1000 Hours Outside {Success!}

At the beginning of the year I quietly joined the challenge of our family spending 1000 hours in the great outdoors.  This movement began as a homeschool challenge and has grown exponentially over the years to a worldwide known adventure.  Honestly, I wasn't sure we could do it.  I tracked our hours without telling anyone because I didn't want to fail or see my kids be disappointed.  

In January of 2022 we logged 19 hours and 24 minutes and I thought, "we'll never make it."  In February, we had a measly 12 1/2 hours.  However, using the app made logging easy, so I kept on pushing the timer on and off when we went out.  March was better with 33 hours and 49 minutes.  In April we found our groove and made 63 hours and 25 mins and then we were rolling.  Sometime in the late summer I saw that we might actually make it and I told the kids about the challenge.  Once they were invested there was no stopping us!

May - 120 hours, 37 minutes

June - 112 hours, 39 minutes

July - 112 hours, 11 minutes

August - 150 hours, 20 minutes

September - 148 hours, 11 minutes

October - 144 hours, 21 minutes

November - 61 hours, 35 minutes

December - 22 hours, 9 minutes

For a grand total, standing as of today or 1001 hours, 11 minutes.  It's going to be beautiful the rest of the week, so we'll still be out there, but today we met our goal.  We were 23 minutes short of 1000 hours yesterday when the kids came in, so I knew today would be it and planned bright and early for us to hit the hills at the park for a sledding party!  I'm so glad we did that!

First down of the morning - a five way race!

Mia and Zayden riding duo.

I haven't sledded in years.  When we came in January 2022 I was recovering from covid and just watched from a chair.  I had a blast.

Sled went fast with four big kids on it!

Zayden taking a turn on Xavier's tummy sled.

I'll be honest - we made Evalynn go the first time.  She didn't want to and I said, "you have to go once, and then you don't have to go ever again."  She went and she loved it and she continued going with all of us until we quit!

Ev tried the baby sled a couple times and it didn't go very well so Xavier attached it to his sled and took her down.

A gorgeous 38 degree morning.

Time for another race...

Daddy organized snow angels.

Mia

Evie

Natalee

Xavier

Zayden

Evalynn alternated being pulled up the hill and pulling her own sled.

Up and down.  Up and down.

Mia invited me for a sled ride and we went pretty far!

Thank you, Lord, for a beautiful sunny morning!

The video is long but just so sweet.  The squeals, the laughter, me yelling "get out of the way!" as though a sled is going 60 mph, the time together.  Treasure the moments in my heart.

Celebratory photo!  We did it!  1000 hours outside!

The queen requested she be pulled back to the van...her little legs were tired.

When we got home we celebrated with a simple (what we had on hand) charcuterie lunch (thanks for my pretty new board, Lauren) and cookies and milk.

I made a reel to commemorate just a few of our outside moments from 2022.  (I was limited to 50 photos - so hard to choose!).  Instagram didn't let me download the music because of copyright, so on here it's just a silent reel, and it's far from perfect, but the memories are fun to reminisce.  

What an accomplishment.  The kids are already excited to try again in 2023!