Episode 35: How to Be Fun

I need lessons, please.

One day, when we told our kids that one of their babysitters would be coming to watch them for the night, my youngest exclaimed,

“I love her! She’s so fun to be around!"

The idea of hearing someone saying, “You’re so fun to be around!" stuck with me because I am not someone that would be described that way.

Ha!

Not that I can’t be fun. But “fun” is not one of the core descriptors of my personality. Sure, I dress fun. And, I have a fun job compared to most. But if you know me, I’m very Type A, focused, and can rarely relax.

I’m so busy being the planner of everything for everyone, who has time to be known as fun?!

However, that statement made me want to evolve what fun means to me. How can I be fun in ways that make sense for me? I don’t need to be the fun parent (because I am not). But that doesn’t mean that I can’t inject fun into my kids’ lives in ways that make sense for me.

Here are some small ways that I have let the fun in in small and natural (for me) ways:

Taste Tests of Foods
Kids love this! Either get some new snacks from Trader Joe’s or from a speciality grocery store (Japanese, Korean, Thai, etc.), and put a few pieces of each into a small bowl. You can either have everyone taste each one together and give ratings on their favorites or do a blind-folded taste test to see if they can get what the food is. One time, my kids did it to me and gave me grass to eat!

Song Game in the Car
I came up with this game randomly one day, and we do it all the time now for short or long drives. Whenever the music title comes up on the screen, we each take turns making up a sentence that includes that song title. For example, if the song is “Stay” by Lisa Loeb, you could say, “I really hope that you can STAY and have dessert with us!” They can get really funny and silly depending on the song titles and the mood we’re all in.

Playing Musicals While We Walk the Dog
My kids are obsessed with musicals (especially Matilda) right now. So I’ll play songs on my phone, blast it, and then stick my phone in my pocket so we can all sing along while we walk the dog. It’s like our version of the 90’s boombox.

Surprise Crafternoons
My job is to teach people to come up with fun and creative ideas, yet I forget to do this at home a lot. This is like the restaurant chef who doesn’t always cook gourmet meals for their family because they are tiring of cooking by the time they get home! But this has always been something I can shine at when I make it a priority. Come up with a creative activity for everyone to do together. For us, it could be marbling or life drawing. Next week, I’m surprising them with an afternoon of Sticker Stories inspired by my friend, Meri.

These are just small things that I’ve come up with that give me a chance to break out from the typical rules and structure that I tend to follow. It reminds me that you don’t have to be that person who is constantly fun to be FUN in ways that fit you.

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Toy flying cars and balloons image created by me with Midjourney AI.