Time Outdoors

Depending on the weather we still try and spend at least 45 minutes to an hour outside each day – if it rains (being English we are used to rainy days) we just put on our wellies and take umbrellas out on our walks.  Even though the girls are in high school, they still love to go on nature walks, both for the nature and the exercise.  The only time we don’t walk is when it is super hot and humid, as that does not suit us very well – we try to go early morning then.  I think the girls just got into the habit of this when we were living in England and Germany.  In England we had the countryside to walk in around our village and in Germany we had the forest about 400 yards from our home – so we were always out wandering around.  When they were small we were out for about 20 minutes or so.  My neighbor who has little children is already getting them used to being outdoors a lot, they walk in the rain and whatever weather, it is cute to see, the little girl jumping in puddles with her wellies on and carrying a little umbrella, and if they are not wealking, then they are in their garden doing things – we showed her this year where to find swallowtail caterpillars and helped them make a habitat – the little girl was thrilled to see it come out of the cocoon and watch it fly away – makes me wish I had little ones again, though my daughters still collect caterpillars each year to nurture and set free when hatched.

We go out from 10-11.  After we finish school the boys go back out for hours in our fenced in backyard with the dog.  Usually around 4 I will take the baby back out for 20 minutes or so until I need to cook dinner.