It might be the last thing that your kids would want to do with you, but hanging out with their parents can be a very great way to spend some quality time together. The trick is, if you want to spend more time with your children, you have to make it fun for them, even in the home. This means you have to distract them from the fact they are hanging out with their parents. So, what can you do to ensure that you have a good quality family party in the home environment?
Go Informal
If you've got a spare room, great! By making an entertainment space, you can distract your kids from the fact that they are at home, hanging out with their parents. Making an entertainment room doesn't have to be difficult, all you need to do is to put a little bit of furniture in there, but make sure it's got everything that's infinitely entertaining. Beans bags are a way to make the most of space when you can't afford extra furniture, and there are suppliers like Sack Daddy that can give you different styles and sizes. When you are creating the room, try to make it as informal and as enticing as possible. It's been setting up a games console, the TV, whatever distracts the children from the fact that they are at home.
Do What They Want To Do
It might be completely obvious, but if you want to spend quality time with your kids, and make an event of it, you have to do what they want to do. Now, this is incredibly difficult, because you can't just ask them right out what you want to do, they will tell you out and out lies because they don't want to hang out with you! Instead, tricking them to hang out with you is the key. So, take the time to observe what they do in the privacy of their bedroom. Whether this is playing with toys, games consoles, or just watching movies, by setting up an entertainment space and getting them to make the most of it, then you can casually wander in and interact with them. Being an entertainer, and providing healthy snacks isn’t going to work here.
Now, it doesn't happen overnight, especially if you are struggling to spend more time with your children. But, by making them hang out with you “by accident” is far better than them not hanging out with you at all. As time goes on, you will hang out with them a little bit more, and before you know it, a Saturday night becomes a firm family fixture in the calendar, where you all gather round and take part in shared activities. It can take a long time to get to this point, but it's worth it. As children get older, they don't want to hang out with their parents, this is a fact of life. So, the option is, if you really want to hang out with them is to do it in a roundabout way. Don't use words like “family time”, or “quality time”, it's about being in the same place at the same time with your kids.
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