What I learned from getting outside

I know what you’re thinking….here goes another blog banging on about how great it is getting outside, research says this, grandma said that…

Well, I don’t think you’d be far wrong… kind of

I’ve been having bit of a tough time of it lately. I haven’t been feeling myself for a few weeks, which really really annoyed the hell out of me.

I had gotten stuck in a cycle of days seeming to be full of the same thing, day in, day out. It’s easy to put blame on baby’s routine and things we need to do for decorating his room. Activities our eldest wanted to fill his day of, mainly parks, parks and more parks.

The new academic year has started and it’s been weeks of colds after colds, with baby experiencing his first ear infection and round of antibiotics too.

I feel exhausted. I’m too quick to snap. My head is too noisy. I crave space and fresh air.

So this morning, with me on the verge of tears, Keith asked me what I wanted to do.

“Get outside”

I knew what I needed to do. I was just sat on the living room floor, feeling overwhelmed and saying to him it’s impossible.

An hour later I was at the start of a little walk in the woods, with my sons looking at me. It felt like with each passing mile in the car, I felt more capable, more in control.

My eldest had packed his rucksack full of food and bobble hats (he knows the important things!!) as well as binoculars and his bug catcher so with baby in the carrier we set off up the hill, with no agenda but to see what autumn colours we could ogle.

We didn’t talk much to begin with, but soon enough talk became more natural again, giggles started to break the silence and I felt at ease again.

We didn’t go far. We took our time looking at the view from the top and found a nice wide open space for baby to get out and toddle about. We got our hands muddy and the boys fought over a pair of binoculars. They looked at leaves together, baby rolled around in them and I breathed it all in.

A lady walked past and heard the boys playing. She said I was a good mum for bringing them to the woods and called me very wise……….. If only she knew that I was in tears this morning at the very thought of doing this. I felt a fraud, and fought back the tears that threatened to reappear.

And then the boys were soon playing loudly again and I forgot all about her. We carried on with the walk, saw a bit of autumn colours and made plans for a few weeks time to go to a few of Perthshire’s best autumn hotspots.

It all felt natural and I felt whatever was weighing me down disappear.

I’m not going to get in to any more cliches about getting outside, we all know what they are. But to me, today felt like a changing point. Tonight feels a lot different from this morning.

There are already plans afoot for tomorrow for the three of us to go to a park, but this one has a zip wire so our eldest will be happy, ducks so baby will be happy and it’s outside so I’ll be happy.

The house, room decorating, colds and whatever else on the to-do list will just have to wait because I’m making getting outside everyday a priority from now on!

Will you join me?

Do you have any stories where the outdoors added that extra dose of magic to your day?