My 5 year old daughter and 4 year old son love it when I give them piggy back rides. We play this game also where I take them down the hallway on a piggy back ride and then after they get off the ride (or I throw them down on the bed), I walk back to the piggy back stop and they “beat” me there. I pretend to not recognize them, but I say they look familiar and they crack up laughing. It’s a game somewhat inspired by Bluey, especially the episode where they play the statue and shopkeeper game. The most recent time we played that game, it started off similarly. They laughed when I didn’t recognize them and then things took a turn. Luckily it was a positive turn.

My kids ended up making costumes and dressing up in a disguise to trick me into not knowing it’s the same people I kept giving rides too. The costumes and disguises got more and more elaborate, but they had one thing in common - there was always a mustache that they made fresh before the next ride. My daughter first came out with a pink stache, so I named her Pink Stache. My son was Black Stache, Pink Stache’s Dad. It all seemed normal so far.

My daughter next came out with a red stache (conveniently named herself Red Stache) and said she was Pink Stache’s Mom…and that her husband was Blue Stache. I told her something didn’t make sense I thought Black Stache was Pink Stache’s Dad, but why is Red Stache married to Blue Stache? They started to see a problem in their story and were cracking up so hard. My daughter blabbered something random and asked for a piggy back ride and that it was definitely a different person.

For each piggy back ride, I also decided that I would collect money. They made blank slips of paper and I would ask them for a specific dollar amount. They would need to go figure out how to write the dollar amount and give me that bill. Exact change only! They went around and worked together to figure out the numbers so they could continue getting piggy back rides. Each person in the Stache family got a piggy back ride (and they were so giggly and familiar!), my kids got to do some math, and I got a ton of exercise. Not a bad way to spend the day.