In addition to the holiday season approaching rapidly, we are also drawing 2020 to a welcome close and this has been a challenging year, so naturally the importance of families spending time together is taking center stage. It's a season when people traditionally have time off from work and school, which means there is an opportunity to get away from home for a holiday vacation. The spacious accommodations at Exploria Resorts offer the perfect backdrop for just such a holiday retreat. After all, these are luxurious, resort condominiums with up to three bedrooms, as well as a separate dining area, living room, and fully equipped kitchen. Even large families have plenty of room to stretch out and relax without tripping over each other just to move around. And the luxurious amenities both in your unit and throughout the resort round out the overall experience. Still, in a time when many people are cautiously avoiding crowds, you may wonder what there is to do on this kind of vacation. While it may be fun just getting away and enjoying a change of scenery, it won't take long before sitting around doing nothing, or just watching TV, gets a little boring. Fortunately, with some imagination, there are some fun activities you can enjoy as a family in your vacation home. Family game night If you drive to your destination, grab a stack of board games and throw them in the trunk before you leave. If you have kids, you probably have a few of these games tucked away in a closet somewhere. For younger kids, games like Chutes and Ladders, Candy Land, Parcheesi, and Hungry Hippo are sure winners. They're even fun for adults and older kids if you just enjoy how much fun the little ones are having. For older kids and grown-ups, Monopoly or Clue might be a better option. Another fun way to enjoy a family game night is to pack your kids' favorite game console and let the kids teach their parents – or even better, their grandparents – how to play their video games. In fact, watching your preteen attempt to teach grandpa how to play Minecraft or Super Mario Bros. could be hysterical. So, make sure you get it all on video! Movie night Pick a fun double feature that everyone can enjoy, and don't forget the popcorn! And instead of just starting the movie and watching it straight through, try going online ahead of time and find some behind the scenes trivia for everyone to look for. For example, practically every movie has an occasional mistake that makes it all the way through to the final cut. It could be a reflection of a cameraman in a car window, or a boom mic visible at the top of the screen. You can usually find these mistakes online. It's also fun to read about famous movie roles that were turned down by one actor, only to make a Hollywood star out of another. (Bet you didn't know that the role in Pretty Woman that made Julia Roberts a star was turned down by several actresses who are probably all still kicking themselves!) A family culinary adventure That's a fancy way of suggesting a family dinner where everyone pitches in to help with the preparation. This is a great way to let everyone express their creativity with food. There are plenty of recipes that allow you to do this, even involving kids, although you'll probably have to do some of the more difficult parts. Of course, it's not a bad idea to have the phone number for a local pizzeria that delivers handy, just in case the whole experiment goes off the rails! When visiting our Summer Bay Orlando resort, one of our popular onsite restaurants, The Italian Kitchen, is always ready to prepare you a fresh pizza by the way. Recipes with stations Depending on your family's tastes, there are a few types of cuisine this works with, but the most popular is probably pizza. You start by prepping small pizza crusts for everyone in the family, plus a few extras in case someone's got a big appetite. Many grocery stores have raw pizza dough that you can break into smaller chunks then flatten out before you put toppings on them. After you have prepared the crusts, put down a thin layer of Italian spaghetti sauce and sprinkle with mozzarella cheese. Then let everyone go down the line, station by station, putting the toppings on that you have previously set out. What kind of toppings? Use your imagination! It's best to include traditional pizza toppings like pepperoni, sausage, sliced ham, onions, and mushrooms. But don't be afraid to experiment a little by including options like pineapple chunks, thin slices of apple, barbecue chicken, shrimp, roasted corn, or whatever else may spark your fancy. This dinner-by-assembly-line concept also works with nachos, tacos, quesadillas, and calzones. You can even use it for your dessert, setting bowls of toppings out that everyone can sprinkle on ice cream sundaes! Speaking of dessert During the holidays, people tend to give in to their sweet tooth a lot more often, as desserts and other sweet treats become more popular. It's also a fun activity with the family to create some of those treats yourself and let everybody help. A great recipe for this, which is also perfect for the holidays, involves making a batch of Chocolate-Peppermint Icebox Cookies. This recipe uses ingredients that are easy to find and they're simple to make. The result is a delicious batch of dark chocolate cookies coated in more chocolate and topped with peppermint. After the cookies are done baking, they need to be dipped in melted chocolate and then rolled in the crushed peppermint candy, which is perfect task for kids. For the full recipe, click here.One of the many wonderful treats of staying at an Exploria Resorts property is the spacious rooms, designed with gathering in mind. At our Summer Bay Orlando resort an entire family can enjoy fun activities, relaxing and adventurous amenities, and on-site dining and grocery delivery service allowing for a safe vacationing experience - and keeping the need to venture offsite into the crowds at a minimum. Explore our family-sized rooms and resort choices here!
