With the busyness of life and our culture that never seems to slow down, we have to schedule in intentional family time. As kids get older they have their own ideas as to how they want to spend their time so as parents we need to coordinate and plan to make sure we aren’t missing the moments of connection with our families. Even as a family who is always home together (at home mom, (mostly) work at home dad and homeschooled kids…wow that’s a lot of “home” 😉 ), we still have to make an intentional effort in order to be together and to create memories together outside of our daily life activities. Here are a few fun ways we love to connect as a family:
Favorite Food & Movie Night
For our family, it’s a weekly pizza & a movie night! Pizza is our favorite so we rotate pizza joints and pick a new movie each week to watch with our girls. Sometimes they get to pick the movie and sometimes we pull out the favorites that we grew up on (The recent favorite we introduced them to was Father of the Bride and they loved it!) This gives me a break from cooking and gives our whole family an opportunity to just relax and enjoy. It’s a sweet time for my husband and I to reminisce on movies we grew up watching with our own families. Our girls look forward to “Pizza Movie Night” because we’ve made it a weekly tradition and it’s a time for us all to be together.
Family Slumber Parties
Once in awhile we will do a big slumber party in the living room. Our girls get to stay up late and we watch movies, have popcorn and snuggle in for the night. They get so excited to pull out all the blankets and make their beds exactly how they want them!
Game Days
As our girls have gotten a little bit older, playing games have gone from a little stressful to really fun! This is especially fun on rainy days or in the winter when we had really cold days. We pull out some snacks and a bunch of games and spend time rotating through everyone’s choice of game! Once again, it’s a fun way for us to introduce our girls to games we grew up playing and a great way to connect without the distraction of screens.
Nature Hikes / Walks
We love getting outside as a family! As much as we can, I try to get us out and moving whenever the weather allows. Whenever we have a chance to be outside we never regret it! Fresh air does wonders for us and it’s a great way to experience God’s creation together! Discovering new hiking areas is a fun way to keep it fresh and new!
Road trips
Nothing connects family like a good, old-fashioned road trip! Am I right?! We’ve loved the road trips we have taken. Besides the never ending question, “Are we there yet?” we love to drive through different states and the anticipation of our vacation spot is always so exciting! There is always such a sense of accomplishment when we’ve arrived and on our way home we are always talking about the next place we want to road trip to!
Share with me some of the ways that you love to connect with your family and how you make intentional time together!
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