month we’re meeting at Mellody Farm Nature Preserve, not Brushwood Center.
The Brushwood Nature Book Club is a space to talk about and explore nature literature in a friendly environment. Each meeting includes discussion, creative writing, and/or art activities to engage with the themes of the chosen book, led by Brushwood’s Poet-in-Residence Kathryn Haydon, and writer-artist Megan Donahue.
This summer, we’re revisiting some of the classics of American nature literature and exploring how they resonate today.
Our July book is A Sand County Almanac: Sketches Here and There, by Aldo Leopold. Through science, history, humor and prose, Leopold uses A Sand County Almanac and its call for a land ethic to communicate the true connection between people and the natural world. First published in 1949, it became one of the most venerated conservation books in the 20th century.
Celebrate Summer with Brushwood Center’s At Ease initiative and enjoy art, music, activities, games, and nature with other members of the Military Community! In collaboration with Kids Rank, Veteran Art Tribe and other Veteran organizations. Brushwood’s third annual Military Kids Fest offers nature, art, exploration, and fun.
Join us for:
Activities
Nature Acrylic Painting with Veteran Art Tribe
Face Painting by Kirsten Saunders
Children’s Yoga with Christine Lopez
Outdoor games
Snacks
Art activities
More!
Resources and Information
Information and Tables by:
American Legion Gurnee Auxiliary
Brushwood Center
Kids Rank
National Museum of the American Sailor
Please note, that this event is designed for Veterans, current service members, and their families.
Contact Jessica Klinge at jklinge@brushwoodcenter.org if you have questions or concerns.
Celestial Nature and Forest Therapy: Summer Solstice
Forest bathing is a guided experience that works to mend the relationships humans have with themselves, the concept of time, their communities, and their environment. It is a practice focused on remembering reciprocity by connecting to our senses through the natural world.
Join Jess Rodriguez, certified Nature and Forest Therapy guide, for a two-hour practice filled with a series of guided invitations that offer opportunities of presence, stress relief, and relaxation.
During this time, participants can expect to walk slowly for less than a mile with plenty of opportunities to stop and simply notice the world around them. Forest bathing is an adaptable and flexible practice that welcomes people of all abilities. For more information visit reciprocalforestbathing.com
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For the safety of our community, the exact location of the forest bathing experience will be disclosed upon registration and is subject to change in the case of a community safety concern. Registrants will receive a reminder email one week and 24 hours before the walk to be notified of any changes.
As Veterans and military community members, we will explore Iraq War veteran Doug Self’s poetry and how his experience impacts the author, ourselves, and our community.
Blast Radius explores the lasting impact of war, both on the battlefield and at home, through the eyes of combatants and their families.
This event is virtual; a Zoom link will be sent to those who register. If you have any technical needs, please email Jes Klinge at jklinge@brushwoodcenter.org.
Review of Blast Radius
“A poetry collection that is both visceral and vulnerable, Blast Radius tackles the complexity of serving in the military and questions whether anyone can return “… home / safe and sound.” Douglas E. Self employs psychological twists and raw physicality to shed light on the battleelds we carry within. A surprise at every turn, these musical lines will knock the wind out of you, in the way only a skilled poet can.” -Tina Parker, author of Lock Her Up
About the Author
Douglas Self is a father, poet, and a veteran of the USMC, U.S. Army Reserve, and the Iraq War who considers both Chicago, IL and Lexington, KY home. He earned a bachelor’s degree in English and Creative Writing from Southern New Hampshire University and a trade school certificate in audio and video engineering from the Lexington School for the Recording Arts. Through his art, he hopes to show other military and combat veterans that healing is possible.
As Veterans and military community members, we will explore Iraq War veteran Doug Self’s poetry and how his experience impacts the author, ourselves, and our community.
Blast Radius explores the lasting impact of war, both on the battlefield and at home, through the eyes of combatants and their families.
This event is virtual; a Zoom link will be sent to those who register. If you have any technical needs, please email Jes Klinge at jklinge@brushwoodcenter.org.
Review of Blast Radius
“A poetry collection that is both visceral and vulnerable, Blast Radius tackles the complexity of serving in the military and questions whether anyone can return “… home / safe and sound.” Douglas E. Self employs psychological twists and raw physicality to shed light on the battleelds we carry within. A surprise at every turn, these musical lines will knock the wind out of you, in the way only a skilled poet can.” -Tina Parker, author of Lock Her Up
About the Author
Douglas Self is a father, poet, and a veteran of the USMC, U.S. Army Reserve, and the Iraq War who considers both Chicago, IL and Lexington, KY home. He earned a bachelor’s degree in English and Creative Writing from Southern New Hampshire University and a trade school certificate in audio and video engineering from the Lexington School for the Recording Arts. Through his art, he hopes to show other military and combat veterans that healing is possible.
Transforming Internal Experiences for Resilience and Restoration through Acceptance (TIERRA) is the nature-based mental health intervention that was co-developed by Brushwood Center and DePaul University in collaboration with Highwood Library & Community Center, Roberti Community House, Mano a Mano Family Resource Center, Zacharias Sexual Abuse Center, Family First Center, and The HAP Foundation. Community Health Workers and Clinicians from these organizations have facilitated TIERRA to over 85 participants in Lake County from 2024-2025 and while we have received much feedback about the program, the most common piece of feedback we’ve received is that the participants want more TIERRA.
During TIERRA, participants were able to dive into themselves and remember who it is they truly are. In talking to participants, I could see that – without having even known them before- a shift was happening. The tides were changing. What once may have been muddy waters were now clear calm waves reflecting the infinite blue of the sky. The possibilities of their world have broadened.
What each individual could see of themselves and for themselves matched that of what they noticed in nature: abundance, love, gratitude, beauty, peace, transformation. The participants of TIERRA saw nature reflect themselves, in every form and facet. The participants of TIERRA have done something remarkable, they cleared the muddy waters. They walked through the labyrinth of life, they journeyed inward, expanded, and journeyed back outward, expanding. They have rediscovered who they are and without fail, they have rediscovered the iridescent web of interconnectedness.
Which is why they asked for more TIERRA, I knew they were not asking for a second intervention per say but rather they craved more opportunities to spin with the web.
Healing Together: The Artwork of TIERRAis an opportunity for the facilitators and participants of the program to move with that creative energy that they built up throughout the program and showcase their reflections through painting and other works of art. It has been an honor to collaborate with Nydia Gonzalez-Carson on these art workshops to offer facilitators and participants of TIERRA this moment, and hopefully create a ripple effect for more moments of grounding in the creative energy of nature for community healing.
Celestial Nature and Forest Therapy: May Blue Moon
Forest bathing is a guided experience that works to mend the relationships humans have with themselves, the concept of time, their communities, and their environment. It is a practice focused on remembering reciprocity by connecting to our senses through the natural world.
Join Jess Rodriguez, certified Nature and Forest Therapy guide, for a two-hour practice filled with a series of guided invitations that offer opportunities of presence, stress relief, and relaxation.
During this time, participants can expect to walk slowly for less than a mile with plenty of opportunities to stop and simply notice the world around them. Forest bathing is an adaptable and flexible practice that welcomes people of all abilities. For more information visit reciprocalforestbathing.com
—
For the safety of our community, the exact location of the forest bathing experience will be disclosed upon registration and is subject to change in the case of a community safety concern. Registrants will receive a reminder email one week and 24 hours before the walk to be notified of any changes.
