Are you and your housemates feeling bummed that summer is coming to an end? Do you all want to have one last fun adventure, but these remaining weeks of your internship require you to stay at home? Did you all think of going camping, but then realize you’d have to buy a bunch of camping gear you don’t have? You should build a fort!

I know building a fort sounds like something silly you used to do at elementary school sleepovers, but there was a reason we built forts when we were kids. Try building one to find out. Here’s my experience of building a fort.

My sister and I realized there was less than a month of summer left, and we wanted to do something fun before she leaves for school. Because 2020 has been a wacky and unprecedented year, we wanted to limit our time in public spaces. We also didn’t want to spend any money because as college students, we are working on budgeting. Building a fort seemed like a perfect idea because all we needed were blankets and some string lights. We laughed as we got tangled in the millions of blankets we brought upstairs. We struggled as our fort collapsed the first 20 times. But we had fun testing our creativity and setting up the fortress in my bedroom. We set up my laptop on a stool and rewatched the “Twilight” series (Team Edward, always).

Anytime we needed something to eat, we’d run downstairs and bring it up. Bathroom? Right next door. Sleeping arrangements? We slept “outside” the fort in our own beds each night. A good time? Totally.

We laughed, we struggled, we got creative and we bonded. Building a fort is literally like building an indoor campsite. You can camp com-fort-ably using materials in your own home. Plus, it really is ef-fort-less fun!

So if you’ve memorized all the TikTok dances, caught up on all the latest Netflix shows and tried every banana bread recipe on the web, next up on your list is definitely fort-building. So what are you waiting for? Grab some blankets!