We have enjoyed many other activities in the 20 years we have been doing this, but these indicate the range of activities we have found helpful. Our minimum requirement in choosing an activity is that everyone is able to participate, although not everyone has to be enthusiastic about the activity. The ability to accept others' limitations doesn't seem to be inborn in our children, but it also is necessary. Another problem we have had to deal with, especially when our children were younger, was competitiveness. We don't generally have teams when we play games like charades, and we keep score as little as possible.
Noncompetitive activities are still our preference.
The biggest obstacle we face in maintaining our tradition of Family Night is the attraction of other activities. Our children's friends don't have the same Saturday night obligation our children do, as they become old enough to drive, the pressure to skip Family Night or to let a family member go out instead of participating increases. We have never been completely rigid in observing this tradition, and we do let the older teenagers not participate on rare occasions. More often we let them go out afterwards, but this can result in very late nights. We are helped in dealing with this tension by the fact that our children have grown up with Family Night and really like it.