I love living way north during the summer. Sunlight stretches to 10p and beyond and the days last forever. Sure, it’s a little tough putting the kids to bed when it’s bright out, but I love it.

But now that summer is waning, and twilight is into the evening, now is the perfect time to have a backyard movie party. Push bedtime out of the way, stay up late, and DIY a drive in.

Now I’m not Pinterest perfect enough to pull off this kind of magic

But I will drag out the extension cords and cable boxes to fire up a show on the side of the house, or garage door, or a sheet hanging over the back deck.

The key part of being able to have a backyard movie, is getting a projection display. Epson loaned me a Home Cinema 1450 projector to try out.

It is so simple to use. It has adapters for wireless networks on the back, and HDMI inputs. I just pulled out my TELUS Optik box, plugged them all in, and we were online watching Netflix in seconds.

The Epson Home Cinema 1450 has easy to adjust legs on the front and around the sides so you can get your picture level, and focusing things on your screen is a snap.

I thought it was going to be a chore to watch a show outside, the hardest part was, literally, waiting for it to get dark.

We have passed out some invites to my sons’ school buddies to come over on the long weekend before school starts to have a backyard drive-in end of summer celebration.

We won’t go crazy with the Pinterest party planning, but we will celebrate one more night to stay up late, and the added fun of a backyard movie will bring everyone together to swap summer vacation stories before they’re back to the grind.

Here are some fun movies with kids taking a starring role that you can find on Netflix:

ET

From the shadow filled lighting to suspenseful score, Elliot discovering ET out in the shed is one of the best scenes in film history. The entire ET story holds up extremely well more than 35 years later

The Jungle Book

This reboot is fantastic and will inspire kids to have the courage to tackle the year ahead. This kind of confidence boosting film starring a confident young boy will especially pump up nervous kids.

The Parent Trap

Lindsay Lohan before she was Lindsay Lohan. This is a very cute movie with two girls conspiring at summer camp to bring their parents back together.

Earth To Echo

A modern take on the themes from ET. Kids have their phones start glitching out, they follow maps to the desert where they find an alien and then it’s an all hands on deck, kids vs grown ups adventure to save the being.

Here are some Back-To-School movie ideas on Netflix

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

More appropriate for the teens than the tweens, Ferris’ ultimate day of hooky is a fun romp to end summer with.

School of Rock

My son starts band at school this year. He’s excited to crank up the alto sax – or is that tenor sax? Regardless, this band camp film starring Jack Black hits all the right notes.

High School Musical 3

My tweens are deep into the Disney musicals, loving Descendants and the HSM trilogy. This one will get them humming along for the new year. And get ready, a reunion show for the decade old HSM series is in the works for this year.

Disclosure: I was loaned a Home Cinema 1450 from Epson for this post. I’m a member of the Netflix Stream Team and TEAM Telus.

First Name

Email address:

Leave this field empty if you're human:

(Visited 59 times, 1 visits today)

Comments

comments