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8 reasons we love camping with our littles

10 June 2016 by Naomi Leave a Comment

8 reasons we love camping with our littles

Last weekend we took our little tribe camping, we were blessed with amazing weather and we had a great time! Here are 8 reasons we take our little people camping and love it.

our camping set-up

It is affordable.
Lets be real here. Cost matters. We live on a single income and a tight budget but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a break from our day to day, it just means we do it frugally! We decided to invest in our camping gear 3 years ago when we knew this would be our way of getting a summer holiday for the foreseeable future. Once you have done that it is hugely more affordable to pay a campsite fee than for a week abroad and there is plenty to see and do in the UK. So we’re big fans of the #staycation! (We’re also a fair skinned bunch so we’re not the sun-seeking types!)

Matthews first camping trip

It is easy to go for short stays.
Throw all the kit plus kids in the car and you’re off. Depending on the season plenty of sites don’t even require booking, you just pull up. Which means it is easy to do short stays over a weekend as well as longer breaks. Particularly good if getting time off work is a nightmare. We are lucky to live in an area surrounded by good sites but there are hundreds all over the UK.

walking by the river rother

There is no need to travel far.
Particularly for a weekend break. Once you are in the middle of the beautiful countryside you could be absolutely anywhere. The fact we were only a 20 minute drive from home didn’t matter at all.

enjoying a long river walk

On that note. The beautiful countryside.
If you have read this blog for a while you might have noticed we’re pretty big fans of being out in nature. A walk through the woods/country park/beach will always lift my mood and is my happy place. A whole weekend outside is fab. It also does the children the world of good to be out in all that fresh air, away from screens just running around like little loonies.

camp fire building

kids toasting marshmallows

Camp fires and marshmallows.
It seems to me there is a primal urge in all men to build fires. Camping allows them to embrace the inner pyromaniac in useful way. Then the kids and mums get to keep warm and roast marshmallows. Everybody wins! (Have wet wipes on hand, children will get sticky.)

sunrise in east sussex

Early mornings.
This might not sound like a great thing at face value but hear me out! If you have little ones you are probably going to be woken up anyway and I find that we naturally tend to wake earlier when camping because of light that creeps into the tent so I vote embrace it! I love listening to the dawn chorus and this last Sunday I got up before anyone else (4.45am!), seemingly on the whole site, sat in my chair and watched the sun rise while I read my bible. Utter peace.

ice creams from grandad (aka grumpy)

Lots of simple fun.
I asked Emma for the best bits of camping…
Running around, playing outside games, squirting water pistols, going for walks, reading books, spending time with family, sleeping in a tent!

cousins in their own tent

Fresh Air = Sleep
We had no problems on either night with either child getting them to sleep. That quantity of fresh air combined with all the running around means they are ready for bed when you want them to be. Even better by the time you get home again and need a quiet paced afternoon to unpack they should look like this!

sleeping children in the car home

Love them!

This was our first camping trip in a while but the first of many as family of 4! You can read about our first camping experience with Emma as a toddler HERE.

If I haven’t sold you on camping with little people and it is simply not your thing, do go and take a look at Hurrah For Gin’s latest post for a different point of view and a few laughs!

Naomi-16

 

Posted in: Lovely Little Family, Things We Do Tagged: adventures, camping, children, family, nature, outdoors, summer, walks

The Sibling Project 2016 – May

28 May 2016 by Naomi 1 Comment

E&M may

In my last post I mentioned how in the harder moments I was just trying to put one foot in front of the other and trust in God. Goodness this month has truly made me live those words with varying degrees of success. I can safely say I will not be sad to see the back of May 2016.

However there have been hard moments when I have looked up and seen my two little blessings loving each other and thought if God’s plan for my life right now is to be at home being their mum I’m not doing too badly at all.

My little brother sister duo are growing up just beautifully if not a little quickly. To me this month has been about communication for both of them.

Emma just cracks me up with her little phrases. She quite often puts ‘indeed’ on the end of sentences which gets all the smiles from me, or answers a request with ‘of course!’. I don’t know she just sounds so grown up in those moments.

Matthew has finally started breaking out some new sounds on a more regular basis. Although ’em-ma’ is still his favourite word and I kind of want it to stay that way, I now regularly hear ‘mamama’, ‘dadada’ and other babble.

Happily, the two of them are still loving being in each others company. I love watching their bond grow but occasionally find that Emma is now a little too protective of Matthew, he’s no longer quite the baby we all still want him to be!

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Previous Siblings Project Posts:
January
February

Naomi-16

Posted in: Lovely Little Family Tagged: children, family, May, siblings, the sibling project

Messy Play (!!!)

3 November 2015 by Naomi Leave a Comment

Last week was half term where we live. Obviously this means that all schools, nurseries, classes, toddler groups, etc.. take a week off. As parents of course we have no such luck, in my house I’m lucky to get a 5 minute toilet break to myself much less a half term holiday!

Consequently my mummy friends and I were in need of entertainment plans and one of the ideas we had was messy play in our church hall(!)

It was a great idea. Honest. 

We learned some lessons, but fun was had and much mess was made. Which was, I guess, the whole point.

So here are a few snaps from last Friday of some very mucky children, as a way of preserving the memories and archiving photos for 18th birthday parties of the future.

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We played with paint, cloud dough, ‘gak’ (cornflour/soap/water), custard, and soap foam. The main lesson here is that this is too much at once. We were perhaps overly keen and hadn’t properly considered the level of clean up that would be required.

For future reference, less mess is better mess. 🙂

Naomi x2

 

Posted in: Things We Do Tagged: autumn, children, Emma, happy things, messy play, October, parenting, play matters, sensory, toddlers

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