We are a pretty tight family. I don’t mean “tight” like “cool” or “totes awesome.” I mean “tight” like “we spend a lot of time together.” I sense it won’t always be this way. The children will inevitably grow up and have a say in what we do together. Maybe they’ll grow up a little and realize that I’m a weirdy, but until they do, I’m obliged to make them spend time with each other and with me and with their Daddy.
The problem I’m having is this: we watch too many movies. I can’t say that we watch too much TV because we don’t have cable or satellite or anything like unto it. But DVDs? We have so many of those that it doesn’t matter. Basically, that’s how we spend the majority of our time together. We watch DVDs.
I want to branch out more. I mean, I do more than just watch TV with my kids. I teach preschool to my kids from home and we do ALL sorts of fun stuff together! We mix play dough colored red and yellow together and make orange. We make slime out of cornstarch, water, and baking soda. We make recycled crayons and we stretch and we read books! Yesterday we didn’t have preschool, but we raked leaves and played with the neighbor’s dog and made cookies and took a trip to the gas station for a treat.
BUT Dad’s not here for those things. And by the time Dad IS here, Mom’s too exhausted to do anything but cook dinner for us to eat together and then pick a movie for us all to watch after family prayers.
I want ideas. I want your ideas.
What do you do as an entire family unit? My husband wants us all to spend the day together tomorrow, bonding.
He has his own ideas for us. He wants me to make a picnic lunch, which I’m happy to do. But then what?
Hit me with your best shot. My creativity is tired.
You could watch a movie….or something….or whatever. :)
J/k. I have some friends here that will go on a walk and choose 1 or 2 colors to take pictures of. They call it their “red and yellow walk” or their “purple” walk and they will walk around town looking for those colors and taking pictures along the way. I don’t know how exciting that would be for your kids, but it’s an idea. :)
You can use a digital camera to “make a movie”. On your computer you probably have a program called windows movie maker (or something like that) and you can put video or pictures with music, words, etc. and make a fun movie.
You can come to Salt Lake City?? Please? :) That’s all the ideas I can think of for now. If I think of more I will let you know.
Oh the possibilities! We love board games, or a pick up ‘game’ of softball. I know that yours are smaller than mine though. I love the idea of a color walk, we have never done that before. We love to go to the park together. We love to work together too lol.
Did you ask your kids what they would choose to do?
A color walk! That’s a great idea! I think we might have to do that. It’s so hard trying to find things to do inside because it’s SO COLD outside, but we could do a color drive. The kids would love that just as much.
And yes, we would love to come to Salt Lake, just as soon as we can!
Amanda, I have asked the kids. They want to make doughnuts. We just made “sugardoodles” (that’s what lacy calls “snickerdoodles”) yesterday so I told her no doughnuts today. Or tomorrow. Or until the sugardoodles are gone. The kids are still too little to play any kind of sport with. I kicked a soccer ball to trent twice yesterday and then he lost interest, haha! They both love going to the library, so we may do that. And they both love ice cream, so we’ll probably get them some.
Thanks for the ideas, you guys! Keep them coming!!!!
I just thought of something else since you are always taking and posting pics and your kids are so little….why don’t you guys take a day and ‘make the alphabet’ with your bodies kinda like sesame street used to do and take pics of each letter and then make them into a book?
We did scavenger hunts – find something yellow! Find something square!
Dance parties are fun.
But, you know… I mostly rest when my husband is home. He can wrestle and entertain the kids.