My son is seven. For a long stretch I gave him whatever was left of me after work, which on most days wasn't much.
I always meant to do more. Teach him to whistle. Learn to juggle together. Show him how to change a tire. Then Saturday would come, we'd both end up on screens, and it would be Monday again.
I didn't need more parenting advice. I needed someone to hand me the thing to do this week, and to make it small enough that a tired parent would still say yes.
So I'm building it. It's called 100Plays.
How it works
Every week, a new play arrives for you and your kid. You don't see it until it lands. Some take ten minutes on a Tuesday night. Some fill a Sunday afternoon.
- Open this week's play.
- Try it together. You'll probably mess it up.
- Save the moment: a photo, a short clip, or the funny thing your kid said.
- At Play 100, open everything you saved.
Failing counts. "We tried" counts. The only rule is that you do it together.
A few of the plays
- #1, The secret handshake. Invent a handshake only the two of you know. Your kid will add steps faster than you can learn them.
- #5, The sealed letter. You each write a letter to the other. It goes in an envelope marked "Open at Play 100" and stays somewhere you'll walk past every day.
- #12, The Rubik's cube. Neither of you solves it this week. You'll come back to it, and one day one of you will.
- #23, A secret code. A cipher only the two of you can read. Leave notes in it all week, in lunchboxes and on the fridge.
- #50, Halfway dinner. Cook something together and scroll back through Plays 1 to 49. You'll barely recognize the two people in the early photos.
- #100, The night you open everything. This is the one you'll both remember.
What's in it
- One surprise play a week. Physical skills, art, puzzles, cooking, outdoors, culture, feelings.
- Small moments on weekdays. Five-minute prompts that keep the thread going between the bigger plays.
- A memory vault. Photos, short clips, and the funny things your kid says, kept in one place.
- A printed book at Play 100. Your two years, bound and mailed to your door.
- Optional Play Kits. Small boxes of materials for some plays. Every play also works with things you already have at home.
A hundred plays at one a week is about two years. You won't do them perfectly. You just keep going.
Who it's for
I'm building it as a dad, so it started with parents like me. It works for any grown-up and kid who want one hour a week that belongs to the two of them: moms, dads, grandparents, guardians, aunts and uncles. Most plays are written for kids around five to ten.
Join the waitlist
100Plays isn't out yet. The waitlist is open at 100plays.app. The first families in get early access and help shape the first hundred plays.
Your kid doesn't need a better version of you. Just one hour a week of the one you already are.