How Much Entertainment Does a Family Need?

It's quiet in my house right now. Both kids are on an electronic of their choice, Erin on the iPod touch and Gavin on my iPad. I'm on the iMac and so was Ken until a few minutes ago. We're just a wired family. It keeps us sane sometimes. We all do our own thing. It really gets convoluted when Gavin wants to FaceTime Ken from another room in the house just to be funny instead of walking to talk to him. (I know Ken's family in Florida regularly chat with each other when their each on their separate computers in their rooms doing their own thing.)

We have a choice of laptops, tablets and handhelds, plus one pc. Who needs cable television when we've got all that? Still, Gavin does like cartoons sometimes so we have Netflicks and Hulu. We actually do have Cable TV, but only because we have to have it because of our cable internet.

Believe it or not one of our favorite forms of entertainment does not come from the electronics. Ken and Gavin love to go outside and watch the chickens and I prefer to read books. OK, I have eBooks and paper books both. But the chickens are live entertainment. The guys give the chicken day old bread that we get from one of the restaurants in town and they watch them flock to it. I really don't like to go outside to watch the chickens but to each their own.

Ken actually thinks cooking is a form of entertainment. I just don't see it. Cooking is something one has to do to get food in the belly so as to not go hungry. Also it doesn't have to be fru-fru or special, just plain old food from a box. Ken, however, believes food can be made from recipes and set up nice on a plate.

There might have been a time about 9 or 10 years ago I agreed with him. But in 2003 I had a gastric bypass. Food these days only does one thing for me - fills me up a little and has very little special meaning to me. I can't get excited about entertainment of food because I don't eat enough to get excited about it. It really just makes me pretty disheartened to think about food to be honest about it. I could care less about how things taste. I eat the same things all the time and really don't care about them. So, food as entertainment does not do it for me. I'm afraid to say I really am not a good cheerleader for Ken when it comes to one of his favorite things to do, unfortunately.

Gavin likes to go to the park for entertainment. Sadly the cold weather has really cut down on that for now. There has been a couple of days here and there that he has tried to get bundled up and went to ride his scooter. Then sometimes he'll also go to Centre College and swing on the tire swing they have set up there. Kids are easy to entertain outside. . Inside recently we've given him a few boxes and let him have at it. He's really enjoyed that. Those boxes have been tunnels, tents, houses, water and electric companies - well, you name it. What kid needs toys? Give them the boxes. Oh, I forgot, he plays HayDay on my iPad. He is really into HayDay. Sometimes I can hardly get my iPad away from him to read my books. There are other games he plays too, but HayDay is the main one right now.

I'm pretty sure Erin just listens to music and watches movies on Netflicks. It's what she's doing right now. Music.

As for me, just give me a good book and I'm entertained for hours. It's all I need. I can go on Amazon looking for free books occasionally. I'll go on Facebook to check up on friends and family. But mostly I'll have my nose in a book.