Keeping Night Camping Fears at Bay

Why is it that everyone associates campfires with ghost stories? That's exactly what your family doesn't need, unless you happen to have a hardy bunch of teens in your midst. So what's a family to do to keep everyone occupied?

By all means, break out the marshmallows and s'mores. These will keep most kids happy for quite some time, allowing the adults a bit of time for talk and relaxing. My son gets tired of eating marshmallows fairly quickly, but that doesn't stop him from wanting to roast them for another hour. Ah, the joys and allure of fire.

Chatter around that campfire, sing, tell stories. Play a word game perhaps, such as First and Last Letter, in which one player says a word, and the next player must come up with a word that begins with the last letter of the previous player's word. For instance, if the first player says marshmallow, then the second player must think of a word beginning with w.

An evening campfire is one of the best family bonding experiences around. Be sure to take pictures, while you're at it, because your kids have never looked so angelic as they do by the light of your fire.

Here are some other activities to fill your family's camping evening:

• stargazing
• card games
• board games
• ranger programs, often offered at state park and national park campgrounds
• reading aloud

Campfire Stories

If you need an alternative to scary campfire stories, here are a couple of my favorite books for sharing around the campfire or for reading aloud once everyone's tucked inside their sleeping bags:

• For elementary-school children, try Jean Craighead George's classic My Side of the Mountain , about a boy who runs away and spends a year living in the Catskills by himself.
• Check out the nifty Cadogan Take Along Books, such as Inspired by Nature: Outdoor Inspiration for All Ages, and Funny Trail Tales: Outdoor Humor for All Ages(both edited by Amy Kelley). The latter, for instance, includes the classic A. A. Milne story, In Which Pooh and Piglet Go Hunting and Nearly Catch a Woozle. Now there's a rare commodity-a story that truly everyone in your crew is guaranteed to enjoy, no matter what their age.