At British Nannies, we love to inspire a better quality of life, both now and tomorrow. We hope that these sustainable and “eco-friendly” activities that can be done with all ranges of ages help encourage natural creativity and connection with our planet and each other. The activities can either be done individually, or easily done one after the other for a whole day of environmentally friendly fun!
There’s three main principles for activity sustainability:
- Use what you’ve already got!
- Foster connection and community.
- Avoid waste for the sake of creativity.
The activities themselves are sorted into sections based on what they require; from nothing to a handful of crafty materials. Starting with the simplest:
Go For a Walk!
Simple as that – go for a walk! Even if it’s just round the block, or to the small local park.
This one can be combined with a large number of the other activities on this list, too.
Natural Treasure Hunt (i-Spy)
Whether on a walk, in the garden, or even from inside the house, set a list of treasures that you’d like to find (one red leaf, one twisted stick, etc). This can be done in an i-spy format, too, especially in limited spaces where you may not be able to go rooting around for a treasure.
Art in-Situ
While you’re out, you can create art on the go for any passer-by to marvel at. Whether that’s collecting leaves to stick to trees using honey, or knolling by collecting lots of coloured objects to leave on a bench.
Visit a Garden
Whether that be a fancy botanical garden or a community-run wildlife garden, there's much to be learned from the huge variety of species that can live in harmony.
Using a phone can be educational too:
Creature Feature
Use free apps such as Seek and iNaturalist to identify plants and animals using just your phone camera. To make this an educational activity then look them up on the internet for fun facts! See if you can pronounce the Latin names? Maybe you found a rare species? You can even become a citizen scientist by submitting your photos on the app for experts to review and contribute to species logs.
Now, for activities requiring items that you or the family should already have:
Board Games & Jigsaws
Whether you bring your own games to the client, or learn theirs, busting out the board games is always great for a rainy afternoon or quiet evening (whether it stays quiet or not depends on the game!).
On the theme of quiet afternoons, what about a movie?
Watch a Nature-Inspired Film or Show
Films are a lovely way to spend an afternoon no matter the season or weather. Prepare some snacks and settle down to watch some beautiful, scenic shots. Bearing in mind some of these may require subscription services, and that you should always check what’s appropriate for the person you’re caring for before you view.
For films, we recommend:
Bridge to Terabithia, 2007 (PG)
Pom Poko, 1994 (PG)
Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax, 2011 (U)
A Bug’s Life, 1998 (U)
Finding Nemo, 2002 (U)
Wall-e, 2008 (U)
Over the Hedge, 2005 (U)
Pocahontas, 1996 (U)
Ponyo, 2008 (U)
Moana, 2016 (PG)
Castle in the Sky, 1986 (PG)
Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, 1984 (PG)
My Neighbour Totoro, 1988 (U)
Princess Mononoke, 1997 (PG)
The Day After Tomorrow, 2003 (12)
Avatar, 2009 (12A)
Documentaries also have the benefit of being educational! Unlike movies, most media sites already have a section for nature documentaries, so instead of listing specific shows, we would recommend seeing what’s new, and what interests the person/people in your care that day.
Another great educational activity for a rainy day – requiring a printer:
Find Out Where Your Food Comes From
Print out a map and mark on the map where different foods in the cupboard and fridge say they come from. What’s the closest and furthest food you can find? Did you learn any new locations – cities, countries, etc? Were there any you didn’t expect?
Using just a pen/pencil and paper:
Find Patterns
This activity can be done either outside in a park or garden, or inside from a window.
If you’re doing the activity outside, take a pencil and paper on your outing and record the patterns you find by placing the paper on top of the pattern, and lightly shading the paper. This can be tree bark, leaves, stones, anything!
Requiring twine/string, and a few items scavenged from nature, you can make the below:
Nature Garland
The easiest way to display your collected treasures from a walk in nature is by hanging them on a string. Simply find a place to hang the string, such as a mantelpiece or window, and attach the leaves, flowers, etc either by making a hole for the string to feed through, or a peg or tape.
Wreaths
Making a wreath is a lovely way to celebrate the season. All you need is some twine, and some foraged materials including bendy sticks (birch, willow, and hazel work great), and whatever you’d like to decorate it with!
To make the basic wreath, grab a small handful of the bendy sticks and start to wrap them as if tying a knot, with some overlap where the . Then, using the twine, wind around the structure until you’ve done two full loops, before tying off. Here’s a photo of one I prepared earlier:
Then, you can decorate using a variety of nature treasures such as flowers, leaves, ferns, mosses, and lichens. Be mindful when collecting these materials that you don’t take more than you need, and that if there’s only one of an item (one flower in a field, for example), don’t pick it, as the bugs and birds will need it more than you!
Decorating it is much the same as creating it – as you wind the twine around the base, you can gradually tuck in more and more decorations on each loop. It can be a little finicky motor-skills wise, but it doesn’t have to be complex to be a great wreath!
Here’s an autumn wreath I made last year after a lovely long walk in a local park:
You can reuse the base wreath by clearing off the decorations as they start to wilt, and storing it in a cupboard until next use.
Nature Web
A nature web is basically a wreath that’s a bit more artistically chaotic. The method to create them is very similar, but you can get more creative with the base sticks – instead of the flexible twigs needed for a wreath, you can use a solid stick with an interesting branch pattern to wrap between.
While you can also decorate these by tucking flowers and leaves into the twine, you can also go crazy with the colour of the string, too. Yarn or thread work just as well as twine – even hair ties might work depending on the geometry of stick you’re decorating!
For the more craft among you, these activities require extra supplies like tape, glue, paint etc:
Nature’s Confetti
If your care recipient either has a birthday or event coming up, or knows someone who does, making some confetti from dried flower petals and leaves is a great way to celebrate. This one does require a bit of foresight, as the drier the foraged goods are the better – if you have repeat bookings over a week or two, it’s a perfect continued activity, though!
On the first day, do the gathering, hang them up in a suitable location to dry, and on the next booking day (up to a month later) use a hole punch to confett-ify the plants. They’ll need to be stored in a suitably dry location until use.
Tetrapack Takeover
Cartons of juice, oat milk, or whatever you like to order, can be used for a variety of repurposed uses – especially if your county doesn’t recycle them! My favourite nature recycling projects involve turning them into bird feeders and planters, which can be hung up or strapped to railings depending on the environment available.
For the bird feeder, you will need:
- 1 tetrapack carton, clean and dry
- 1 stick (a perch)
- Scissors
- String (to attach/hang from something)
- Bird food
For the planter, you’ll just need:
- 1 tetrapack carton, clean and dry
- Scissors
- Substrate for the plant (soil/coir/pon)
- A plant!
You can of course also re-use plastic bottles in a similar way, too! And of course you can always use organic materials such as toilet rolls for planting seedlings, too.
Leaf Prints
Using paint or ink, you can paint a thin layer on a foraged leaf (the more pronounced the skeleton, the better) before pressing it to some paper to record it’s print. For more advanced artists, playing around with larger sized pieces, or collaging different leaf shapes (perhaps adding flower prints and other textures such as from fir cones) can create more intricate works.
That's all for now! If you do try any of these ideas, please take a photo of your finished creations and tag us on Facebook.