Wonder & Wild

🌱 Seasonal activity boxes for children and their families, full of open-ended creative projects.

18/05/2023

It’s and I’m feeling rather pleased with myself. I’ve managed to convince by bowling green lawn loving husband to leave an area of grass to grow wild this summer. While the rest of the lawn has been cut twice already this month, we also have a patch that is covered in beautiful daisies, buttercups and longer grass.

As well as looking rather lovely, a no mow area of lawn has many benefits for the creatures we share our gardens with.

✨ Wildflowers that grow in unmanaged grass support many pollinating insects.

✨Frogs, newts, grasshoppers and other insects shelter in long grass.

✨ Caterpillars feed on grass that’s been left to grow.

By increasing the biodiversity of our gardens and introducing native wild plants, we are helping to slow the catastrophic decline in insect numbers in the UK. There is lots of information out there about creating wild spaces and www.wildaboutgardens.org.uk is a great place to start.

I’ll keep you posted on our progress! xx

08/04/2023

We were back at our favourite yesterday, soaking up the sun and enjoying some Easter nature play. How cute is our little bunny plant pot, full of wheatgrass seeds which should sprout in the next few days! 🐰

06/04/2023

Hello friends and hello spring! I did it again and took an unplanned and rather extended break from the ‘gram!
After Christmas I had a surprise return to teaching and, after almost 8 years out of the classroom, needless to say it’s been a journey!
I’m sure I’ll share more about it here soon (because grrrr, our education system), but my message for now is please be extra nice to your kids’ teachers. It’s tough out in the trenches right now and they are all doing an amazing job. I’m only working two days and I honestly couldn’t imagine doing more!

Here is a pic of me finally finding some time to get to back I really love. We had a Crafternoon Tea Party for Long Legs’ birthday recently and we decorated these little bird houses with paper, moss and dried flowers. Super cute! xx

01/01/2023

This past year was really sad and stressful for our family. Whilst I’m not one for sharing personal stories here in social media, I will say that even when times are dark, there is still light and laughter to be found. And while 2022 will always be remembered for a tragic loss, it was also the year of our first real holiday as a family, a beautiful wedding and lots of gap-toothed smiles. We are so very lucky in so many ways.
Wishing you all a safe and peaceful 2023, sprinkled a little magic. I think that’s all we can really ask for. Xx

25/12/2022

Happy Christmas everyone xx

12/12/2022

Baby it’s cold out there! However, if you can face the freeze it’s really worth getting outside. Click the link in my profile for 5 great ways to stay warm in the winter weather.
(Article and beautiful tree decorations by the brilliant Bizi ) ❄️

05/12/2022

I think I’m finally over the onslaught of emails over the Black Friday weekend. It was a lot!

This year I definitely feel that a smaller, more thoughtful Christmas is in order. My family has had a tough year, we’ve just bought a new house that needs a lot of work and with so many people struggling, it just doesn’t feel right to go over the top. Plus, Christmas and all its trappings really isn’t great for our planet.

Small, local and lovely is how we will be Christmasing this year and I’m really looking forward to it. How about you? ✨

27/11/2022

Dreaming of the sea…
I love going to the coast in winter. It’s quiet, it’s wild and without the distraction of jumping in the waves and making sandcastles, the kids are more open to exploring.
In my twenties, a quick dash down to the coast for a surf was a favourite winter activity, always with a takeaway cup of tea and a Twix afterwards. There was never anyone else around and it felt like a secret only we were privy to.
We had a walk in one of our favourite woods this morning but today it’s the sea I’m dreaming of.

15/11/2022

Halloween may have been and gone but I had to share some more pictures of our spooky potion play set up. It really didn’t take all that long to put together and it kept the kids entertained for ages with lots of bubbling, fizzy fun.

I’m now planning a Christmas version, what ingredients should I add? ✨

10/11/2022

There’s so much beautiful dead stuff around at this time of year! Preserve the magic by pressing into air drying clay. ✨

04/11/2022

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE… ✨✨✨

Yesterday is was cold, grey and damp and I rather wanted to get back into bed and read a good book. But I have a nearly four year old who gets very grumpy when she’s stuck in the house all day and so, knowing it would also do me some good, I took her out to the woods. My plan was to have a quick walk and then head to the cafe for a hot chocolate.

No sooner had we started our walk however, when we were stopped in our tracks by a beautifully spooky fallen tree. ‘A dragon skeleton!’ I cried, inspired by the Wild Things book we have been enjoying at home. A few steps on and we spotted a tree covered in the tiniest toadstools, reaching up as far as we could see. ‘A fairy city!’

And from there we went on to discover troll hair, goblin bogies, a dragon’s claw and some leaves with chicken pox! We also found a big pile of bubbles on a tree trunk which we decided must be a nest for a frog!

Little Legs spotted many of the Wild Things herself and came up with her own ideas for our discoveries. We walked for an hour and a half and then we went to the cafe for a very well deserved hot chocolate.

There really is magic all around us, if only we stop to look for it. The woods are full of life at the moment with their carpet of fallen leaves and strange array of mushrooms. So get out there and find your own Wild Things! And thank you Little Legs for a wonderful mid-week adventure. It really was better than bed and a book!

(I’ll share details of Wild Things in another post soon, it’s an utterly brilliant book!) xx

02/11/2022

Have you still got one or two of these little guys hanging around? Or like me does your whole house look like a pumpkin pick and mix shop?

Please don’t just throw them in the bin (very bad as methane gasses build up when any food ends up in landfill). And don’t just dump them for wildlife to eat as they can make many animals very sick.

Instead, eat them or compost them. I’ve recently discovered a really easy pumpkin soup made with coconut milk. I’ll pop the recipe up in my stories along with a few others I’ve found here on Insta.

🎃 🎃 🎃

Address

Chipping Campden

Website

http://www.wonderandwildclub.com/

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Wonder & Wild posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Want your school to be the top-listed School/college in Chipping Campden?