So, I'm back for week two of the Daily Outdoors Challenge. As I mentioned last week, my goal is to spend a minimum of 30 minutes outdoors with my children each day exploring and enjoying God's beautiful creation. If you want to join us, simply make a goal for spending time outdoors with your family and post/link-up or comment about your adventures!
We had a fabulous time and although I didn't quite make my goal last week, we had such a wonderful time outdoors together. I'm thankful that I'm taking the time to make sure that I join them outside as well.
Spending outdoors every day might take some forethought, but it certainly doesn't have to be complicated. While this week we had more 'destination' outdoor adventures than normal, most often it is time spent in our own yard or neighborhood.
So here is our Daily Outdoors Diary...
Saturday
Peaches, sweet peaches. We left early Saturday morning in search of succulent peaches at the Schnepf Farm's annual Peach Festival. I hate crowds, but it was still a delightful morning wandering the peach grove in search of ripe peaches, riding some carnival rides (4 out of 5 eligible cousins rode the little roller coaster this year) and enjoying the beautiful sunshine!
I think it is so adorable that each of these biplanes are named after a farming family in our area!
Sunday
My parents backyard is a popular gathering spot on Sundays. They have trees to climb, toads to locate, a putting green, spiral staircase to the balcony and ready access to a faucet. Climbing, golf and water - what more could little boys ask for??? Greta and I enjoyed some patio time!
Monday
I hang my head in shame as I report that aside from running from my car to an air conditioned building and back to the car again (way too many times with four children on a hot day), we did NOT find time for outdoor adventures. I spoke at a wonderful MOPS group that morning that was on a beautiful campus. We should have stuck around there for a while, enjoying the beautiful desert landscape. Next week, I'll try and think through my schedule in advance and find time to squeeze in an outdoor adventure into those occasional crazy busy days.
Tuesday
My grand plans to have a cowboy meal (beans/rice) at the park didn't quite materialize. My hubby vetoed eating a hot meal outdoors when it was 109 outside. After I stepped out of my air conditioned home to ascertain the situation, I had to agree with him.
Instead, the boys and I went to the park in our neighborhood after Greta went down for the night {6pm bedtimes come in handy}. We took paper and our rock crayons and explored textures by doing some crayon rubbings. Initially, we chose leaves that we found, but the boys quickly started doing rubbings of all different kinds of textures they could find.
Wednesday
We are just soaking up everything my sister loves about Arizona while she is visiting. She misses the sunshine and I think we've done a pretty good job at helping her soak it up! Today we spent the morning at our 'The Lagoon' (aka my grandfather's community pool). Greta had her second exposure to sand and LOVED it this time. It was fun to watch her wiggle her toes and explore the new textures and sensations!
Thursday
Another several delightful hours were spent exploring our zoo. I've written before about why we go to the zoo so much. I just love how we see new things each and every time we go. The coati's gave us quite a treat this last time as they played possum and went into all kinds of crazy positions while sunning themselves. We also discovered that Thursdays are 'bone days' for many of the animals and happened to be back by the wolves when they were thrown a bunch of fleshy bones. It was quite a scene to behold.
Friday
Friday found us painting in my parents backyard!
I love this idea! I will be sure to take pictures when we are outside this week and link up next week. What a great idea!!
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