The following is a post by MPFJ staff writer, Jeff. ย Jeff writesย about reducing waste, saving money and building freedom at his website, Sustainable Life Blog.
Recently, I attended the Financial Bloggers Conference in Charlotte, North Carolina, and just a few days after that ended I hopped on a plane to Hong Kong and on to Phnom Penh, Cambodia for a bit of traveling and temple viewing. When I left my home in Wyoming, the weather was still in the mid to high 70s, which is fairly warm. However, after almost 3 weeks on the road, when I got back to Wyoming the leaves had started changing and the temperature was down into the mid 50s! Fall was here, and I am super excited – it’s my favorite season! In honor of my favorite season, I’m going give you a few of my favorite fall activities for families.
Go For A Walk
This is absolutely one of my favorite things to do any time of the year, but I really enjoy it during the fall. You get the nice cool, crisp weather, the leaves are starting to change colors a bit and everything just feels so relaxing. The buzz of summer is gone and you (well I don’t) feel in a hurry to get anything done or rushed in any way. It’s just so relaxing, and to me going on a walk is the ultimate way to relax even further and get some exercise too! Every weekend in the morning, my wife and I relax a little and then wake up, she does yoga and I play with the kid until she’s finished, and then we all go on a family walk to the local park. We live just a few minutes walk away from what I think is the best park in our town, so we take full advantage of it and use it many times a week.
Play Tourist
This is something that I think is really underrated unless you live in a destination city (and even if you do). Many people have lived where they do for years, but don’t take the time to see what the tourists come to their city to see. Since the summer is over, you can grab a jacket and play tourist for a day, and look for anything that sounds interesting to you or is fairly low cost to take the family to. You can use Trip Advisor to check for good and interesting things to do in your area, and might even find something that you didn’t know about at all in there!
Scavenger Hunts
If your kids are old enough, try planning a scavenger hunt around your neighborhood or somewhere in your city. Give them a map and a list of things to find, and see which group of them comes back first. If your kids are not old enough to go out on their own, have mom and dad join each team and provide a set number of hints if necessary (up to 3) if they need it, but other than that they are on their own! You can give them a few places to check out and have them play amateur food critic on the way, with “who has got the best X (pizza, bagel, etc)” and have them report back their thoughts on why.
While all of these will work in the summer, I find they are great fall activities because there are less people and you can do more. You also don’t have to content with the heat for very long, which should let you have more fun.
How about you all? What fun and cheap activities do you during fall? What activities have worked best for you and your family? Share your experiences by commenting below!
***Photo courtesy https://www.flickr.com/photos/dheuts/3804259707/
