Love in Action: Play and Laugh


Love in Action Day 10

It’s time to have some fun!  For today, the rest of the Love in Action series, and hopefully beyond, you will focus on family fun.

Play and Laugh

Happy, healthy, loved children laugh.  They laugh a lot. They laugh uninhibited and with joy.

And they play.

Your blessed privilege as the parent of these laughing, playing children is to laugh and play with them.

If you have babies and toddlers, this is easy.  Sit on the floor with them and investigate toys, set up blocks, roll a ball, let them play with your hair, your hands, your face. Share their contagious laughter.

If you have older children or teenagers, play is a bit more involved.  It may involve board games, train tracks, remote control cars, sports, even video games.  It may involve word games, jokes, riddles, or cards. Whatever you play, it should involve laughter.

Need ideas?

Love in Action: Cat's CradleTry some classics, like Monopoly, Twister, or Scrabble. Play basketball or four-square. Try Cat’s Cradle (remember the string game from when you were a kid), Simon Says, or good old-fashioned Freeze Tag.  Hey, how about marbles!

Ask your children to teach you their favorite games. Return the favor and teach them your favorite games from when you were a child.  Learn a new game together online or from a book. We like Hopscotch, Hangman, Hot Potato, & Ha Ha Ha.

Schedule a family game night, or set up an ongoing game of Chess or a perpetual game to play when in the car, such as counting cars or Shell’s Gas Stations.  How about Padiddle? (Count cars with only one headlight; it only counts if you’re the first person to hit the roof and shout “PADIDDLE!”)

Stop whatever you are doing and play, or start spontaneous word games, knock knock jokes, or 20 Questions while working together in the kitchen.

It doesn’t matter what you play.  Just play!

Don’t just play to check it off your parental to-do list.  Play because you love to be together, to play together, to laugh together.

Play together and fill your home with laughter.

What are your favorite games to play with your children?

8 thoughts on “Love in Action: Play and Laugh”

  1. I had forgotten about Padiddle… That was fun to play when I was a teenager! 🙂

    We actually have a running monopoly game going on between my husband and oldest son just before bedtime, and usually have a puzzle set out on a card table (which makes me think I need to go start one again since it’s too cold to go outside).

    Thanks for sharing these great ideas and spurring us on toward love and good deeds! 🙂

    1. Love the running Monopoly! We had to stop our running chess game when small hands “helped” a little too much. 🙂

      So…have you started playing Padiddle again?

  2. Our son has discovered the art of pushing trucks and cars. So currently we play Push The Truck.
    I sit in the kitchen, he sits in the living room and we push the truck. There’s a transition strip in the door way and so the truck launches off of that and our little guys goes crazy. He giggles and laughs. It is the best thing EVER!

    1. That is the best thing ever. 🙂 Soon he’ll graduate to launching it off furniture. Also the best thing ever…although slightly more hazardous to a passing dog.

  3. Cat’s Cradle – such fun! Malynn and Sam play it all the time and even have come up with their own designs. I suppose boredom can lead to creativity at times :0)
    We love to play a great “improv” game, where you take an object and you have to make an ad or commercial about it but it cannot be what the item is originally used for. Such as: a spoon is not a spoon but a Barbie shovel and you can get it today only for the low, low price of $19.95! 🙂 We make up a lot of our games too. Have fun with your families!

    1. I love that idea! The “improv” game is definitely something my children would get into. We started Show and Tell in school years ago as an informal launch into public speaking. Now that they’re older, I give them something like a hairbrush and they have to immediately improvise, much like your family, telling us what it is used for and answering questions. Such fun!

      Thanks for the idea, Tammy! I’m going to give it a try on the next rainy day in the trailer. 🙂

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