Sometimes the hardest part of loving someone from far away isn't knowing what to say.
It's knowing what to do together.
You can ask about school. You can ask what they had for dinner. You can ask what they did that day. But anyone who has spent time on a video call with a five-year-old knows how quickly a conversation can become:
"How was your day?"
"Good."
"What did you do?"
"Nothing."
And somehow, despite loving each other very much, everyone is suddenly staring at the screen with nothing left to talk about.
That's one of the strange things about distance. When we're physically together, conversation doesn't have to carry the entire relationship. We cook while we talk. We read together. We walk the dog. We play games, make things, notice things, laugh at things, and sometimes simply sit in the same room.
Long-distance families need those shared experiences too.
Whether you're a grandparent living several states away, a parent traveling for work, a child spending time between two homes, a military parent separated by deployment, or an aunt or uncle who doesn't get to visit nearly as often as you'd like, the goal doesn't have to be finding more things to talk about.
Sometimes the answer is simply finding more things to do together.
Here are 25 ways to start.
When You Want to Share a Story
Stories are one of the easiest ways to cross distance because they immediately give two people something in common. Instead of looking at one another through a screen trying to keep a conversation moving, you're wondering, laughing, imagining, and discovering together.
1. Read a Story Together
Choose a book you can both see and turn reading into a shared experience. Take turns reading if the child is able, pause to look closely at illustrations, predict what might happen next, or ask what the child would do if they were inside the story.
Don't worry about finishing the book.
If one page leads to a ten-minute conversation about whether dragons would make good pets, you've probably had a pretty successful storytime.
2. Make Up a Story One Sentence at a Time
One person begins:
"Once there was a penguin who desperately wanted to learn how to fly..."
The next person adds a sentence.
Keep going back and forth until the story becomes completely ridiculous—which it probably will.
This works particularly well across ages because there is no right answer and no special equipment. It also gives a child real ownership of the experience instead of asking them to sit and listen.
3. Create an Ongoing Adventure
Instead of finishing your made-up story in one call, create one that continues every week.
Maybe you're explorers searching for a hidden island. Perhaps you've discovered a mysterious door in the forest. Maybe you're investigating why every cookie in town has mysteriously disappeared.
End each week with a little uncertainty about what happens next.
Now your next call isn't simply another video call.
There's an adventure waiting.
4. Share a Family Story
Tell a child something they probably don't know.
What was their parent like at seven?
What did Grandpa get in trouble for as a child?
What was Grandma's favorite game?
What happened on the worst family vacation ever?
Children love discovering that the adults in their lives were once children too. Family stories also give them something bigger than entertainment: a sense of where they came from and the people whose stories became part of theirs.
5. Reinvent the Ending
Read a familiar story, but stop before the ending.
Ask:
"What if it didn't end that way?"
Create your own ending together.
It turns reading from something a child receives into something you create together.
When You Want to Make Something
Creating together works beautifully across distance because you don't need to be working on the exact same object. You're sharing the process, which gives conversation somewhere natural to go.
6. Have a Drawing Challenge
Give yourselves five minutes to draw the same ridiculous prompt.
A giraffe going to school.
A dog driving a race car.
The world's worst superhero.
Then reveal your masterpieces.
Artistic ability is absolutely not required. In fact, questionable drawing skills may improve the activity considerably.
7. Design Something Together
Instead of drawing the same thing, create one idea together.
Design the perfect treehouse.
Invent a new playground.
Create a dream bedroom for a dragon.
Design a vehicle that can travel underwater, through space, and somehow still fit in a garage.
One person can draw while the other contributes ideas, or you can each make a version and compare them.
8. Make the Same Simple Recipe
Choose something easy enough to prepare in both homes.
Decorate cookies. Make mini pizzas. Assemble funny fruit faces. Mix trail mix. Build ice cream sundaes.
The goal isn't really cooking.
It's being able to say, "Remember when we made those together?"
9. Start a Shared Journal
A journal can physically travel between two homes.
One person adds a drawing, question, photograph, story, joke, or memory and mails it to the other. They add something and send it back.
Over time, the journal becomes a physical record of a relationship that has continued despite the distance.
10. Create Something for Your Next Visit
Make a list called Things We'll Do When We're Together.
Add to it whenever someone gets an idea.
Visit the zoo.
Bake Grandma's cookies.
Build a fort.
Find the biggest ice cream cone in town.
Go on a night walk with flashlights.
Anticipation is part of connection too. You're creating a future together, not simply talking about the present.
When You Want to Explore
Children ages 5–9 are wonderfully curious, and curiosity gives long-distance family members an almost endless supply of things to share.
11. Go on a Five-Minute Scavenger Hunt
Choose three things everyone has to find.
Something soft.
Something older than you.
Something that makes a funny noise.
Something blue.
Something you'd take to a deserted island.
Everyone races off and comes back to explain their choices.
12. Explore the Same Question
Pick something you're both curious about.
Why do fireflies glow?
How deep is the ocean?
Can penguins recognize each other?
Why does the moon sometimes appear during the day?
Look for the answer together.
The adult doesn't need to be the expert. In fact, saying "I don't know—let's find out" shows children that curiosity doesn't disappear when you grow up.
13. Take Each Other Outside
Bring the phone or tablet into the backyard.
Show Grandma the strange bug you found.
Let Grandpa show you what's growing in his garden.
Compare the weather.
Look at the moon.
Listen for birds.
You're giving someone who lives far away a window into your physical world.
14. Become Nature Detectives
Before your next call, give each other a mission.
Find the most unusual leaf.
Photograph an interesting cloud.
Find something shaped like a letter.
Spot three different birds.
Bring your discoveries to the next call.
This has the added benefit of letting your shared experience continue even when you're not online together.
15. Visit Somewhere Virtually
Explore a museum, zoo, aquarium, national park, landmark, or another part of the world online.
But don't make it a lesson.
Choose what interests you.
Wonder about things.
Pick favorites.
Imagine what you'd do if you were actually there.
Exploration is much more fun when nobody has to take a test afterward.
When You Want to Play
Play removes a lot of the pressure from long-distance communication, particularly for children who aren't naturally interested in sitting and talking.
16. Play "Would You Rather?"
Would you rather live in a treehouse or on a boat?
Would you rather be able to fly or breathe underwater?
Would you rather have a dinosaur or a dragon as a pet?
The answer is often less interesting than the explanation.
And sometimes one silly question opens a surprisingly meaningful conversation.
17. Play Twenty Questions
One person chooses an animal, object, place, or character.
Everyone else gets yes-or-no questions to figure it out.
This works especially well when you establish categories first so younger children aren't trying to guess literally everything in existence.
18. Play "What's Missing?"
Put five objects in front of the camera.
Let everyone study them.
Turn the camera away, remove one, and bring it back.
What's missing?
Then switch roles.
Simple games often work best because the technology isn't the interesting part.
The person on the other side is.
19. Have a Mystery Sound Challenge
Make a sound off camera.
Crumple paper.
Shake keys.
Pour water.
Zip a backpack.
Tap a spoon against a glass.
The other person guesses what made the sound.
Children will almost certainly find increasingly ridiculous ways to make this harder.
Let them.
20. Create a Family Trivia Game
Ask questions only your family might know.
What dessert does Grandpa always order?
Where did Mom go on her first airplane trip?
What does Aunt Jenny call her dog?
Who makes the best pancakes?
This turns family history into play and can be especially fun when several generations join the same call.
When You Want Something Quieter
Not every connection needs to be high-energy. Some of the nicest long-distance moments can feel remarkably ordinary.
21. Color Together
Each person brings something to color or draw.
You don't need to constantly talk.
Color. Chat when you feel like it. Show each other what you're working on.
Families who live together spend plenty of time doing separate things in the same room. Long-distance families can create a little of that feeling too.
22. Do Homework or Reading Time Together
Grandpa can read his own book while a grandchild does independent reading.
A traveling parent can sit on video while a child finishes a worksheet.
You aren't entertaining one another.
You're simply sharing space from two different places.
There is something surprisingly comforting about that.
23. Watch the Same Sunset or Moon
If geography and time zones cooperate, go outside at the same time.
Look up.
The view won't be identical, but you're sharing the same sky.
For families separated by great distances, something this simple can feel remarkably grounding.
When You Want to Build a Tradition
The best long-distance activities aren't necessarily the most impressive ones.
They're often the ones you repeat.
24. Create Your Own Weekly Ritual
Choose something small enough that you can realistically keep doing.
Sunday storytime.
Wednesday riddles with Grandpa.
Friday drawing challenge.
A traveling parent's hotel-room bedtime adventure.
An aunt and niece's Saturday morning mystery.
Consistency turns an activity into a tradition, and traditions give children something to anticipate.
Eventually, they stop saying, "Are we calling Grandma tonight?"
They start saying, "It's Grandma night."
That's a very different feeling.
25. Create a Shared Adventure
This is the idea at the heart of Bailey & Beau Co.
Sometimes families don't need another conversation prompt or another game. They need a place where the experience is already waiting for them.
Bailey & Beau Co. was created to help children ages 5–9 and the people they love share meaningful experiences whether they're sitting together or connecting from different places.
In the Reading Room, families can experience stories together rather than simply watching one person read. In the Activity Room, they can explore interactive experiences built around imagination, curiosity, creativity, and conversation.
The experiences are designed around approximately twenty meaningful minutes.
Not because twenty minutes is some magical formula for family connection.
Because family life is real.
Grandparents have schedules. Parents travel. Children get tired. Families move between homes. Time zones get complicated. Some evenings simply don't have an extra hour hiding in them.
Connection needs to fit inside real life if it's going to become part of real life.
The Activity Isn't Really the Point
You could try every activity on this list and discover that your child's favorite is something we didn't mention at all.
That's okay.
Because the drawing isn't really the point.
Neither is the scavenger hunt, the recipe, the story, or the game.
They're simply giving two people somewhere to meet.
Years from now, a child probably won't remember every question Grandpa asked during Twenty Questions. They may not remember what Grandma drew during the five-minute drawing challenge. The story about the flying penguin may disappear completely.
But they may remember something much simpler.
"Grandma and I used to have our Sunday nights."
"Dad always called from his hotel and we'd read together."
"My aunt and I made up the craziest stories."
"Grandpa and I had this game we always played."
That's why meaningful long-distance family activities matter.
They give families a way to accumulate the little experiences that normally happen naturally when people live nearby.
One activity becomes another.
A joke gets repeated.
A tradition begins.
Someone remembers what happened last week.
There is something to look forward to next time.
And slowly, across video calls and storytimes, drawings and discoveries, quiet moments and ridiculous games, something begins to form.
Shared history.
The miles haven't disappeared.
But the relationship has kept growing anyway.