Outside my back door

Fun doesn't have to be complicated.  Fun can be simple & cheap, lying just ouside your back door.  Let me show you.

Just outside my back door are five bicycles.  Those bicycles provided hours of fun this past week for my family.  We visited my parents, my sister and her family in Rochester, Minnesota, for the 4th of July and took our bikes with us.

My kids rode their bikes over to their aunt's house to play.  They rode to the pool every day.  The guys took off one afternoon while us ladies sat and gossiped -- oops, I mean visited :-)  One day we loaded up and went in to Rochester and rode the trails there.  Three generations of family tooling around beautiful paths, checking out the nature sanctuary and having a great visit.  In fact, we were able to get in to see the Rochester Honkers play baseball for free because we rode our bikes to the game.

Now, if we hadn't taken the bikes we still would have enjoyed our time together.  However, adding the bikes to the trip was a sprinkle of cinnamon on the latte.  We didn't need to spend more money to do it - we just used what was available and had fun with it. 

My question for you is what have you done this summer to have fun?  Have you listened to your children laugh?  Read a book by a new author?  Read a book considered an old friend?  It's too easy to define fun as shopping, eating at restaurants, or watching movies.  All of these activities are fun, but they cost money and calories and you just sit and get.  Fun can also be planting a garden, even if that garden is one tomato plant in a bucket.  Fun can be bringing the neighbor across the street some of the cookies your kids just baked. (I hate baking cookies.  All cookie baking is done by husband or children in our house.)

Go look outside your back door.  What do you see?  A patch of lawn that could grow a flower or tomato plant?  A sidewalk to explore?  Neighbors to meet?  Maybe you see a bicycle. . . take it for a spin.  You will have fun!