Write a Story Together - Fun Stuff To Do Anywhere

Write a Story Together - Fun Stuff To Do Anywhere

Now, I'm not talking about a serious literary attempt here. This is about writing a silly, possibly completely non-nonsensical story. You can do it with just you and your child, or a while group. It can be great for a long car trip. Still, it can be fun if one participant is willing to write the story down as it is created, so it can be enjoyed in it's goofy completeness later on.

Someone begins the story, but only says the first line. Another person makes up the next line - and so on. There should be no discussion ahead of time about plot or what sort of story you think you're going to tell. The first person will have one idea of what the story is that they are telling, but the others will have different ideas, and take the story in different fun and nutty directions. Every takes several turns until the group as a whole agrees the story is done. Usually someone will have to make an effort to bring it to a close.

To go just one more silly step further, limit each person to three words each.

We have also done a group story where each person wrote out their contribution, and we didn't limit the space they had, but everyone only got one turn. It didn't go as off course and silly as keeping each turn shorter, but it was still very fun, and we had a neat souvenir of our family get together at the end.

Storytime at Your Library - Fun Stuff to do Anywhere

Storytime at Your Library – Fun Stuff to Do Anywhere

Most libraries offer a storytime for young children. All the libraries that we have lived near offered three different storytimes, one for babies, one for toddlers, and one for preschoolers. We have also visited other libraries that only offer one storytime for all ages together. Several times, I have seen evening storytime hours for the whole family, although we haven’t had a chance to attend one of these yet.

Regularly attending library storytimes has benefited both my children and me in a number of ways. When I was a new mom, with no friends who had babies, library storytime is how we made connections with other families with new children close in age. Some of the friends we made there, have remained lifelong friends to this day, over 9 years later.

It also established what I consider a very healthy habit of regular visits to the library. The kids love to pick out a book or two (or six) to bring home. I got into the habit of checking out parenting books that I had heard about without spending a lot of money. One or two were useful enough to me to buy my own copy of, but without the library, I would have given up before I found them.

While libraries don’t usually offer storytimes for school aged children or teens, they do have a lot of other programs for the older kids too. Some have book clubs, movie afternoons, read-to-dog programs, or other regular activities for older kids and teens. And, the programs are all free. Check out what your local library has to offer. Most libraries post their offerings online at their websites.