Interphase

Interphase is the first stage of the cell cycle. Imagine that a cell is like a little factory that makes things. Before the factory can start making new things, it has to get ready first. This is what interphase is all about. During interphase, the cell grows bigger and gets stronger. It also makes copies of all its important stuff like DNA, which is like the cell's instruction manual. Just like how your teacher might give you a new notebook at the start of a school year, the cell makes a copy of its DNA so it has a backup. This way, if anything goes wrong during the cell cycle, it has a spare copy of instructions. This stage lasts the longest out of all the stages so that the cell can be fully prepared for the next steps. Once the cell has finished interphase, it is ready to start the next steps of the cell cycle.