I had an ideal childhood, if I say so myself. My first memories are from our home on my grandparents’ land. They had 20 or more acres and we had a trailer parked on it while my parents started their own business and saved to build their house on their own land. My parents let us run wild on that land. We ran through woods, played in the dirt, and swung from trees. When we moved to our house, I still roamed wild on our land. My brother and I played on our beloved “dirt pile” that looked like a micro badlands from constructing the greenhouses that I called home. I fell in love with plants and flowers; learning their names and learning to care for them. My parents let me build forts, trusting me with a hammer and nails all on my own by the age of 8 because, well, they taught me to use them!

In addition to my wild home life, my parents took us on vacations to national parks across the west with fun excursions that kept it interesting. We panned for gold in the Black Hills of South Dakota after exploring the Badlands. We took the train to the Grand Canyon and walked all along the South Rim. I fell in love with travel, on one of these trips: marveling up at the canyon walls of Zion Canyon in Zion National Park. And my parents fostered this all through my childhood and still foster it to this day in their grandkids. We still go camping together, hiking together, and enjoy time spent outside together!

So, it’s no surprise, that I wanted to give my kids that same experience. That same ability to be a wild child. To foster a love, appreciation and stewardship for the natural world around us. Admittedly, I haven’t done as good of a job with this at home as I thought I would. I do crush it on vacations. We spend a ton of time on hiking trails and outside when we’re traveling or camping. But, I have a long way to go when it comes to our life at home.

2025 feels like my year to truly embrace outdoor time at home. I feel like Liam being two now has opened a lot of doors for that because I don’t feel like I have to be quite as hover-y and diligent about him. I can let them both roam more wild in our fenced in back yard. I feel like I can let them both loose a little more on greenway trails. So, I’ve decided that 2025 is a year that I embrace my own inner wild child, that I become the wild mama that I’ve always wanted to be, and let my kids be the little wild children that is innate in them. This is something that I want to continue to foster through all of our lives.

Simple Ways I’m Embracing Wildness in Raising My Kids

Taking the 1000 Hours Outside Challenge

I love 1000 hours outside. It’s a great tool for education, inspiration and fun! I really wanted to crush this last year, and I just discovered that it wasn’t going to happen for me in 2024. I stopped tracking pretty early on because I found myself overwhelmed. But I made my own tracker in my bullet journal for this year, and I’ve already started tracking my time with them outside. I’ve come up with fun activities I want to try outside, I want to unleash them for more open play in our backyard and just try simple ways to spend more and more time outside, where they can start to truly create deep, long-lasting bonds with nature.

Continuing My Own Education as a Mother

I started this last year by reading How to Raise a Wild Child. That book gave me so many amazing ideas, so much inspiration and taught me so much. I just started Rewilding Motherhood and have found a lot of empowerment from it so far to remember that motherhood doesn’t have to look the same for everyone. I feel like I have a lot more autonomy over this experience just from starting to read this. I have another on my bedside table to start this year: There’s No Such Thing As Bad Weather. I’ve been reading books about nature and nature connections as well that are reinvigorating my desire to do things like grow my own veggies, look at the stars, plant flowers and carve out time for time outside. So far, those have been Rooted and Braiding Sweetgrass. I have just been really inspired by these and I can’t wait to write posts on these books as well.

Eating Meals Outside

This feels like something so simple that I don’t know why I haven’t done it more. I love to eat outside. I love a good picnic. I love feeling the sun on me, feeling the wind and hearing nature around me. Admittedly, I don’t love the bugs or when it’s too windy and dirt is flying, but also, this is something I’ve found myself doing less and less of over the last ten years. Matt’s not huge on picnics, so it’s just not something we’ve made a priority. But I’m going to prioritize it this year. I’m picturing summer breakfast picnics, eating most of our meals outside while camping, and lunches in the spring and summer.

Taking Walks – On Greenways and in Our Neighborhood

We have always loved taking walks. We’re a big walking family, but for the past almost 4 years, at least one of us has been pushing a stroller or had a kid in a carrier. But, I know that this is going to be something so fun for us to do as a family and let the kids set the pace, to play, to pick flowers and ask questions. Charleigh has already started doing this and the idea that both of my kids will be toddling along beside us just warms my heart.

Taking Night Walks

This is an idea I got from How to Raise a Wild Child. I loved the idea of allowing your kids to feel safe in the dark, engaging different senses and seeing their world in a completely different light. Scott Sampson recommends starting your evening adventures at dusk and into the night to ease them in and quell fears. I love the quote about this from the book, “Be authentic and open yourself up to rekindling that childlike sense of wonder, chasing their passions as well as your own. If you model this kind of engaged playfulness, the child will feel more secure and do the same. The end result will be a growing sense of wonder in both of you.” I can’t wait for these nighttime adventures!

Letting the Kids Take the Lead on Local and Familiar Trails

We get out on our local greenways a lot and there is one in particular that doesn’t allow bikes or even runners outside of a certain timeframe, so these trails feel like the perfect place to let our kids roam on trails, to set the pace and to follow whatever path calls to them.

Free and Open Creek Play

This is something I’m really excited to start this year. Because I have two pretty small kids, I’ll need to be sure Matt or someone else is with me, but we have a state forest near us with an amazing little creek that runs through it. I desperately want to give our kiddos open creek play time. Where they can learn to skip rocks, splash and we can bring little nets to catch the little minnows and crawdaddies in the water.

Fostering Curiosity Without Offering Answers Myself

Another big lesson I learned from How to Raise a Wild Child is that not every interaction with nature needs to be an education. Even if I know the answer to the things my kids are asking, I need to put the curiosity in their hands, to allow them to use their curiosity, and then encourage them to look for the answers elsewhere to keep that interest alive: the library, a computer at home, etc.

Take Advantage of More Nature Programs

Our local conservation center has a lot of different nature programs that I’ve really only just learned about. I am really excited to get more involved in those. I want the kids to learn in a really hands-on way in their own backyard and learn things that they can hopefully translate into our own adventures.

I have put a lot of thought into this over the last year. I love the idea of raising my kids wild. To keep them inspired, to keep them connected, to give them a desire to cherish and protect, and to bond with them over a shared love of our great outdoors. So here’s to one of my biggest life goals: to raise my children wild.

Also, I want to take a moment to thank my parents. Thank you for giving me the space to explore, to make mistakes and even get hurt from time to time. Thanks for making experiences in nature a priority and for allowing me to grow up in the most incredible greenhouse in the entire world where you continued to foster a connection with nature. You also are fostering this in my own kids as the best Mimi and Papa out there. You guys are constantly my inspiration and the yardstick to which I compare myself! Love you guys!

Are you raising little wild children? What are some of the things you do to encourage free play outside?

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