Woodland Retreat

We held a wonderful and blissful relaxing time in the Treetops woodlands last weekend, a day retreat with tutor Laura Routh-Parsons.

Laura used to hold Yoga and Meditation classes here at Treetops about four years ago, so it's been wonderful to welcome her back.

We started with a lovely calming meditation listening to Laura's gorgeous voice and the nearby birds and breeze through the trees.

We then added bits and pieces we'd brought from home to add to Laura's beautiful and colourful nature mandala, which created a lovely centre piece to our gathering.

Enjoying some gentle movement and simple yoga poses we got our bodies moving, worked on some breathwork/pranayama, which on this Retreat was Breath of Fire, this is really good for balancing and strengthening your sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems, increases your resistance to stress, boosts brain function and gives you a general feeling of wellbeing, especially with regular practice. 

We took a break for some flapjacks and elderflower cordial.

Laura then held a beautiful sound session as we lay on the soft woodland floor, either looking up at the canopy of beech leaves and blue sky or with our eyes closed covered with an eye mask, wrapped up cosily in blankets with supportive cushions.

Using crystal bowls, chimes and bells, it was so beautiful mixed in with the sounds of nature, it was just the perfect spot to be.

We moved across the woods to the fire pit to enjoy a delicious lunch and chat.

We had a lentil and nettle daal, made with nettles foraged from the edge of the woodland that morning, served alongside warmed naan bread.

My little outdoor kitchen set up on the treehouse platform!

Pudding was a lemon drizzle cake infused with homemade elderflower and rose cordial.

Finished and packed up mid afternoon, leaving no trace apart from flower petals and footprints.

Join us back in the Treetops woods for our next Woodland Retreat on Sunday 17 September.

10am - 3pm

£65

Relax and Restore

Make time for you; peace, relaxation and the perfect place to just get away from it all.

Some recent comments:

A huge thank you for the beautiful woodland retreat on Sunday. Oh my goodness, I enjoyed it so much! Everything was lovely, including the food (of course!) as always.

Thank you for a wonderful few hours, can't wait to return

Such a wonderful day!

Retreat Day - Forest Bathing

It's been really busy with classes at Treetops this term, so it was lovely on Saturday to have one of our Relax & Restore Retreat days with Laura.

What a beautiful autumnal day it was too!

Our theme for the day was Forest Bathing

Forest Bathing (aka Shinrin-Yoku) is letting nature into your body through all five senses, the woodland and grounds at Treetops are just perfect for this.

In the morning Laura led some grounding Yoga indoors, followed by a delicious and nutritious lunch.

Lunch was inspired by Deliciously Ella's new book

After lunch we had our Wellbeing session where we talked about the benefits of being outside, especially as we head into Winter, how being amongst the trees and nature is so good for our blood pressure, stress levels, immune functions, helping our minds and bodies relax.  Just 15 minutes has proven benefits.

The book below "The Nature Fix: by Florence Williams, is brilliant and I really recommend it.

We headed outside into the woods and Laura led a gentle meditation, listening to the trees and the birds (and the falling acorns landing around us!)

Everyone had some quiet time to wander and collect some autumnal treasures

In the afternoon we made our own Smudge Sticks

Smudging is the ancient practice of burning herbs for spiritual cleansing and purification.

We had lavender, rosemary and rose petals from the garden

Sage and a variety of acorns, sticks and leaves from the woods.

You tie them together with string and wrap them tightly together, leave them to dry upside down for a week or two.  You then light the smudge stick and allow it to smoulder in a dish.

The benefits include improved mental focus (thanks to the rosemary) an increase to your wellbeing, improves sleep (lavender) increases energy, clears negative energy and the air around you.

We finished the Retreat with some meditative candle-gazing and amazing sound therapy under snuggly duvets and warmed eye pillows.  Bliss!

This was our last Retreat Day for 2018 but if you would like to join us in 2019, please send me an email.  Gift Vouchers are now available for Christmas Gifts

June's Relax & Restore Retreat Day

We had a great day on Saturday at our Relax & Restore Retreat Day, a lovely group joined Laura and I for a day of wellbeing and relaxation.

We started outside, it was warm and peaceful as Laura led a gentle yoga flow.

Our theme for the day was Bee You, so our lunch was delicious and nutritious with Laura's 'fresh from the hive' honey used in our dressings and as a drizzle.

We enjoyed warm Persian Lentils with Honeyed Roasted Veg

A yummy baked feta with thyme, figs and honey

A green salad with edible herbs & flowers that was served with a honey, mustard and thyme dressing.

And a very summer pud, home made meringues, baked peaches in basil and honey, served with dairy free vanilla ice cream.

Laura took the group down to the woods after lunch for some meditation and breathwork, it was really relaxing and they were surrounded by birdsong.

Once back at Treetops, I led a Wellbeing and Creative session which was all about the health and body benefits of honey.

We made some honey and lavender bath melts along with some oats, sugar and honey scrub.  Perfect things to take home and carry on the relaxation.

At the end of our day Laura took a calming yoga nidra and sound meditation session, with everyone under their duvets and warmed eye pillows.

It was a perfect end to an idyllic day.

* Laura *

Our next Retreat Day is on Saturday 11 August 2018

To book now, please email me.

Relax & Restore Retreat March

On Saturday we held another Relax & Restore Retreat Day with Laura from The Wellbeing Feeling.

It was a lovely relaxing day and great fun.

We started the morning with a gentle flow yoga session and meditation.

Followed by a delicious lunch.

The theme of the retreat was "Sowing the Seed", whether quite literally sowing seeds, eating seeds and psychologically planting seeds of thought etc

Seeds have many dietary benefits, and are great added to our cereal in the morning, our salads at lunchtime, our cakes and bakes at tea time, and our casseroles and pies.

I made a vegetarian cottage pie, very vibrant thanks to the beetroot!

recipe here 

With a winter slaw salad, with an extra sprinkling of seeds and a tahini dressing.

After lunch Laura took everyone into the woods for a mindfulness walk, some meditation and lots of chat!

And they returned to sowing seeds, which was fun, coir pots and interesting seed mixes.

And after all that exhausting work (!) it was time for relaxation and a good lie down.

Finishing with a wonderful Yoga Nidra session

(More than one person fell asleep!)

If you would like to join us on our next Retreat Day, we are holding one on Saturday 5 May.

11:30am - 4:30pm

£75

Namaste