Week One: 30 Days Wild 2021

Last Tuesday, I stumbled across 30 Days Wild in a Facebook group I’m in. It’s a fun challenge set by The Wildlife Trusts to take part in ‘one random act of wildness’ each day. I immediately set about planning some activities for us for the month ahead! When I told Autumn about it, she seemed excited too. I’m hoping that this will help her to learn about and appreciate the natural world more and for us both to feel more connected to nature. Too often we’re rushing around busily and just don’t notice things. Here’s how our first week went.

Going barefoot on the grass

For our first day, we stood barefoot on the grass to connect with nature. Standing barefoot on the earth (or earthing/grounding) as it’s known may possibly also have many health benefits! It’s a really interesting science that I hope is researched more in the near future. I have to say that standing barefoot on the grass or sand always makes me feel happier. Autumn enjoyed it as the grass tickled her toes!

Studied a creepy crawly

On 2nd June, we found a caterpillar in the garden near our Japanese Quince bush. I initially mistook it for a piece of old garden broom! We used the Seek app to take a photo of it and find out what it was. After finding out that it was an Oak Eggar/Northern Eggar, I found out more about it for Autumn and showed her pictures of what it will look like as a moth. We also talked about the lifecycle of moths and butterflies.

Planted a wildflower garden

I haven’t really done anything with the garden since we moved into our house in November. Both the long winter and having a newborn have meant I haven’t had much of an opportunity to. However, I had spotted an area of grass next to the patio area that wasn’t part of the lawn and thought about planting wildflowers there. Last Thursday, this became a reality. The ground was too tough for me, so I asked my husband to dig up the majority of the grass from the area. Autumn and I then had fun using bee and butterfly friendly Seedboms to disperse wildflowers across the area. It gets quite a lot of sun there and has been warm this week, so I’m hoping they’ll start to grow soon!

Read a nature related book

On Friday, it didn’t stop raining all day. If I ever needed an excuse to grab a blanket and a book, it’s rain. So that’s what we did. We chose a lovely book about a man who saved a penguin, which now travels thousands of miles each year to visit him. Even better, it’s based on a true story. I’ll be reviewing this book on the blog in the next week or two, so watch this space!

Planted some herbs

Saturday saw the return of the sunshine, so we headed back out to the garden. This time we planted a rosemary plant and some basil seeds. Autumn liked the smell of the rosemary! Hopefully the seeds will grow and we can use both plants in our cooking in the coming weeks.

Saved a bee

On Sunday we saved a bumblebee. The poor little thing had come in through the back door unnoticed, until my husband saw it next to the door mat. After some time, it became apparent that it was too weak to fly. Unsure about trying to move it outside, especially with our cat lurking nearby, I made it some sugar water. We observed from a distance and after about 10 minutes it began to drink. Unfortunately, one of its legs became tangled in the doormat. However, moving the mat outside, we were able to free it. After some buzzing and us rushing indoors in case it was angry with us, we watched it fly. Hopefully that’s a sign that it made a good recovery.

Plastic free day

At the one week mark, I was feeling a little ambitious. We have already made lots of swaps to reduce our plastic usage over the last few years, but I wanted to educate Autumn on plastic pollution and attempt a day without any plastic whatsoever. We went to a zero waste shop on Sunday in preparation to buy things such as body wash and toothpaste, which she enjoyed. Although there were obviously some plastic things we still needed to use, (I can’t see without glasses or contacts), even I was slightly astonished by just how many plastic things there were in daily life that I wasn’t able to swap out. It is scary how unavoidable plastic is. I was proud of how well Autumn took it all on board – although she was looking forward to playing with her Barbies again! I’ll be writing about our day in greater depth in a separate post.