The Great American backyard seems to be making a real comeback lately. Tons of fun ideas and products are now available to make backyard time more fun than ever. A backyard is a great place for parties too! Even if your party is an indoor event, opening up the back door and including outdoor activities and amenities, can truly enhance the enjoyment of your more outdoor-oriented party guests.

Here are 10 items or ideas that can increase the fun of backyard time for everyone:

Children-oriented:

1. Trampoline With Basketball Hoop

When you were a kid, did you ever want to fly past the hoop and sink the ball like a real pro? With the 12-foot Jump-N-Dunk trampoline from Skywalker Trampolines, your kids can do that over and over again. And they will get some solid aerobic exercise at the same time! It is available from several online retailers. Here is an article showing the best trampolines with basketball hoop which will be the more fun and active sport for your kids.

2. Mud Pie Kitchen

Let your kids indulge their desire to get a little muddy and have great fun doing it. Products are available to help you, but you can set up a ‘MUD – PIE KITCHEN’ in the corner of your yard with some old household items, items discarded by neighbors, or thing found at a local source for “Shabby – Chic” recyclables.

Find an old table and perhaps a few small chairs to set up. Put out a variety of old baking hardware such as pots, pans, utensils, and of course pie tins that they can use to make pies that no one would want to eat. An area of open soil and a source of water are naturally required as well to make great quantities of glorious mud. Some play sand and castle- making equipment can also be added to increase the fun even more (and provide a somewhat cleaner alternative for some).

3. Giant Inflatable Bowling Set

Know what it might be like to be a mouse that has found its way into a bowling alley!

Give your backyard a bowling lane with huge 24” tall inflatable bowling pins and an 18” diameter inflatable ball for the complete bowling experience. Available from “Play Now Inflatables”

All that is needed is a relatively flat area for set up. The distance between the bowlers and the pins can be anything you want. You want your guests to relish in the strangely satisfying feel of knocking things all over the place.

After the game and the event, all you need to do in deflate the pins and the balls, which can all be folded up and stored in a surprisingly small space.

4. Giant Yard Dice

A great many games depend on throwing dice for game-play. However, the tiny little pair of dice that come with most games would get lost in a heartbeat outside.

Add a fun new dimension to older games by offering outdoor- ready and outdoor sized game dice from Play Platoon. Available online.

The dice are quality made using hardwoods and come with a storage bag for stowing them away after the games are done.

5. Lady-Bug- Tic-Tac-Toe

For the craft-minded host, make acute -as-a- button yard tic –tac -toe game set with some natural materials or recyclable furniture items.

Just find an old square piece of wood (perhaps an old table) or use a backyard cut tree trunk as a surface to play this classic game upon.

Draw out the familiar grid work with a marker on whatever surface you’ve come up with. Then steal some rounded rocks from the landscaping that have at least one relatively flat side. You will need enough for both players in a standard game of tic-tac-toe.

Now paint the rocks to look like lady-bugs using a suitable acrylic paint. Your craft-minded friends will take one look and say “AWWW- look at that!”

It is amazing that how this simple game has become such a universally known and persistent activity in our lives.

People just love it!

Teen or Adult Oriented:

6. Game Of Phones

Available exclusively from Uncommon Goods is a unique but modern card game that stars your smartphone in scavenger –hunt like activities. Card tasks like “Sent a text to your parents and the first one to get a reply wins” and “The person with the most cracked screen wins the round” surprise players with loads of laughs. Well over a hundred cards ensure a full night of fun finding and doing things ON your smartphone and WITH your smartphone.

7. Inflatable Game Table/ Cooler

For those with a backyard pool, comes an innovative game idea from Dream builder Toy —- an inflatable floating Beer-Pong game table sporting a drink cooler in the middle.

Add a captivating new activity (that can involve beverages other than BEER) to refreshing pool times.

8. Led Lit Cornhole Game

Cornhole is a social game. Unfortunately many social are set in the early evenings or at night time. Sometimes, as a result, the cornhole game sits unused in the darkness.

A LED Lit Cornhole game, available from several makers, is one way to ensure that the game can be played on into the night.

9. Old Windows With Mirrors

Is your backyard somewhat small? Do you feel confined by a looming privacy fence?

Use a trick, from, the interior design industry, to make a backyard seem more spacious than it is. Put mirrors on that privacy fence to create an appearance of more room.

Implement this is a stylish way of taking old windows and replacing the glass with mirrored glass. These can then be hung at eye level on the privacy fence.

You’ll be amazed at the difference that this can make, even outdoors.

10. Bottle Lights

Recycle old wine or soda bottles (any bottle with standard sized neck should work) by turning them into beautiful lighting fixtures with Cork Shaped USB Rechargeable LED wine bottle lights from e-Lander Direct.

Since there is no wiring needed, the bottles can be placed anywhere, in your backyard for gorgeous mood lighting!

With some great products and a few new ideas, you can increase the enjoyment of your backyard for yourself, your family, or family guests.

A few simple activities can get conversations going, which is the real reason that we get together with others.

The very simplicity of the activity enhances the social time without overpowering it.

The trick is to bring in things that are surprising in some way, freshly whimsical, or that touch a new area of your guest’s daily life. Give them something to do that will bring them together with other guests or even family members in a shared event — and let human nature do the rest.