By Kate Hodges
07th May 2020
DO and RECIPE Green Shoots
This year, we feel more tuned in to nature than ever. The turning of the season seems more acute, flowers brighter, foxes and badgers bolder, and the spring migration of birds a flurry of welcome visitors. Our one-hour walks feel like intense shots of wildness, and we’re not taking anything for granted. This month we’re thinking about making wild salads, finding the green shoots in fields and parks - find out what to forage in May here. Mix chickweed shoots with the young, heart-shaped leaves of the lime and red clover heads to make a hedgerow salad. We love this piece about ‘nature’s microgreen’ chickweed, and this one about a family’s lime leaf snack adventure.
RECIPE Vegging Out
Whether the lockdown means you’ve got bags of extra time to cook, or you are up to your eyeballs working and looking after children and need quick and dirty mealtime ideas, National Vegetarian Week is a spur to experiment with new recipes. Running from May 11-17, this year, the event is fully digital, with online cooking classes, ideas for sharing veggie dinners over video calls, and meal planners. Join Chris Packham, Stephen Fry and Joanna Lumley in going meat free. Need recipe inspiration? Try these classic meat-free basics courtesy of the inspiring Cookie and Kate or travel the world in plant-based splendour with these recipes; the Cashew and Smoked Tofu Potstickers look incredible.
EVENT and DO Spools Out
One advantage of events going digital is that suddenly they’re accessible to everyone. This year, we can all enjoy Birmingham’s Flashback Film Festival. Exploring the radical boundaries of celluloid, this year you might enjoy watching a film about throat singing, take a stroll through a conflict zone in Iraqi Kurdistan, or even submit your own 1-second animation (we’ve been making ours using the Clayframes phone app). However, somewhat predictably, we are most looking forward to their Internet Cat Festival!
MAKE Arty Party
Have you been making art under lockdown? The International Museum of Childrens Art in Oslo is holding a competition to document how children experience the change to their routines, their hopes, their fears and their moments of joy. Even the youngest child can express themselves in pictures, and this collection of art will serve as an archive that people in the future might look at and learn from. The museum’s online collection is inspirational – have a browse here.
DO Beat This
We love love love SK Shlomo’s fun, interactive beatbox shows, and, from this week, he’s taking this explosion of joy online. Every week, for six sessions, he’ll be live and direct on the Family Lockdown Tips and Ideas page, teaching your kids to beatbox, creating an anthem, and welcoming special guests including Bastille, KT Tunstall, Bill Bailey and Basement Jaxx. Laughter and sunshine guaranteed.
What we’ve been reading this week:
‘Not just weeds’: how rebel botanists are using graffiti to name forgotten flora
“A rising international force of rebel botanists armed with chalk has taken up street graffiti to highlight the names and importance of the diverse but downtrodden flora growing in the cracks of paths and walls in towns and cities across Europe.” Read more here
Found something inspirational to read that you’d like to share? Want to share your lockdown creations with us? Have an idea for things to do? We’d love to hear from you. Email Kate
One more thing: As well as bringing you this newsletter and bits and bobs for The Green Parent, I also write books. And I have a new, very Green Parent-friendly title out this week. On A Starry Night: Fun Things to Make and Do From Dusk Until Dawn is a fresh collection of exciting things to do after dark or with the curtains drawn. Discover how to make tin-can lanterns, have a glow-in-the-dark bath, climb trees by torchlight, go bat spotting or create a very simple (and cheap) lightbox. It’s the perfect for lockdown. FInd out more about it here
