Family Movie Night (and a Giveaway)
As you can imagine, this summer has been a little on the chaotic side for our family. Between flying straight to Vegas from vacation in the Outer Banks, to three weeks living with Bart’s sister, then six weeks with my parents, and now six weeks in Arizona, it’s definitely had a touch of the crazy.
Bart and I have made major efforts to keep the girls’ lives as calm and regular as possible during this time so that they don’t feel totally unmoored. They have regular nap and quiet times every afternoon, and they are in bed at 7 on the dot pretty much every night. We go to church on Sunday, visit the library and IKEA weekly, and have regular meals as a family.
And we also reinstated Friday Movie Nights once we were all back in the same house.
In my usual fashion, we’ve kept things very simple. I know myself well enough to realize that if I make it complicated, I’ll just quit, so it’s pretty streamlined.
We have (homemade) pizza for dinner, and then we have (not homemade) ice cream while we watch our movie.
Just before seven, we pause the movie, get both girls completely ready for bed and put Ani down. Then we finish the movie with Ella and she goes immediately to bed once the movie is finished (since she basically never stays up late, even by 7:45, she’s usually asking “how long until this movie is done?”).
Sometimes, if I’m feeling very nice (or I want to get things rolling earlier), we’ll let the girls eat on a picnic blanket and start the movie during dinner instead of waiting until after.
. . . a Poloraid camera with film, and a puzzle, a bottle, a book, a changing pad and the biggest box of styrofoam peanuts you’ve ever seen.
Pampers is giving away another identical gift basket with all those goodies to one reader. Yippee! (Also, save the box and peanuts – my girls have been playing in it daily for two weeks. We may be a little starved for toys around here).
Watching Alice in Wonderland with my niece when it's my turn to babysit. It's our movie.
While dinner is being cooked, the parent that is not cooking dinner that night sits and reads to our daughter the entire time. She loves her reading time so much.
Jealous that you have IKEA. We don't have those in Nebraska. Booo!!
I love your daughter's red hair. My youngest has bright red hair and I love it. 🙂
We've been doing Friday night movies for well over a year, and that works out excellent. I make the kids popcorn and fruit for dinner (and sometimes yogurt, and occasionally something more but popcorn usually is good for everyone) and the kids eat on the floor with their floor pillows. This week we're doing Who Framed Roger Rabbit before it disappears from Netflix.
I love our nighttime routine because I get to read to my kids. I love that they enjoy reading books so much!
demureprincess7(at)gmail(dot)com
Weekly field trips all summer long! They're the best.
What a great giveaway! I love getting to have lunch with my husband most weekdays (working at the same university definitely has its benefits). I'm really enjoying reading about everyone else's routines, and must admit I will be stealing some of these ideas to try for ourselves. We are excitedly anticipating the start of new family routines when our little girl finally joins us next month–there's some great inspiration here! =)
I love walking to school in the morning as a family.
My fave routine is a weekly library trip- I'm sure you can relate
Um best giveaway ever! Also you do movie night way better than me, I'm taking notes 🙂
Can't wait to have movie nights with my family! Also, thank you for such an awesome giveaway!
we love stories before bed! Would LOVE to win this giveaway 🙂
Breakfast tacos and Mexican Coke on Sundays. The best!
One of our favorite routines is reading together before bed!
And M&Ms sprinkled in the popcorn bowl for movie night.
That is awesome!
Saturday morning Costco with Grandma and cousins!
Ty, who it is safe to say has almost zero culinary talents, makes waffles every Sunday morning with Tal. They are sometimes… not that great, but it's the sweetest tradition.
Coffee and snuggles in bed on weekends!
Friday night was always our pizza/family night as well growing up. Those were the days when I thought a can of grape soda was second to none. 🙂
i like our family game nights