As if my daily life of raising two toddlers 3 & under while pregnant with a third isn’t challenging enough, I also decided to take it upon myself to attain a nearly impossible goal of spending as much time outside as possible – specifically: spend 1000 hours outside in a single calendar year. This was prompted by the 1000 Hours Outside Instagram page, which I learned about from my sister-in-law. The idea is that you balance screen time with outdoor time. According to the 1000 Hours Outside website, the average American child spends 1,200 hours in front of a screen. That’s over 3 hours a day. Comparitvely, kids spend only 4-7 minutes playing outside a day. Now, we aren’t a screen free family, but I will admit that I fear that some of the wonder of childhood can get lost between all the screens we have access to. This topic is probably almost as dividing as sleep training, and not an issue I wish to debate with other parents. I think we all do what works for us and try to do what’s best for our child(ren). But I personally love the outdoors, and find my children are better behaved outside (and I worry less about messes, things breaking, etc) and want to raise the boys with the same love for camping, hiking, and general exploring that my partner and I have. So, I took upon this rather challenging goal.
