Let's go bowling

I suck at bowling. (Actual bowling - I rock at Wii bowling.) I lob the ball a bit too far down the lane, I don't take the time to line myself up and I often get gutter balls. But every time I've gone bowling with my son, I've had a blast.

And I am not sure why that is. Admittedly, my son is very good at bowling - he has even gotten a strike and beaten me several times. (In my defense, the stoppers over the gutters help.) So, maybe my enthusiasm for bowling comes from watching him truly enjoy playing the game.

So, I was a little sad to see that there are fewer bowling alleys than there used to be. You can blame the decline on people not having the time to join leagues or the rise of entertainment centers taking over traditional alleys, but for our family, we rarely go bowling because I never think of it as a weekend activity.

To change that, I am making a list (no surprise there). This particular list will be all the stuff we really enjoy doing together as a family, but rarely do. I hope to have lots of uses for this list:

• As an answer to those weekends when we don't have any scheduled plans. I am fine with everyone having our own downtime, but it's good to get out as a family.
• As a reward for my son when he accomplishes something big - he gets to pick the weekend plans.
• Rainy day fun.
• When we have family/friends visiting and need to figure out a group activity.

I'll start my list with bowling, and add in the arcade (for as bad as I am at bowling, I am surprisingly good at skee ball).

What would be on your family activity list? Tell me in the comments.