How we get our tween and teenager to still hang out with us

I don't mean to be,  but somehow my very existence just seems to be an embarrassment to my older kids. My oldest son is 15 and my daughter just turned 12. It doesn't seem to matter what I do, I almost always get an eye roll or look of disgust from one of them. As kids get older it's natural that they don't want to spend as much time with you. I totally get that, but there are times that I want to spend time with them. We have a spread of age ranges in our kids of about 7 years. As my oldest son has gotten older, it seems like that gap widens. His interests are so much different than my younger son and while the middle daughter can swing either way, liking what the older brother likes and also liking what the younger brother likes,  it's often hard to find something that pleases all three. One of our favorite things to do as a family is have family movie night. We don't get to have family movie night very often. Our schedules are quite busy, but when we do find ourselves with a free evening it's usually the first thing the kids think of to suggest. Thankfully, with Netflix we have found some great titles that are age appropriate and that all three kids can enjoy.  There are even great titles that I remember from when I was their age.

On those rare nights when it's just the older kids around, there are even great titles to pick from too. We just watched Forest Gump. Hard to believe that movie came out nearly 20 years ago! Movie nights are great. We have the chance to slow down, and I can  sit close enough to my big man child that I can tousle his hair and share a bowl of popcorn with him. I didn't even notice a single eye roll. Disclaimer: I am part of the Netflix stream team.  In exchange for my blog post, I received a month long subscription to Netflix.  All opinions are 100% my own.  I wouldn't tell you about something that I didn't love.