What?! Bowling at Home?

I hope the quarantine is treating you okay and that you are still finding time to devote to your hobbies while remaining healthy. It is a challenge for us to remain calm and stay quarantined, but I assure you the hospitals and healthcare personnel definitely appreciate all we can do to lighten their load.

If you are feeling bored, or are wondering what some other activities are that you can do at home, I am sharing one that I did this past week.

Lucas and I find we don’t really go on dates anymore, and that we have other interests besides sitting at home and watching TV. Unfortunately, because of the quarantine, it is hard to get out of the house and do other activities in the world, because everything is closed!

With a little creativity, we were able to replicate one of our favorite activities, bowling, at home. It sounds impossible, doesn’t it? 

Not to fear. We used bottles as the pins. You could also use any other tall and cylindrical shaped object, such as glue sticks, empty cans, water bottles, spray paint cans, shampoo bottles… the list is endless. 

One might ask what to use as a bowling ball. We started with an orange, but it seemed to be getting mushy after a few bowls. So we decided to implement a yarn ball wrapped in plastic to protect the yarn. You could also use a bouncy ball, a rubber band ball, a ball of socks, or perhaps even a soccer/basketball (we were unsure of using these last items, as we thought they were too big for our pins and we did not know if they had the necessary weight to knock down the pins. I suppose if you throw anything fast enough, you will be able to knock a few pins down, though). 

To keep score, we downloaded an app that helped keep the bowling scores for us, but you can also print off downloadable templates and keep score manually. One caveat to this method is you have to look up rules for scoring. 

It is advisable to make sure the backboard for your bowling alley isn’t something likely to be damaged, such as a hollow wood wall. We were bowling against a metal heater, which stood up quite well to the rapidly flying bottles. We managed to escape with no dents in the heater (don’t tell our landlords!).

We also used galactic duck tape for our lane markers (thanks for the gift, Dad). You could also use masking tape or any other kind of unclear tape. Perhaps you could even tape down string or yarn? The possibilities are endless.

Another fair warning is to make sure your pets don’t get involved in the game. Our cat, Brexa, came to observe. After she sniffed the bottles, we started to bowl with her in the room. This alarmed her and sent her running from us. Make sure your pets are okay with the activity or that you play in a pet-free environment. No need to unnecessarily terrorize your family!

Lesson: Adventures can happen at home if you can be a little creative!  Home bowling is definitely much cheaper than going to a bowling alley, but requires a person to be inventive about the game. It still was just as fun!

We played two games, each winning one. We were able to get a few spares, but no strikes. Although we were not able to bowl at a traditional bowling alley, we had a lot of fun recreating the environment and playing the game at home. 

“DO MORE THINGS THAT MAKE YOU FORGET TO CHECK YOUR PHONE.” —UNKNOWN