By Kate Hodges
16th February 2022
EVENT AND LEARN SCANDI-LICIOUS
The annual Jorvik Viking Festival is the biggest Viking Festival in Europe. This year, the main festival has been postponed until May, but there’s a huge online event this week, That Jorvik Viking Thing. Enjoy live streamed Viking-themed events such as pot making, poo day and storytelling firmly aimed at kids, watch videos about viking life, learn how to dress, play and eat like a Viking and take a virtual tour around the Jorvik Viking Centre. Axe-cellent for home-ed or just for fun!
EVENTS WHIZZ BANG
Many Welsh schools are on half term this week, so there’s plenty of time to enjoy Cardiff Science Festival. The event takes over the capital’s cafes, libraries, bars and streets with plenty of hidden events. Find out about Cardiff University’s Otter Project, learn about the science behind Lush bath products, try Lego robotics, create your own lava lamp and dissect owl pellets! February 19-22 Free
EVENTS LET IT GLOW
It’s the season for winter light festivals, now more popular than ever. This weekend, the east springs to colourful life at Love Light Norwich. Join a psychedelic bike trip on the Glow Ride, watch Saturday’s Love Procession, dance beneath the Celestial Sound Cloud, make a wish on a neon dandelion clock or see Norwich Cathedral magicked into a kaleidoscopic canvas. Free. Find more about the country’s most spectacular glow-shows – including Derry’s Illuminate, which falls across the next two weekends plus the Outer Hebrides’ Dark Skies festival, where, if you’re lucky, you might glimpse the Northern Lights– here Oh, and don’t miss London’s incredible City Lights show, five pieces that are dazzling the City now!
MAKE BE FAIR
Fair Trade Fortnight runs from February 21, and is a chance to pause and think about the way that products on our shelves are made and arrive in our shops. This year’s event is an online festival – Choose The World You Want – with Zoom and online events, recipes in the Food Tent, and storytelling and film screenings. Plus lots more. It’s a great opportunity to sit down with your kids and discuss how your choice of what to buy can affect the lives of farmers and workers across the world.
EVENT AND DO KINDNESS COUNTS
Random Acts of Kindness Day falls on February 17. Why not use it as a spur to make a stranger smile, to thank someone who might miss out on gratitude, or to make a new friend? Ideas from the gang behind the initiative include picking up rubbish around your neighbourhood, sending an anonymous care package to someone who could use a little encouragement, or to leave a favourite book – complete with explanation of its virtues – in a public place for a stranger to find. Find lesson plans, colouring pages, and join the Kindness movement here
WHAT WE’RE READING Together forever: lessons for lifelong lovers: “After that initial attraction, what keeps a couple together? And as we change and grow over the years, how do we make sure we move in the same direction? Philippa Perry and five other relationship experts on how to keep that loving feeling” Read more here
WHAT WE’RE LISTENING TO The Way We Parent Podcast: Paula Morales McDowell’s honest and candid discussions with a rainbow of parenting experts and everyday parents explore topics such as Untigering with Iris Chen (read an interview with her in this month’s Green Parent magazine), raising happy eaters and unravelling bias. They’re easy-to-digest, thoughtful and insightful hours of wisdom.
Listen here
