Last Saturday I introduced our goal of visiting the library every week well this week I wanted to mention about another of the goals for this year. Our exploring the outdoors – primarily this will be our garden but I’m also aiming to have one visit/activity per week to somewhere else – maybe a local park, forest or zoo, somewhere we can connect with nature and experience the outdoors which have been such an important part of my life.
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T's first ever time outside in the garden as a crawler
Exploring outdoors doesn’t have to fill anyone with dread (yes I was one of those when J was crawling and not walking and to some extent I still am a little with T – hence why I’ve set myself the goal this year). It doesn’t have to cost a fortune and can happen what ever the weather. One of my favourite blogs Learning for Life has the motto
“Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, and snow is exhilarating; there is no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather.” John Ruskin 1819-1900
which I agree with but it has appeared to me that children’s clothing companies don’t have the same thoughts as wet weather gear only comes in 12months+ from the main high street stores (anything else is out of our budget) so T who is 10 months old was dressed in J’s first suit (12 – 18 months) and J in the (18 – 24month) one from last winter and we headed out to do some gardening.
J helping garden
We’ve not really gardened properly with J aware of what is going on (some flowers in tubs last summer) but we have a large garden and over 2/3rds of it are starting to resemble waste land so we need to get on with it and start to create what we want our gardens to be this means J and T need to be involved as well so that we can both work on it together.
J and RDD gardening together collecting leaves
With clothes on to deal with the weather and any puddle that we found we headed into the garden. T immediately removed her wellies and started to eat stones, mud and leaves from around the garden but loved the crawling around and J jumped in his sand pit – now a mix of sand, mud and water, zoomed up and down the slide and then spotted RDD gardening and headed over to help.
T after she removed her wellies enjoying the texture of grass
I think what I’m learning with J and T is that something it’s the simplest things that give them the most enjoyment – experiencing the garden when it’s not hot sunny and the paddling pool is out filled J with such joy and he connected with nature so much more.
J finding the only puddle in the garden and jumping in it
Is anyone else joining me with explore outdoors this year and if so what plans have you got to connect your children and the natural world?
J's first contact with garden wildlife in 2012 our friendly garden robin
Multiple Mummy
That is lovely – I really need to wrap my three up more and head out to play in the garden! With this mild weather at the moment it is perfect.
Thanks for linking up to Family Frolics – Hope you come back and look forward to reading more posts.
Kerry 🙂
JDaniel4's Mom
My son loves to jump in and play in any form of water.
I would love for you to link this to Read.Explore.Learn.
Kierna
I love this post – just look at their faces! Cheers for linking up this week & the mention!
Mama Pea Pod
Oh, I remember what a pain it was to not be able to play outdoors in the winter with the older child when you’ve got a non-walker with you too. Logistical nightmare every time. I sympathise!
Thanks for linking up to the Outdoor Play Party! Hope to see you back again sharing more of your outdoor adventures in 2012!
Rebekah @ The Golden Gleam
We’re trying to get out every day too. The other day it was cold and the only motivation to get out was that I needed to cover our vegetable garden to protect it from frost. I find having to take care of produce encourages me to get out since veggies are high maintenance plants. 😉 T is a doll and looks just adorable in her wet weather gear.
abbie
This is SO great! So many moms are hesitant about getting outside on the days that are not “perfect”, but sometimes those can be the days that kids need to get out the most. And the exploring can be so much more fun, maybe messy, but lots of fun!
Connecting with nature is all I blog about! It is my mission to make sure my girls have a great sense of awareness about the natural world around them. We use outdoor play, books, games, crafts, field trips, adventures and much more as our way of accomplishing that. So glad that you joined the outdoor play party! Lots of great outdoor play ideas over there. I hope you will join up again.
Pip
The outdoors is so important for all of us. Everyday i take a walk, even if it is just a short one, a trip to the park, working on the allotment or in spring and summer we have the back door open all the time!!
Great to see you including your children in gardening. MY boys love working on the garden and i think its a great life skill. teaching them to grow foods we can eat and care for the world around us. We are creating a nature area this year to encourage birds and insects!!
Laurie
Thanks for this encouragement to just get out there and get dirty, despite the “hard” work of finding weather-appropriate clothing to wear. We live on a busy, hilly street and I often let that stop us from taking walks, etc., but it’s really just an excuse! :o)
Isil
We love outdoors and getting messy,too.The book sounds fun!Thanks for linking up to Book Sharing Monday.I would love it if you link to my site and help me spread the word.x
Cerys @ Rainy Day Mum
I’ve just found your button and about to add it to my blog 😀