Flora has been loving her Mud and Bloom subscription boxes this year. Each month has brought new seeds to sow and interesting facts to learn. And some wonderfully creative activities that have been perfect for spending some much needed mum-and-daughter time together. After last month’s bottle decorating and nature paintbrushes, she was really keen to see what delights August’s box had in store.
Mud and Bloom
For those of you who are new to my blog (hello 🙂) Mud and Bloom offer monthly subscription boxes for kids for £7.95 including P&P. The letterbox-sized kits have both gardening and nature craft seasonal activities with full instructions and kits, quizzes, and games. They’re designed to follow the EYFS, KS1 and KS2 national curriculum (ages 3 – 8) and are brilliant fun too. You can check out my previous Mud and Bloom reviews here if you’re curious about earlier boxes.
August’s box
Here’s what was inside August’s box:
- instructions for growing herbs – chives, coriander, parsley (organic seeds and compost pellets provided)
- some butterfly body drawings, glue, plus instructions on how to make petal pictures
- some wool, ribbon, metal hooks, plus instructions on how to make a twig frame
- a fact sheet and what caterpillars to look out for
- and a quiz.
Herb garden
I love using fresh herbs in cooking so we were very excited to see some chive, coriander, and parsley seeds in our box.
As it happens, I already had a trio of metal pots with their own tray, which was perfect for our trio of herbs. Rather than use the compost pellets, we planted the seeds directly into three plastic pots with fresh compost. Now we just need to keep them watered and our fingers crossed.
And just look at last month’s radishes and lettuces. Salad for tea tonight, nom, nom, nom!
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Butterfly petal pictures and twig picture frame
With a caterpillar theme this month, the butterfly petal pictures plus a natural twig frame were just perfect. And how cute are those three pre-drawn butterfly bodies?
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Flora collected lots of petals from my cutting beds and we settled down to work. We decided to do one picture each and then dry and press some petals for the third (which wasn’t ready in time for this review).
And rather than twigs, she thought some dried out (OK, dead) allium stems would make a better frame. Although they were a challenge to work with, being super brittle, I think she was right. The frame is delicate and subtle, to match the pretty butterflies.
We decided to display our two pictures back to back so we can hang her artwork one day and mine another day.
Honestly, this was so much fun to do. I know the petals will dry out really fast and won’t look as vibrant the day after but that’s not really the point of the activity. It’s about using symmetry, shapes and colour. And it’s a lovely way to spend a few hours, outside, in the fresh air, getting creative.
Caterpillars spotting and quiz
Out of the five caterpillars to look out for this month, Flora thinks she’s seen three of them: Peacock Butterfly, Tiger Moth, and Cabbage White. The Emperor Moth and Cinnabar Moth crawlers have been elusive so far this year.
Still on the creepy crawlies front, we’ve seen plenty of flying ants on our lawn (yuck), a few grasshoppers, and lots of gorgeous dragonflies darting over our ponds. And we did chuckle when we found out that the Tiger Moth caterpillar is also known as the Woolly Bear due to its fuzzy tufts of hair!
Final thoughts
We loved the activities in this box, they were so creative and colourful. And although it will be a while before we can harvest any herbs, they look very fetching on our kitchen window ledge (next to Flora’s carnivorous plants, haha). Thank you, Anja, another fabulous box, we’re already excited to see what will be coming our way in September!
Yay!! I’m always excited to see what’s in your Mud & Bloom box, Lisa! The butterfly petals activity looked really enjoyable and very effective too. I love how you & Flora had mum and daughter time whilst getting colourful & creative in the garden. The natural twig frames are perfect for the artwork too, both of your butterflies look really pretty. Oh wow, look at your radishes and lettuces! I am impressed! I’m pleased to say mine are still alive but they still have a long way to go before they end up on my plate, ha ha! Lovely review, looking forward to see Septembers box now <3 xx
Thank you, Bexa! I thought of you while we were creating our butterfly pictures, I know it’s something you’d be really good at! I’m sure you’ll be harvesting your radishes and lettuce soon, now that the weather isn’t so warm it will give things a better chance to grow 🙂 xx
This sounds like a great box. My son loves seeing parcels in the mail for him, an activity box would be so much fun.
Jennifer
I’m sure he’d love this one – the company has just started shipping to Europe so they might ship to you too! x
This is so cute! So creative and very educational too! I would love this for myself really! I love the whole concept and simply how pretty it all is!
Jessica & James
It’s so much fun to do, the fact that the boxes are educational too is the huge bonus! x
This is so lovely, what a fun and creative thing to do together! I love the art you guys have created! These Mud & Bloom boxes are so lovely, I really look forward to seeing these posts each month!
Hels xx
Ah, thank you, Hels. We really did love this month’s activity, it was so much fun, and the right time of year for collecting lots of colourful flowers too! xx
This looks like such a fun box! I wonder if we have anything like it in the USA?
They are brilliant boxes! The company has just started shipping to Europe so you might be in luck, she might ship to the USA soon too! x
These boxes are so cute! They are such a fun and easy way to teach children about nature. I would’ve loved the butterfly petal picture when I was little!
Eve | http://www.evemorganinteriors.com
They really are fun to do – TBH Flora already knows quite a bit about nature from our garden but it’s so lovely to have something like this to do together! x
I say it every month, but I really wish there had been something like this around when I was younger because it looks like so much fun to do together ? I used to love growing herbs, although I admittedly hated the taste of everything and always forgot to water them, but I would’ve loved the butterfly petal pictures for sure.. ?
Ah, watering, that’s something that Flora does need a little reminding about but we’ll get there! These boxes are so much fun though, I love how creative they are, we always look forward to them! x
I love the idea of art and craft subscription boxes!! But what I love more is that you’ve showed what you did with all of them instead of going with an unboxing post, which are great in their own right but with craft supplies you have to see what they turned into!
Aw, thank you so much, what a lovely comment! TBH, I’m too chicken for a YouTube video but I know what you mean 🙂 xx
This looks like a fun, creative way to keep kids entertained! I don’t have kids but I think my little sisters would love something like this
Emily x
I’m sure they would – I’m a big kid and I love Flora’s boxes too, haha! x
What an awesome box! Being outdoors and in tune with nature can be hard when everything is on our phones, but I like that this box is so creative, and has a lot of different activities to enjoy outside.
Thank you, Lupe, we do love these boxes, it’s such a fun way to get outside and spend time with each other 🙂 xx
These boxes look brilliant! They’re the sort of thing I’d have loved as a child. I love anything to do with nature and gardening. I especially like the seeds to grow your own herbs. And I’ve found a few odd looking caterpillars in our garden this year, which I’ve never seen before. Love these posts Lisa x
Oooh, the caterpillars sound interesting! Honestly, Joy, we love these boxes so much, they are such good value and I think this month’s creative activity was our favourite so far 🙂 xx
That looks like a really great craft box, my sister would probably really love something like that, it sounds perfect for a gift, the butterfly petal photos look really great! Xx
They are such fun to do and the bonus is you learn stuff too – thank you so much, we’re very proud of our petal artwork! xx
I LOVE seeing what you’re going to be growing this month when you review these boxes. It makes my inner foodie very happy. Whenever you talk about growing vegetables, I read in admiration, knowing that this is probably something I’ll never manage. BUT I think a herb garden is actually something I could manage to maintain and not kill off. It’s great to see Flora enjoying the activities too. Your butterflies look really pretty! x
Sophie
http://www.glowsteady.co.uk
Actually herbs are not that easy (well, I think so anyway!) but a lot of the vegetables we’ve been growing this year are new to me, eg beetroot, pumpkins. So it’s not just Flora who’s learning from her boxes! Thank you ? xx
I love the whole idea of Mud and Bloom! PRetty cool that you get all of the essentials mailed to you, without wasting additional resources. Oh man, your radishes GREW! It’s so cool to see the progress of your plants. Glad you enjoyed this month’s box as well!
Nancy ♥
They are fab boxes, I can’t recommend them highly enough! And yes, it’s so good that you don’t need a garden to enjoy the activities – although if you do then it’s obviously helpful, as our radishes will testify, haha! xx
This Mud and bloom box of yours is so exciting. The activities are so interesting and the best part is planting new seeds and to see the previous months plantation ready. The art work is lovely. Both you and Flora have done a wonderful job. 🙂
Via | http://glossnglitters.com
Aw, thank you, Via, what a lovely thing to say. It was so exciting to be able to harvest last month’s sowings and we loved making our petal pictures. They’re such great boxes! X
These boxes are so cute and I’ve already found myself recommending them to other people just from having seen them on other peoples blogs. Flora’s butterfly picture is just lovely (as is yours too, of course!) The twig framing is such a great idea.
Ah, that’s amazing that you’ve recommended them to others, thank you! And thank you so much for your lovely comments too, we had so much fun with our activities this month 🙂 x
This month’s box looks amazing! I really like the idea of the butterfly petal pictures 🙂 I think I may try my own version with Leon, I’m sure he would enjoy this as an activity. I can’t wait to see how the herbs turn out, I always remember my gran having loads in the kitchen when I was little, we don’t have them anymore but you’ve put it in my mind again so I’ll have to get some for us to grow.
Jordanne || Thelifeofaglasgowgirl.co.uk
Honestly, the butterfly art was so much fun, we loved the whole thing from choosing petals, laying them out, and the final versions. Fingers crossed for our herbs, I adore coriander ?? xx