(Goblin is 27 months)
While we were at my parents last weekend Granny and I took Goblin for a walk in the woods behind their house. These are the woods I grew up with so for me these are "proper" woods.
Wood are a great place for toddlers to get in some gross motor practice - jumping over logs, running up hills, climbing and balancing across branches in the muddy bits.
It is also a great place for observation. There are so many things in the woods that Goblin hadn't seen before, or didn't know the names of. We found a fallen tree. Goblin learnt the word "bark". I got him to feel the bark and see that it was rough. We found some Gorse. For anyone who doesn't know about Gorse, it is a prickly plant that grows all over the UK. It's yellow flower appear all year round and smell of coconut. Goblin recognised the flowers were yellow and I picked one so he could smell the coconut smell.
I also encouraged Goblin to touch the Gorse so that he could feel it was prickly. He thought this was funny. We found some Holly and Bracken. I pointed out the contrast between the prickly leaves of the Holly and the curly leaves of the Bracken. We also looked at the different colours of the two sets of leaves.
Goblin liked the springiness of the Bracken. We found tuffty grass. I pointed out how it swished in the wind. And we looked at silhouettes of the trees against the sky.
Goblin was rather excited because the wood is below the flight path for a light aircraft airport. As it got late and the sun started to go down there was a series of aircraft flying low over head on their way back to the airport - Goblin was in heaven.
We found mud. I didn't need to point anything out, Goblin knows all about mud. But that didn't stop him investigating it a bit further.
I'm linking this to
Brilliant I love exploring the woods with J and hopefully T once she's walking as crawling around just isn't safe where we go.
ReplyDeleteI'm really trying to get us outdoors once a week at least to do something instead of just play exploring and learning about nature is so much fun.
This is awesome! I would absolutely love it if we lived close to someplace like this.
ReplyDeleteSuch a beautiful nature walk, what wonderful pictures!!
ReplyDeletethanks for the comments guys. Yup I was very lucky growing up near the woods. we have to go a bit further for Goblin to get some good wood action, but not too far.
ReplyDeleteApril, all the photos were taken using my phone - its amazing how good camera phones are these days.
Goblin is lucky to be able to go in these woods with you. It is the simple pleasures they enjoy so much. Like you say there is so much to learn about nature as well as coordination and exercise and all whilst having fun. Thank you for linking with Country Kids
ReplyDeletewhat a lovely post I think there is so much to learn when you step outside and its so wonderful watching children enjoy nature and all its beauty :)
ReplyDeleteLovely pictures. I also grew up by a woods and we could take a shortcut to the park by the lake through them.
ReplyDeleteIt is so nice to be able to take kids out to play in nature. They can learn so much just by investigating outdoors. Thanks for sharing on fun frugal friday. I hope you will stop by again. : )
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