April 2026
- Bailey McLaughlin
- Apr 19
- 7 min read
Here comes spring. The trout lilies are up at the cemetery, the mud is drying out, and we’re getting ready for tour season. In order for VFC to be successful we need your help. Volunteers are essential to how we operate and our commitment to keeping burials affordable.
On burial days we need volunteers to help us set up and clean up. In addition, we need volunteers to help support families at burials by assisting with parking, carrying the body to the grave, lowering the body, filling in the grave and bearing witness.
During tour season we need volunteers to help with trail maintenance, lead tours, and independent events such as bird and nature walks. Year round we need volunteers to help us spread the word about what we do by speaking about VFC at events in their own communities, finding venues to screen our award winning documentary, and boosting our events on local forums.
Our volunteers consistently tell us that volunteering is a deeply meaningful experience.
“I first learned about the Vermont Forest Cemetery family in 2023. Not long after that I attended a cemetery tour on a sunny autumn afternoon. I was instantly hooked, both by the beautiful setting and by Michelle, Paul, Jim, Bailey and others who had the vision and energy to create this special place. Shortly after the tour, I purchased the rights to a burial plot. It is the perfect setting for my final resting place with the added benefit that I have become part of a group of friends and supporters who are committed to protecting Vermont’s natural beauty. While medical impairments prevent me from many volunteer activities, but I have been able to bear witness at burials, attend VFC events, share my enthusiasm for the cemetery and its mission with people in other interest groups and make modest financial contributions. I am comforted knowing that nearing the end of my life I am part of the Vermont Forest Cemetery family.”
— Don Balcom, volunteer & graveholder
“It’s quite easy to find beautiful and meaningful connection on a hilltop, in a forest, at a cemetery. Whenever I leave I always feel like ‘that’s exactly where I needed to be.’”
— Jen Whitman, tour docent & burial day volunteer
“Volunteering at Vermont Forest Cemetery has shown me a different path for burial than I'd ever seen- that it can be participatory and reciprocal. We have been burying our loved ones for all of human kind and somehow only recently lost this critical process. Supporting families with burials and tending to the forest has returned a piece of my humanity and given my life deeper meaning. It is work that I believe everyone should know, and VFC creates a loving space to be present to life and death.”
— Elise Simone, trail builder & burial day volunteer
Michelle Downing is one of our volunteers who has supported us by hosting a screening as well as volunteering at a burial. She is a fledgling singer songwriter and after her experience she was inspired to create a song called “Dig a Grave” which we shared in an earlier newsletter that includes these gorgeous lines.
“Dig a Grave
what happens next is anyone’s guess
my gut says we’re more than flesh
of skin and bones nothing left
changed into something more
when it’s my time to go
I too would like to help the plants grow
holding space for crying men
wind stilled at attention
geese flying overhead
eulogy echos then ends
leaves falling from the trees
winding like a memory
a life well lived in front of me
standing with a spade in my hand
What do you wear to dig a grave?
hiking boots, sharpen your spade
this land will remember their names
written in the moss and the loam”
We hope you’ll join our amazing community of volunteers. Sign up for our volunteer list to get notified when we need support on a burial or trail maintenance day.
Join our outreach team and promote VFC at community events in your own community.
Don’t have time to volunteer? There are other ways to help: reach out to a local venue about hosting a free community screening, repost our events on your social media and local forums, contact our local and national media about doing a story on the cemetery, help us partner with community organizations focused on end of life or make a donation.
Events
On Thursday April 23rd from 6pm - 7pm, join us for a virtual Natural Burial Q&A with Founder and Head Cemeterian Michelle Hogle Acciavatti, Outreach Coordinator and Board President Jim Hogle and Cemeterian Bailey McLaughlin. This is a great space to ask all your natural burial questions, learn more about how to plan for you and your loved ones and more.
Join us on Saturday April 25th from 10am - 11:30am for a screening of the award winning documentary From Earth to Earth: The Lost Art of Dying in America followed by a Q&A at the Rochester Public Library. We will also host a screening in Bristol on Friday May 1st from 10am - Noon with the Bristol Eagle Seniors at Howden Hall.
If you would like to have a screening in a town near you, email Jim Hogle at info@cemetery.eco with your suggested venues.
Our last virtual book club for the winter season will take place on Sunday April 26th from 4pm - 5:30pm. We’ll be reading The Serviceberry: An Economy of Gifts and Abundance by Robin Wall Kimmerer!
Robin Wall Kimmerer is an Indigenous scientist, mother, decorated professor and enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation. In The Serviceberry, Kimmerer considers the ethic of reciprocity that lies at the heart of the gift economy, how it shows up within natural communities and how we can use this framework to create a better and more balanced society. Over the past several months we've explored natural burial, how to communicate with loved ones about your end of life plans, holding grief and joy together at the same time and now we are culminating in how we can engage with radical reciprocity in death.
We know you have questions about home burial!
Our founder, Michelle Hogle Acciavatti, regularly assists people in establishing family cemeteries on their own property through her business, Green Mountain Funeral Alternatives. On Tuesday May 26th from 6:00pm - 7:30pm come learn everything you need to know to have a natural burial on your own property.
This workshop will cover: how to determine if your property qualifies, how to site a cemetery on your property, how to work with your town for approval, how to amend your deed and create an easement, and how to plan for burial at home and complete the necessary paperwork with or without a funeral director.
Tours are right around the corner! Starting in June, we’ll be offering 2-3 tours every month through November. These tours will be hosted by our founder and head cemeterian Michelle, our cemeterian Bailey McLaughlin and with a team of natural burial advocate docents.
Join Michelle Hogle Acciavatti on a special Founders Tour through Vermont Forest Cemetery. This roughly mile long walk spans the entirety of the open cemetery where you’ll learn about the history of the Vermont Forest Cemetery, the process of natural burial, forest ecology and all the stories the forest holds. Our first tour of the year will be a Founders Tour on Sunday June 7th from 2:00pm - 3:30pm.
Our first cemeterian tour led by Bailey McLaughlin will be Saturday June 13th, from 10am - 11:30am.
Our tours tend to fill up quickly, so keep an eye on our website as we begin to add this years tour dates. We promise to announce them in our newsletters as well so you never miss an opportunity!
Dirt Camp
We still have open spots available for campers for this summer's Dirt Camp! Camp will take place Monday June 22nd through Friday June 26th from 9am - 3:00pm.
We want to introduce you to the two camp directors that make it happen!
Lars Gold (They/Them): Having grown up in the swampy south, Lars spent most of their adolescence romping through wetlands, sandhills, and river deltas while trying to avoid alligators and cottonmouths. It was amongst this backyard wilderness that Lars cultivated their inexhaustible fascination with the natural world (and their love of lizard-like critters.) Lars is STOKED to be a part of Dirt Camp as it will allow them to continue inspiring young people by sharing their deep reverence for learning, especially in such a unique and special location. With a B.S. in Chemistry, Master of Arts in Teaching, and as a practicing high school biology & earth science teacher, Lars has the pedagogical knowledge and professional acumen necessary to craft meaningful learning experiences for children across the full spectrum of need and ability. Science is for everyone!
Bailey McLaughlin (She/Her): Bailey McLaughlin is a Natural Burial Cemeterian at Vermont Forest Cemetery and former educator. She is so incredibly excited to donate her time and bring her two passions - teaching and the natural world - together! She holds an Advance Tracking certificate from Tracking Connections and is pursuing her official Animal Track & Sign Certification through Cybertracker later this month. One of her roles at the Vermont Forest Cemetery is creating a forest stewardship and conservation plan in order to heal our beautiful patch of forest and inspire children and adults alike to become citizen scientists. With a B.A. in Education and role as a deathworker, Bailey is excited to weave forest life and death together with care and intention.
Mud Season Guidelines
We bury year round at Vermont Forest Cemetery and while winter certainly presents its challenges, there’s nothing like mud season! We encourage you to read through the mud season guidelines below before your visit.
🔴Tracy Hill Road, Beaver Meadow Road and Cram Hill Road are all very well maintained but visitors without experience driving in mud are urged to use caution.
🔴The Cemetery is at 1800' elevation: we generally get much colder and windier weather than the valleys. We invite visitors to check current weather conditions, dress accordingly, and make good choices.
🔴Trails may be muddy: good footwear is a must.
🔴Our privy is closed for the season. Public bathroom facilities are available at the Roxbury Town Offices, at Roxbury Fish Culture Station, and at South Village Mobil in Northfield.
🔴 We do our best to be good neighbors to those around us by minimizing traffic going to and from the cemetery. If you’re planning on bringing more than two or three cars to your visit, we highly recommend carpooling.
As a reminder the cemetery and all of its trails are open to the public from dawn-to-dusk each day.
Those of us who work at Vermont Forest Cemetery are committed to providing the best possible service to our community, and encourage you to contact us at any time with questions, concerns or ideas at info@cemetery.eco.
We value your continued support and are deeply indebted to those of you who have volunteered to help build trails, participate in burials, or just bear witness for those experiencing loss; for those who chose to make tax deductible donations, and to those who have chosen to support us through advanced purchases of burial rights. Thank you for your continued support!
We hope to see many of you at the cemetery. It is a beautiful place in all seasons, made all the more beautiful by the stories it holds.
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