Earth Hour

Saturday night, March 28th, was Earth hour from 8:30 to 9:30 pm.  For those who do not know what Earth Hour is, it is an effort to bring awareness to global warming by turning off your lights. This was a worldwide event, as many as 1 billion people participated.  My family chose to participate in this event.

It turned out that the hour spent in our home with the lights out was one of the best times my family has had together in awhile.  At first, it seemed as though Earth Hour was just going to be an excuse to go to bed early,  but it turned out to be a great opportunity to spend time together. We decided to play the game where one person starts telling a story and then each person adds to the story.  My 11 year old son started the story with a werewolf who was a cannibal (gross, I know, but he is 11) my 6 year old ended the same story with a beautiful princess getting everything she wanted.  Somewhere within that same story, great philosophers who were in fruit form (yes apples and peaches) were teaching everyone life's great lessons.  I wish I would have had a tape recorder going while we did this.  It was 45 minutes of great fun.  My son asked us if we could do the same thing again tonight.

What I learned in this lesson of frugality is that you do not need to spend a dime to have a wonderful time with your family.  Something I had already known, but wow was it ever apparent last night.  What made it even better, my kids learned something about global warming because we had to tell them why were taking this hour to sit in our family room in the dark.  Who knows, maybe we even saved a dime with this little exercise.  What I do know, is that we created a memory with our kids that I think they will remember for a very long time.