In most nursery and early-years classrooms in the Netherlands you will find a corner set up to celebrate the seasons. In autumn it will be decorated with leaves, nuts and mushrooms, and children are welcome to play with it and decorate it with things they have found in nature. Also I grew up with the concept of ‘the seasonal table’. Not only in the classroom, but at home as well, we had a corner set up with ‘pretty little things’ we had found on forest walks, or made during crafting sessions.

In our house we love to set up a little display as well. As soon as we return from our summer travels and school starts, I go and find the box with autumn decorations and start to set up our little corner. Starting with apples, then after a few weeks leaves, nuts and mushrooms. Going forward to Martinmas, Sinterklaas, advent and Christmas, our seasonal table changes a lot — inspiring us to decorate it with simple craft projects.

The seasonal table doesn’t cost much to set up. Apples we have picked from our tree, pine cones, nuts and conkers we have found in the forest, leaves we pressed in between the pages of a book… There are cardboard mushrooms the children have made in school and we store away carefully year after year. The children look through their Schleich and Ostheimer animals and select relevant woodland creatures and place them in between the leaves. Over the years I have collected a few sweet decorations and felt fairies and invested in the silhouette lamp. (You can buy ready-made inserts, but I have made the ones you see in the photos myself.)

With every change of our seasonal table, I also like to select appropriate books and put them out on our coffee table. Of course, it is also a perfect time of year to go puddle jumping, so having those books ready to cosy up with afterwards (with a hot chocolate or warm tea, of course), is not a bad idea.

xxx Esther