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Family Campfire Activities

Few activities have the potential to create lasting memories like camping with your family. There are many ways to pass the time while at your campsite, but few are more common than spending time around a campfire, where there are hundreds of different foods to cook, songs to sing and games to play.

Food
- Food-related activities are some of the most popular ways to spend time around a campfire. Some choose to roast a simple marshmallow on a stick, while others like to add a graham cracker and a piece of chocolate to make a s'more. Warm a can of beans over the flame. Roast a wiener on the second prong of your marshmallow stick. Food activities are almost limitless. With a pan, you can cook almost anything you'd cook on a stove. With a cast-iron sandwich maker, you can cook grilled cheese sandwiches and make bread pies by combining two slices of buttered bread with any sort of fruit filling you'd like.
Stories and Songs
- Telling stories is a great way to spend time with family around a campfire. Not only is it a great way to foster closeness, but learning to speak publicly, even in front of a small group of familiar people, is a valuable skill for all children to learn. And once you've talked, why not sing? Singing around a campfire is a centuries-old activity. Visit the Resources section at the bottom of this article for a link to a resource containing hundreds of different campfire songs.
Games
- There are dozens and dozens of popular games to play around a campfire. Telephone is a game in which one person whispers a sentence into the ear of the person beside her. That person then whispers the same thing to the person beside him. Once the sentence has made it around the circle, you can observe the funny ways the original sentence has changed. Or why not try Truth or Dare, Duck Duck Goose, or Name That Tune? Even a regular game of cards takes on a special magic when played by campfire light.
Other
- If you've run out of games, songs, stories and food, there are still other fun and educational family campfire activities you can do. Learning the constellations, or even simply lying on your back and appreciating the vastness and depth of the sky can be both fun and educational. If you've got a laptop or portable DVD player handy, and if your family likes movies, there's nothing like the proximity of all that darkness to make a scary movie even scarier.

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