You Tell Me: Frugal Family Fun
One of my goals this year is to set aside more “family days” for my family. Now that our schedule is back under control, we need to start doing more things together. I feel like my kids, my husband, and I have really gotten more out of touch with each other than I’m comfortable with. It’s not surprising why. For a couple of months, I think we were just doing what we needed to do to survive our crazy schedule.
But now that things have settled down, we need to focus on strengthening our family bonds again. And I really believe family “dates”, so to speak, do wonders for creating the kinds of memories that strengthen family relationships. Here are a few of our favorite frugal family activities.
Bowling. My family loves to go bowling. Except for my husband, we’re all pretty terrible at it. For a couple of bucks each, we can play one game, and the memories of laughing after I hurl a too-heavy bowling ball down the bowling lane last a long, long time.
Movie night. Another favorite activity is to rent a movie, pop some popcorn, and veg in front of the TV together. It’s possible to rent a movie for $1.99 at our local grocery store. I can’t get a new release for that price, but I can pick up an old favorite that I know our family will enjoy. My kids like anything that involves animals and lots of laughs. The Shaggy Dog, Air Bud, and Homeward Bound are all well loved at our house.
Walking to the park. This one is for semi-warm sunny days only. When we don’t want to spend any money, we let the kids grab their scooters, and they scoot down to the park while Jim and I struggle to keep up. It’s great exercise and lots of fun.
Those are some of my favorite frugal family activities. What are yours?
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By Lynnae McCoy, on Jan 25, 2008
I'm Lynnae, wife of one and stay-at-home mom of two. I'm committed to getting out of debt by being frugal with my choices in life.
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All of the above are very frugal. I’d also say going out to dessert (like ice cream, or regular dessert if you prefer) or coffee (the kids can get a donut) are relatively cheap outings but that are special enough to get excited about.
I don’t know if there is one in your area, but Redbox allows you to rent movies for $1.00 overnight. You have to return it the next day, but it’s still a good deal. :)
If you like it, try iceskating too, lots of fun ^-^
Our favorites are trips to the beach (we’re 5 minutes from one so that’s easy for us), to the park for an afternoon picnic and kite flying, and out for coffee for hubby and I while the kids nibble on samples or get ice cream.
We often play games together–the kids and I play board games (their new favorite is Boggle), their daddy plays video games with them. We also read aloud together and walk around the mall (not shopping just walking) together. Our local library has a ton of movies–the kids are free and the adults are $1 for 3 nights. We have also tried Redbox (you get a free rental for your first).
We have a local zoo, it is very small, but still has a big range of animals. Once a month they have a half off day for residents day, all you have to do is show your drivers license and the adult admission drops to 6$ and kids under 12 are free. So for 12$ we can all go to the zoo! The kids love the animals and never seem to tire of visiting.
Bowling sounds like fun, but we are so far away from a bowling alley, the drive time and fuel cost would be a waste. So, we never get to go.
Take Care
LJ
Nice tips. Our favorite is the family game night where we let the kids pick the board or card game and we all sit down and play together, always fun!
I LOVE bowling as a frugal alternative. When my fiance and I first started dating, he and I would go bowling all the time. In college, we lived in an economically depressed area where bowling was THE THING to do. For our third anniversary, my fiance bought me a ball, a bag, and shoes – which was a good investment to keep down the cost, because now I don’t have to rent my own shoes.
Bowling = frugal & FUN
I used to love going on picnics with my family when I was young. They were a year round activity, on cold and wet days we would stay in the car, at the beach or wherever, and eat inside. Then bundle up and go for a walk. It was especially fun on bad weather days because we would have the beach to ourselves.
I don’t know about where all of you live, but my local library has all of the new release movies, as well as older titles on DVD for 3 day check out. In order to get the newer releases, you have to put them on hold…but I can handle the hassle for free. Especially with family movies that I’m not sure I want to pay for, it’s a great money saver.
We also like to play board games of all sorts, Blokus is a favorite right now.
I second bowling, the beach, picnics, and board games. As StyckyWycket said, cheap bowling shoes pay for themselves quickly. Picking board games takes some care, because they can be rather expensive if you only play them once.
Card games are another great one. My family has had a lot of fun with big poker nights. Sometimes we play using plastic chips and sometimes we play for treats like hard candies or shelled peanuts.
Another one is going to a bargain movie theater. You know, the ones that show older movies for $2 or something.
Minor league, college, and high school sporting events are relatively cheap and can be just as exciting as major league games if you get into it.
Casual biking, hiking, and fishing can be great as long as you don’t get carried away with fancy equipment.
Lawn sports, like badminton, horseshoes, volleyball, or croquet are fun. Like board games they are expensive if you only use the equipment once or twice.
Spending more time together is great.
On RedBox…sometimes there are coupon codes that can actually get the renatal for free (as long as it is returned in time)!
Nettie – I LOVE the idea of going out to eat and setting a dollar limit! Brilliant!
First of all, I commend you for planning the family time. As a child, we had Family Nights every Tuesday evening. We knew to plan it – it was like church: non-negotiable. Those are some of my best memories. After I was married, I felt terribly left out knowing my family was continuing the tradition without me.
I don’t have kids yet, but by God’s grace, I plan to have those family times with my kids someday. It’s too important.
BTW: once a month, our family went out to eat together on Family Night. I don’t know how we did it, but each of us (4 kids) were given $4 as our limit for food. We could pick anything on the menu as long as it wasn’t over $4. Talk about teaching kids to be frugal! We’d figure out how to get dinner AND dessert out of that four bucks!
We like to go to a mall with a playarea (obviously only fun for families with small kids) and get a treat in the food court, using B1G1 coupons of course! The kids get to play to their heart’s content and my hubby and I can have a mini date. :-)
Also, we live in a small town so we like to walk around downtown and look in all of the shop windows. Then we top it off with a stop at the little corner coffee shop and buy Mommy & Daddy a treat and a scone for the kiddos!
Fishing is a pretty cheap thing that we enjoy. There are plenty of free fishing lakes nearby and bait is very inexpensive.
Funny Story:
On one trip, my 4 year old son asked if we were going to keep the fish, clean them, and eat them. I said sure! He asked if boys like to clean fish. I said of course! Later, while we were cleaning them (it was pretty messy) he looked up at me and said, “Are you SURE boys like to clean fish?”
Heck yes!!! This is my favorite! Puzzles, bike-riding, flashcards….hmmm…uh, crafts, there’s tons of stuff to do!
It can be a lot of fun (and educational) to have a scavenger hunt. Go to a park or wooded area and make a list of items for the kids to find -like a specific type of leaf or flower, a flat rock, an acorn, a pine cone, etc.
Oh too much to share here. I have to blog about it! LOL!!! I also have a Friday’s Fun section on my blog (Just For Fun) where every Friday I try to post some fun frugal family activity. :) I too LOVE the idea of a set budget for those eating out!! GREAT idea!!! Although with inflation, by the time mine are old enough, It will prolly be up to $10 per child. LOL!!
I love all these ideas! My kids are young so the park is always a great idea but we take them hiking, to the beach, and sometimes to museums like the Natural History Museum. This is a great topic–I’ll do a list or post on family fun places in LA on my blog- http://frugalmomla.blogspot.com. The Getty Museum has family days quite often which are popular.