Nature is essential for many reasons, but one of my favorites is how it ties so nicely into life learning. By simply carrying out our nature-based family traditions this autumn during our forest homeschooling, we’ve learned so much about many aspects of life; birth, growth, transformation, hard work & diligence, patience, responsibility, prosperity, harvest, death, repurposing, emotions, cycles, decomposition, connections and reflections. How did we accomplish such a vast array of lessons, do you ask? The answer is simple; by going outside and interacting with pumpkins.

We began by noticing during the end of summer how little pumpkins were growing in the backyard. By reflecting back, we remembered that we had dumped out our pumpkin seeds in that exact place after carving our Jack O’Lanterns the autumn prior! How special?! A gift from the earth; the birth of an unexpected life.

We watched and watched as the pumpkins grew and transformed over time. It took hard work, some diligence and a bit of responsibility from my young children as they gave the plants plenty of water and patiently observed the rate of growth. The girls colored the differences each day into their nature journals and took the time often to reflect on the changes they had seen from the pages prior.

Finally, our pumpkins had fully grown! It was then that we experienced prosperity & some of our harvest as we proudly picked our pumpkins. We felt grateful toward the earth as my youngest patted the ground and sweetly said, “Thank you!”

Since our tiny pumpkins were a bit too small for carving, we kept them in our play area and used them as toys and props during our free-play. For larger pumpkins, we visited our local farm during our annual tradition of moonlight pumpkin picking! The girls experienced here, too, that a pumpkins lifecycle is the same no matter where it grows.

By cutting the vine, we learned about a form of “death” and realized what the purpose of a vine actually is. We eventually carved our pumpkins into Jack O’ Lanterns, keeping the insides for cooking and baking and learning about repurposing. The soft glow of our Jack O’ Lanterns was a reflective and magical experience, and allowed us to take in the season’s beautiful treasures.

After a while, our strong and fierce looking Jack O’ Lanterns began to become mushy and a bit silly looking. It was time to learn about decomposition, and with this the girls began to feel a bit sad. As we learned, accepted and talked about our emotions, we also took the opportunity to realize that this was part of the lifecycle. Our pumpkins were returning to the earth, and next year they might regrow so that we can once again enjoy them.

At this point, we were able to connect and reflect on the lifecycle and all that we had learned simply by living and being outdoors.

You might have been contemplating how such a simple task couldn’t possibly teach so much; but let me share with you a wise quote I once heard from one of the worlds most famous icons, William Shakespeare:

“The earth has music for those who listen.”

In other words, take notice to the small details and look farther into simplicity. Pumpkins might only seem like vegetables from the ground, but think about the larger concept; nature can gift us so many unexpected learning opportunities. Get outside and learn from them yourself!