One of our goals this year is be outside more than 1000 hours (and even exceed last years’ total). So it’s time to check in on this years progress so far.

Winter is by far the hardest time for us to get lots of hours outside. It’s dark, and cold and just not as easy and that’s ok! Last year we also clocked the least hours outside in January/February, I know that we will make up for it in the summer months.

If we split the time up evenly between all 12 months we would need 84 hours a month to get to 1000 hours outside. We only got to 53 hours in January and in 2021 we only hit about 43. The good news is we are focused on getting outside more and that is what matters.

I highly recommend the 1000 hours outside podcast to learn about the benefits and inspiration.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-1000-hours-outside-podcast/id1448210728

Are you trying to spend 1000 hours outside?

I was very excited when we met our goal of 1000 hours outside last year! It was an audacious goal and well worth it.

The 1000 Hours Outside movement really spoke to me and they have many great resources:

https://www.1000hoursoutside.com/

While getting outside can look different for everyone I wanted to share what we did in 2021 that helped up reach our goal:

1. We were intentional about getting outside even when the weather wasn’t great. To be honest the pandemic helped with this as well. In years past we would just visit museums, pools or indoor playgrounds during the winter and while that is great a lot of that wasn’t always available to us. We adopted the There’s No Such Thing As Bad Weather attitude and got outside.

2. We traveled a lot (for us). We spent over 70 nights away from home in 2021, at least 55 of those in our RV. When we are traveling we spend most of the day outside exploring where ever we are visiting. I am not sure that we will be able to keep up this level of travel, but I hope so, we love experiencing the world with our kids.

3. We counted everything! Dinner in the backyard, trips to the playground, a day in Disneyland, time at walking to school….all of it. It didn’t have to be a long hike in nature to count. In the summer we spent almost every morning in our back yard while it was still cool.

4. We allowed for seasonal shifts.

If we broke down the year evenly we would have needed at least 84 hours outside each month. In January 2021 we only logged 42 hours. I wasn’t worried about the deficit knowing that spring, summer and fall would be much easier to be outside. Our month with the most time outside was September with 158 hours outside followed by May with 129 hours. Even summer can be difficult to be outside all day when it’s blazing hot in the afternoon. The shoulder seasons and trips banked us the most outdoor hours.

5. We tracked our time but didn’t sweat the details.

I logged our time outside on a simple spreadsheet and just did my best to be accurate(ish) I didn’t use a timer and mostly rounded to whole numbers. I didn’t subtract 5 minutes here or there for bathroom trips inside or add outside time for walking into a store. We didn’t count time in the car driving to places we would spend time outside or camping sites. Our total could truly be hours less or more but that’s not important to me it was just a fun thing to work towards together.

The 1000 Hours Outside website has other ways to track your time outside if spreadsheets aren’t your jam.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

One of our big goals for 2021 was to spend 1000 hours outside:

Some Family Goals For 2021

It felt a little daunting but so much research shows how important being outside is for kids (everyone really). We made it our mission to make it happen and loosely tracked our hours outside in a simple spreadsheet. Let me know if you want the template, I will be happy to share!

This is what our spreadsheet looked like for 2021. The times outside are in hours and always just an approximation. Our total could be much less or more but the idea was just to spend more time outside.

You can see from the spreadsheet that some days we spent 0 hours outside and others it was all day. Also you can see that our hours total were much more in the summer than in the winter. May had the most hours outside and January had the least.

We tried to get out no matter the weather but it is much easier in the summer when we can enjoy meals outside and enjoy the freedom of summer.

We logged approximately 1189 hours outside this year and I am very proud of us.

One of our goals for 2022 is to beat last year and be outside at least 1200 hours.

_______________________________________

What are some of your goals for 2022?