A Family Night In With Traditional Toys

Establishing a special family night is a great way to plan fun, quality time with your family. Family fun night should be a simple and fun way for your entire family to share in enjoyable activities together. Get creative and involve food, crafts, and traditional toys in your family fun night for memories that will become a tradition.

If your family doesn't already have a special, planned family night or if your family times have become boring and too routine, try some new ideas that will spark a new interest in family fun. Traditional movie nights can be spiced up with a family dinner that everyone helps prepare. Plan a simple and quick meal, like pizza or sandwiches, and give everyone a job to get it ready. Get the whole family to help prepare snacks and plan an intermission for a bathroom break.

Schedule a variety of family fun events for your weekly family nights. Movie nights can be fun, but other activities allow your family to talk and enjoy one another's company. Try a family game night for an educational and fun time together. Bring out the traditional toys and your family's favorite board games and set up a game table. Traditional toys, like board games and cards, are a great way to teach children good sportsmanship. Team younger children with other family members until they can play alone.

Make one family fun night a construction night. Choose a building project that the whole family will enjoy and clear a wide open space or set up a table. Traditional toys, like blocks and jigsaw puzzles, may be fun for your family. Paper mache creations, craft stick castles, or clay modeling are other fun building activities your family may enjoy. Plan a construction dinner for this family fun night as well. Individual pizzas or make your own subs are a couple meal ideas.

For a family fun night that no one will forget, plan a karaoke night and don't forget to charge the camcorder batteries! Set up a stage area with a microphone or a karaoke machine, or even an traditional toy sing along machine and remember to leave plenty of space for dancing! Turn up the radio and give everyone a turn in the spotlight. Get everyone together for a fun family number as well!

Family craft nights are a fun way to spend time together and build something creative! Plan an easy project for everyone to make on their own, like clothespin reindeer ornaments for the holidays, or learn a new craft together, like needlepoint. Other ideas for family craft night are scrapbooking together, creating a family collage from magazine clippings, or making traditional toys, like rag dolls, for an area toy drive.

Have a backyard campout for one of your summer family fun nights. Set up the tents, cook on the grill, and play with fun, traditional toys, like Frisbees and bubbles. Lounge around the outdoor stove and play some traditional toys and games, like Old Maid or checkers. Camping is one of the best ways to spend quality time with one another and a backyard campout is all the fun with less trouble!

Gary Clay is an authority on Traditional toys, and owner of Traditional toyshop Monkeyshine.