An overview of the fourth month of the “365 day nature play challenge”. We head into April planning holidays and bigger adventures but still find everything is tending to the small side… then a small handful of chaos arrives.
Changing tack and looking towards summer.
It’s been a busy month, April, filled with a very small amount of school time. We’re been off on the road staying with family and exploring a new area (Suffolk). We ended the Easter holiday with the arrival of a kitten, who has kept us all entertained but limited in the amount of time we could leave the house for.
A month on from swearing we’d do big challenges in April (see the March overview) we’ve definitely found some new ideas and directions but I’m worried we default to the small and the local now, even though the weather’s good enough to easily go further and stretch ourselves. Going into May I’m determined to stretch the length of challenges longer and see how long I can keep B challenged and interested for. The recent walk in the woods reminded me of the ease with which sore feet and a boring stretch of path can derail a happy morning. I’m planning to try and predict obstacles more on the May trips and hope to push our stamina a bit.
New ideas and struggles
Being in a new environment gave us several new ideas which we’ve both really enjoyed. My favourite was our morning being nature detectives. It felt full of potential and I’m looking forward to doing it again in a bigger outdoors setting. B came up with a cracker in a churchyard in Ipswich when she started planning life as a bird. I’m sure we’ll try that one again in a different location soon.
We also had a few days where we pushed ourselves and failed to get very far. Kite flying is going to be one of the biggest challenges of the year I suspect. I’d been looking forward to this one for ages and thought we were absolutely going to crack it. We were in a very flat and windy place and surrounded by people who could help. The location was the main obstacle… I realised that success is probably 99% the right place and we couldn’t find one. B got cross with it. I was also surprised to find that of all the people we approached for help hardly any had ever actually managed to do it. We will continue hunting for the right help and the right place and cross our fingers we find both later in the year!
The other less than brilliant day was our first boat trip of the year. I’m still working out how much commercial boat trips count as nature challenges but I think the experience of being out on the water goes a long way to justify it. In this case though the cold and the wind stopped us being able to appreciate it very much.
Spring fun
It’s been a great month for just getting outside and meeting friends there though. We’ve had several lovely days hanging around in parks and B has finally had the weather and the opportunity (so rare in winter) to just play in the natural world with friends. It was lovely seeing her confidence in these environments which is much greater than last year. The joys of dandelionsand tree climbing and easter egg hunts are all so great in themselves it makes me wonder why we don’t just spend all our time doing them.
The bigger days
We did manage a few successful bigger challenges. The day out at the farm zoo was hardly a challenging day but was a lot of fun. A bigger but shorter challenge was the stargazingwhich we finally got to do in comfort but with less clear results than a cold South Wales beach in January provided. Best of all for me were our days by the water. Warmer weather has made us seek this out more and we had a fabulous time both dodging waves by the very large Thames and making boats, wading and racing on a tiny stream in the middle of a Glamorgan wood.
Travelling and returning
Interacting with nature while travellingbecame a big discovery as we travelled around the country by road. B went from spotting Teslas to spotting kites and roadkill (the latter not happily). We found new games and I was amazed at how observant she’s got in the last few months.
As we passed 100 days of nature play challenges, we also found ourselves back at the very beginning of the challenge and playing again with the little sticks on the bit of grass under a tree in North London. It made us both realise how much we’ve learned and changed in the last few months and inspired us to keep going. It’s amazing to think we’re already four months in.
Finally… Trouble.
The second half of the month has been dominated by the arrival of Primrose the kitten. B has been taking the lead in looking after her and doing really well and the bonding between them has been lovely to see. She also has provided us with a lot of hilarity if some movement restrictions.
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