Slow and Seasonal Living

I started moving our lives towards slow and seasonal living a decade ago. In the beginning, it felt like we weren’t getting anywhere, I had lists of seasonal foods and activities and would do my best to be as seasonal and intentional as possible. The thing I didn’t realise was that all of the lists I was making and the research I was doing was making a difference. Slowly, over time, the knowledge I was gaining was helping me to start making better decisions. It lead to me knowing which foods were in season in the supermarket and to finding pure enjoyment out of watching the seasons change when out on a walk.

Ultimately, it lead me to minimalism as owning only the things that you use or that add value to your life through beauty meant I had a lot more time for sitting down with a cup of tea and reading a book, or painting, or taking long walks in nature. Seasonal living allows us to simply be, in a world where we are encouraged to be always looking ahead and planning the future, or backwards to (over-)analyse our past; seasonal living encourages us to be present.

As we earned more money I was able to buy more and more local produce. It definitely costs more to buy locally but we managed to make it work. We started prioritising our food over other costs in our lives, like eating out, TV subscriptions and clothes (no judgment, these priorities will be different for everyone, and even within one person, they will inevitably change over time). I started by getting our fruit snacks from a local farmers market at the weekend and then we moved on to getting a vegetable box delivery once a week. All these slow steps can add up, and even just knowing what is in season makes it much easier to choose the right things in the supermarket. You’ll also notice that when you buy seasonal foods your shopping bill will come to less.

By looking into seasonal living and buying locally we started to learn about sustainability. First, we started trying to cut our waste through packaging – the easiest place to start if you are buying locally and vegan. If you are looking to start reducing your waste, try not to be too harsh on yourself and do it all at once. Also, remember that your life changes from week to week. We’ve been run down with colds (and I’ve had bad anxiety) for the last two weeks, so I bought a few soups from the supermarket for easy lunches. Yes, normally I would make them and they would be zero waste but at the moment that’s just not something I’m capable of doing, and that’s okay. I’m doing my best for our current situation.

I would definitely recommend the slow living lifestyle and I’m so glad I found it years before I had children. The push to be out and about doing something big and photogenic with your children every day is crazy. Taking a slower and more seasonal path means I get to spend lots of time outside with my children, moving at their pace and letting them point out the many things I would have missed. I’ve learnt that if I take it slowly with them we can really connect, and not only do they not mind doing the same things over and over again, they love it!

If you’ve read a few of our blog posts you’ll see that we are now trying to document this journey to try and encourage others to give it a try. Living sustainably, shopping small and locally when possible, slowing down to enjoy the seasons and what they have to offer, and finding peace in a slower routine has been a huge benefit to my physical and mental health.

However, if I’m honest, the fun of documenting it has been taken away slightly by trying to promote our lifestyle and blog on Instagram. We chose it as our main platform (after the blog) as it’s very visual which is how we work best, the issue I have with it is that everything is about being first, even in seasonal living. The first photo and chat I saw about autumn and slowing down for autumn and cooler weather appeared at the end of August! By the first of September, everyone was posting about autumn and autumn leaves and pumpkins, completely missing off the end of the summer. I found this such a shame as the end of summer with its golden light and harvested fields make it one of the most beautiful times of the year.

We are going to continue documenting our journey for ourselves and also as something to share with the children when they are older. We aren’t completely giving up on Instagram, we have both found wonderful accounts and individuals through the app, but we are giving up on the hashtag competitions and the ‘need’ to post daily. Instead, we are focusing our energy on ourselves, our lives and finding new ways to connect with like-minded individuals. If anyone should stumble upon our articles and find them useful then that will be an extra bonus!

But buying things to ‘look’ seasonal, and posting seasonal content weeks before the correct time, totally takes away from our life goals and the message we are trying to share.

Happy autumn friends,

Livvy and Summer