There’s nothing quite like cashing in on a relaxing chunk of vacation time! But what if the price of travel doesn’t exactly align with your family budget? Instead of side-eyeing credit card offers, try checking out this list of staycation ideas for families. They’re packed with plenty of great ways to build family memories without breaking the bank. 

What Is a Family Staycation? 

Think of the staycation as the traditional vacation’s budget-friendly cousin. A staycation is all about enjoying time off with your family–without ever traveling far from home. 

But in order to make your staycation a success, it’s important not to mistake it for a week of remote work. Make sure you actually use your paid time off and resist the urge to make yourself available to co-workers.  

Trust me–the office will be there when you get back. In the meantime, don’t let it creep into your family time via emails, phone calls, or work documents. 

How Much Does a Staycation Cost?

Keep in mind while a staycation can easily save you a lot of money, there’s no need to forbid yourself from spending any money at all. Sure, it’s possible to pull off a staycation using free activities alone. 

But there’s no harm in setting aside a little money in the family budget for some fun activities. You should find the extra cash much easier to find when you don’t have to worry about things like airfare, hotel costs, and eating out for every meal.  

How to Present the Idea of a Staycation

Okay, so the term “staycation” is a handy way to describe a week of fun at home. But unless your kids already have positive associations with staycations of the past, it may not always be the best term to lead in with. 

To some kids, a “staycation” may sound like a downgraded version of the traditional vacation. With that in mind, it may be safer to simply announce that you’ve got some time off coming up and that you’d love to spend it doing fun things with them. 

Staycation Ideas for Families

Now that we’re all on the same page about what a staycation is, it’s time to start exploring ideas for your own. As you scroll through the following list, don’t be shy about asking the rest of the family which ones sound the most fun. You may even end up coming up with a few of your own!

Create Your Own Water Park

Looking for a way to beat the heat during a summer staycation? Rather than spending hundreds of dollars for a day at the waterpark, create one of your own in the backyard. Here are some fun ideas to get you started: 

• Kiddie pools are no longer limited to the little blue plastic options that appear in front of Walmart every summer. Look into family-sized inflatable pools or borrow portable pools from friends and family members to set up all over the yard. 
• Skip the slip and slide and opt for a large tarp! Spread some shampoo over the top to make it extra slippery, position a water hose or sprinkler over it, and wait for the fun to begin. 
• Fill up some water balloons, outfit the whole family with water guns, and stage a full-family water fight!
• Or hang water balloons from a tree branch to create DIY water pinatas.

When it comes to projects like this, Pinterest can be a parent's best friend. Don’t be afraid to do a little research. You’ll be amazed at what a little ingenuity and a few cheap pool noodles can do! 

Explore Like a Tourist

What type of activities do tourists tend to enjoy when they visit your area? Granted, the answer will depend on where you live. But look for ideas like free museums, history tours, or aquariums. 

If you’re looking for inspiration, try visiting tourism sites like Get Your Guide or Viator. Sites like these can help get you into a tourist mindset and are a great way to uncover hidden gems. Feel like you’ve seen everything your town has to offer? Widen your search radius a bit and look for destinations worthy of a day trip. 

You may discover a state park, a lake to go fishing in, or just a cool restaurant you’ve never been to before. Getting out on the open road to explore can be a lot of fun, whether or not you end up springing for an overnight hotel room.  

Go Camping at Home

Never underestimate the fun of the backyard camp-out! Grab a tent online or rent one at a local outdoor store. Or ask around and see if anyone has one that you could borrow. 

If you’re feeling really adventurous, you could even try building your own tents with tarps or large canvases! Pack a cooler full of hot dogs, smores, and other camping treats to cook over an open flame. 

If you don’t feel comfortable building your own firepit, it’s now possible to buy a wood-burning fire pit for less than you’d spend on a family dinner at a restaurant. And don’t forget to come armed with plenty of camping games and fireside stories to keep everyone entertained. 

Create Your Own Escape Room

Escape rooms are great staycation ideas for families who love solving puzzles! And staging your own escape room at home comes with plenty of other benefits, aside from saving money, 

It also makes it a lot easier to choose a storyline that’s both age-appropriate for your kids and that caters to their unique interests. Plus, there are plenty of options out there, from pre-packed escape rooms to printable options that come with everything you need. 

If you’re the creative type, you can even make your own escape room from clever clues and household objects. Need some help getting started? Ask Gemini, Google’s new free AI assistant, to design an escape room challenge based on your kids’ ages and interests.     

Have a Yes Day

Don’t feel like you have to plan the perfect staycation alone! If you’re looking for a staycation idea your kids are sure to love, then try out a “yes day.” The rules of the Yes Day are simple: for a full day, parents agree to say yes to anything (within reason) that their kids want to do. 

Just make sure that your kids know that yes day is not without boundaries! It’s important they understand that you won’t be saying yes to anything dangerous, morally wrong, or outside of your pre-agreed budget.

Explain that yes days are more of an opportunity to do things like build an epic blanket fort, eat crazy foods, or visit their favorite park. You may be surprised by how many fun things they come up with! 

Have an Imagination Staycation

If you’re looking for staycation ideas for families with younger children, you’ve got a huge ace up your sleeve. Imagination is every kid’s superpower. They can use it to instantly transport themselves to the Australian outback, an English castle, the moon–you name it.

Travel to France … at Home

Here’s how it works: pick a place you’d like to visit for a day as a family. For example’s sake, let’s say you choose Paris. Spend your “travel” day cooking French recipes together, taking a virtual tour of the Louvre, and doing French-themed craft projects. 

You might also stage a bike race in honor of the Tour de France, pick up a few words of French, or learn a French song like Les Champs-Elysées. Try out some traditional French playground games or stage a Paris-themed scavenger hunt. If you’re looking for a fun mother-daughter activity, don’t forget to stage your own Paris-style fashion show! 

Travel Back in Time

Escaping a pricey 12-hour international flight isn’t the only perk of an imagination staycation. It’s not only unbound by space, but also by time. A fun spin on the idea above is to spend an evening “traveling” back through time. 

For instance, if you might decide to stop by the 1920s to create your own flapper headbands or paint your own wooden toy cars. Or you could hop over to the golden age of radio to tune in to free recordings of classic detective shows. 

Whether you want to check out life in medieval times or a toga party in ancient Greece, history is your oyster! 

Build a Backyard Laser Tag/ Nerf Gun Arena

Want to enjoy all the fun of paintball without the risk of a nasty bruise? If so, then grab a laser tag set or Nerf guns for the whole family. Then, get creative in setting up a DIY arena in your backyard. 

Obstacles and hiding spots could include anything from upside-down trash cans to inflatables, old pallets, or barrels. Pro tip: Try looking up DIY backyard paintball arenas for inspiration. 

When you invite the whole family to get involved, you may even discover that building your arena is just as much fun as the game itself. Also keep in mind that (unless your cardio is on point), you may want to let the kids invite some friends over to play if you’re not up for more than a few games!

Room Redesign

This is one of those rare staycation ideas that work well for families with kids of virtually any age. The idea is to set aside a day to help your kids redecorate either their own rooms or a spare room in the house. Just remember that this one requires some planning, so don’t be afraid to turn it into a multi-day project. 

If you plan to add new elements to the room or rooms in question, start by announcing your budget. This is both a great way to teach kids about budgeting and encourage them to get creative about ways to DIY a project for less. 

Once everyone’s clear on the mission, create an idea board by printing photos of your favorite projects from Pinterest or DIY kid’s room decor articles. Estimate how much each project would cost, draw up a game plan, and set aside a day to turn your shared vision into a reality. 

Get Thrifty

Not quite ready to redesign an entire room? No problem. Take a page out of our guests from Flea Market Flippers playbook and show your kids how much fun turning old trash into treasures can be. 

Stage a design challenge where everyone in the family gets a pre-set amount of cash. It can be as little as $10. Then, hit up a local garage sale, flea market, or thrift shop. 

Challenge everyone to find a cheap object to upcycle or transform into a way cooler version of itself. While this can be a particularly fun project with older kids or teens, never underestimate the power of younger children to think outside the box!

Family Film Festival

The cool thing about this idea is that there are several different ways to go about it. You can turn it into an all-day activity or break it up to include a new film every night. No matter how you go about it, the idea is to allow each member of the family to choose one movie that everyone watches together.

This can be a great chance for parents to share movies they loved growing up with their kids and for older kids to introduce movies they’ve watched with their friends. While it’s totally optional, you can even shake things up by creating a rule that everyone has to choose a movie that no one else has seen before. 

Or if you’re feeling really adventurous, you could even try watching old classic films that no one may have ever seen before! On the other hand, if you’re in the mood for something more reliable, you could choose a theme like Disney classics or Star Wars movies.

Staycation Ideas for Families With Teens

By the time a kid becomes a teenager, they’ve usually begun to develop their own unique personality. This tends to make it a little trickier to nail down staycation activities that all teens will actually enjoy. 

Instead, try reserving one day for your teenager and simply asking how they’d like to spend it. The key here is to stay flexible and resist the urge to be offended if their dream day doesn’t include the entire family. 

Remember that teens live with a weird mixture of emotions. On one level they’re starting to crave their independence. On the other hand, your approval of the person they’re becoming means more to them than you’ll ever know. 

Some girls might like to spend a little girl time alone with mom, while guys might prefer a fishing trip with dad. Others still might jump at the chance to introduce the whole family to an activity they love! The bottom line: it’s less about coming up with the right activity and more about letting them take the lead. 

Try an Airbnb or Local Hotel

Sound counterintuitive to the whole point of the staycation? Hear me out. Remember, the staycation is about saving money–which can be hard to do when you factor in gas, airfare, rental cars, restaurants, and lodging for an entire week. 

But you can cut out most of those expenses and still indulge in a one or two-night getaway in a nearby hotel or vacation rental. For example, you might choose to book a stay in a part of your city that you’ve never explored before. Or expand your radius for a quick trip to a nearby town. 

The perk here is that you can often score awesome last-minute booking ideas on sites like Airbnb or Hotel Tonight. Whether you want to spend a night in a cozy cabin or downtown apartment, sometimes a little change of scenery goes a long way. 

Take In Some Live Entertainment

Family staycations are a great opportunity to take advantage of any events your town has to offer. If your family loves sports, then make an effort to check out a local game, whether it be at the pro, college, or even high school level.

If theater is more your thing, then look into local productions around town. Whether you end up attending a local festival or listening to live music, take advantage of whatever cool things are happening near you. 

Final Thoughts on Staycation Ideas for Families

At the end of the day, there are as many different staycation ideas out there as there are families. While I hope the ideas here have helped get your creative gears churning, don’t hesitate to use them as a jumping-off point for any of your own!

Encourage the entire family to participate in planning a week of fun that everyone will enjoy. You’ll soon discover that when it comes to making memories, it’s more about who you’re with than what you do. 

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