Three Things : Weekdays + Creative Family Giveaway

I have thirteen children. We love to read aloud as a family. One of my favorite parts of being a mother is introducing my children to good books and good music. Three of our children are adopted from West Africa, and drumming has taken a central roll in our family. I just had the oppurnunity to introduce my African children to Van Morrison and the Chieftians. They immediately grabbed our drums, and joined it. What fun!

We love to do pizza and game night. It is such a great way for us to unplug, eliminate distractions and reconnect...something we should do much much more often.

This might be silly, but I absolutely love car rides with my family, and the longer the better - I always have. In the car, it's just us, no distractions like the computer or other friends. We always talk about our days or our weeks, or we play games together. I read Harry Potter outloud to my sisters on our way to South Dakota several years ago. My mom always saves the best snacks for road trips - homemade Chex mix and pull-apart Twizzlers!
Thanks for the inspiration Ali, I might go make a page about this!! =)

my favorite thing to do as a family is playing outside together. it could be on the playground, on a walk, just in our yard - being outdoors enjoying each other's company is the best!
ps. what an awesome book - i would love a copy! :)

We have two young boys, ages 2 and 5. Our favorite things to do together as a family include putting on music and dancing, reading books, playing games/puzzles, or just getting outside to play or go for a bike ride. It's so cute (and sometimes hilarious) to hear what the kids have to say. Never a dull moment!

Our best times as a family is in the van on a road trip. We talk and share and laugh and tell stories with no interruptions. It's wonderful!
I will bring along the journal books I kept for each of my three kid and I will read from those books and we laugh and laugh.
My kids are all grown now, but we will still drive a couple hours to go out to eat, because the best part is the bonding and reconnecting that takes place on our way to dinner.

Hi, Ali - we love to just spend time in the backyard as a family. We have a 4 yr old daughter who loves to play outside and we play frisbee, ride bikes, swing or have tea parties (even Dad!) Elizabeth has a great imagination and we love to foster that! Thanks for being a great inspiration!
Martha

Life is busy with an 8 month old, so my favorite times are when we get to slow down and just watch him explore and learn about his world. He just started crawling on Mother's Day so we spend time just following him around and introducing him to all of the new things he's seeing (and trying to keep him away from the cat, poor kitty).

We go on family bike rides. The little one is in a seat behind my bike and the other three kiddos try to keep up with their daddy on their little bikes. We love enjoying the fresh air together.

I am so glad you re-posted this book. I was hoping to grab a copy - but had lost the title. Creativity is something I hope to inspire in not only my children but others as well. Being creative is a gift - not something that everyone has - I am finding out. My girls are 6 and 4 and they make Daddy scrapbook pages for his book. LOL. So thoughtful and already adding ribbons to pages (just from watching me). Funny how much they truly absorb.

Oh, I would love some ideas on how to keep my little ones busy on a rainy day. The products you showcased today are all great.

Our favorite thing right now is long bike rides with our 3 boys (8 -10 miles). It's a healthy tradition!

we love to go on long walks and go to the park. Everyone is just busy having fun and enjoying each other with no distractions.

I love to sit down to supper with my family-when we think of it, we play 'good thing, bad thing' and talk about the best and worst parts of our day. It is a good way for the kids to share with us, and even the littlest one can participate.

Almost every night after dinner we have a family Bible study. It began when our oldest was just 3 years old. He is now 19 and we still continue. All of us have learned so much. Each night a different family member then prays out loud a pray that goes with the Bible reading. Then that family member gets compliments like, "I like when you..." Even after all these years we still like the compliments!

One of our favorite things to do is go to the bookstore and spend hours looking around and learning. We also enjoy taking walks around the lake in our neighborhood.

I dont have children yet, but I love when we just decide stay cozy at home and watch a movie together.

My family loves to be outside. Playing in the backyard, riding bikes, taking walks, or spending time on the lake on our boat. We are outdoorsy people.

fav family things:
*roasting smore's around the fire pit
*playing croquette in the backyard
*watching lion, witch and the wardrobe for the 100th time
*making pancakes
*eating breakfast on the patio
...we have lots of family fav's...

I just put this book on my Amazon wish list. My favorite thing to do with my children is coloring on the sidewalk with chalk, going on walks, and doing little projects, whether it be drawing, painting, or gluing stuff to construction paper. :O)

Hi Ali-
My favourite thing to do as a family is be outside! Especially go on walks...the longer the better. It is the perfect time to have a long chat about everything and anything...love to communicate!
My husband and i are trying to have a family of our own...and the summers down here are perfect for long family walks! Can't wait to begin our family and share everything we love with our little one!
Thank you for all of your inspirational stories and quotes...love reading what you have to say!

We love to sit and play games or draw together. While we play or draw we try to encourage as much conversation as possible. We try to only talk a little and mainly listen to what they have to say. The kids also love family movie night- big comfy sofa, snacks and a good movie makes for one fun night!
Mary G

I love anything date/calendar related too!
We have a couple favorite family activities. The most important is sitting down to dinner together, talking about our days, my DS has the most interesting stories!
One is gardening, we are lucky that we can do something outside most of the year here in Florida, just spending the time outside working on something we all love is great and it's a great time to just talk with no distractions.
Another is playing games, my 5 year old just loves when we all play his games together, candyland, guess who, monopoly jr. and his backyardigans game.
And one of our favorites is going on trail rides, exploring nature and the beauty of it on our four wheelers, we have such a great time on those weekends.
We are just now getting to do these things as a family now that my DH is back from being deployed, right now it's just great to do anything together! But one thing i made sure of when my DH was gone was doing some of those things with my DS, we did alot of craft things together too which he loved and i did even more!
Thanks for the giveaway!

May be there're lots of things, but each time I look at the photos of our 15 days of holidays in Mallorca (every year we spend summer holidays there )I realize that is the best and great thing we do and the best time we spend together in all the year.

What a great book. Our favorite things to do as a family are just simple things like eat dinner together, cuddle and watch a movie together, play together, and even do work around the house and yard together. It is the simple moments that happen while doing these things that help build a stronger bond among family members and are the most memorable.