Category — Games

J’s attended 2 of her 3 birthday parties of the weekend, and I hung around Friday’s party long enough that I couldn’t resist taking a couple of pictures to share.

First, rainbow fruit skewers. . . cute, right?

Lucky for me, some of the kids were suspicious of the mangoes, which were recruited to represent orange even though the birthday family aren’t mango fans, either. So at party pick-up I proceeded to eat a vast amount of mango. I love me some mango, especially when I don’t have to go to the trouble of cutting it myself!

You might remember that for J’s Halloween-themed birthday party, the kids pinned spiders on the web. At Friday’s party, the girls pinned the hat on the birthday girl (yes, we pinned a hat poorly in keeping with the no-current-front-portraits tradition).

And the Birthday Girl requested the same cupcakes that she wants every year. They’re baked in ice cream cones!

When I started taking pictures for a post, my friend insisted that I recommend Pinterest for birthday ideas. (Incidentally, I’m “doing” Pinterest, too, although I’ve barely pinned anything yet.) Here’s her board with a couple of items that she pinned. Which reminds me of another great idea that I didn’t get a chance to photograph: pre-scooping ice cream into cupcake holders, then popping them back into the freezer until it’s time to serve the cake. How smart is that, right?

When I was thinking about the whole big kids/little kids thing, I remembered something I hear all the time, which is how little babies and toddlers are so cuddly, cuddly, cuddly, and then big kids don’t want to cuddle.

Well, yes, okay. Sort of true. It would be lovely if there were a happy medium between the baby who wants to be touching you at all times (Jezebel’s post on Alicia Silverstone reminded me of this–basically saying, gosh , that sounds annoying. Except–fair warning–she says it more colorfully).

My sweet little J has always been a cuddle bug. Her affections are not constant, but they can be fierce. She remains fully open to hugs and cuddles.

M, who spent much of her first two years either in my arms or sobbing because she wasn’t in my arms, has cooled considerably over the years. She’s stoic, and she prides herself on being self-sufficient. But she needs a little affection, too. So I got tricky.

We play a game called “100 Kisses,” is from Lawrence Cohen’s book Playful Parenting. Details are at the link, but basically, you tell your child that you’re going to give her 100 kisses, and then you do. As cheesy as this sounds, the game became a favorite, and we still play it occasionally, especially when she’s had a bad day.

I also give M a little bedtime back rub most nights. J gets her share of cuddles, too, but it’s not as much of a formula as with M. M summons me each night when she turns out the light after reading, so it can be a bit of a drag sometimes. But I’ve discovered that the combinations of her sleepiness and her intense desire to continue the massage makes her much more communicative than usual.

Finally, I’ve said before that I like New Moon Girl Magazine, and they have a “Girl to Girl” advice column. One of the recent letters was so moving. It was from a 10-year-old girl who said, “I feel that I’m developing too fast, and I really wish I was a little kid again. I feel sad a lot. I also get this weird feeling when I’m around my mom: I want to hug her (I love her a lot!), but then I feel too embarrassed.” What followed were several encouraging responses from peers giving all sorts of variations on empathetic and kind advice that generally included, “Just hug your mom!”

Anyway, I love that column specifically for its insight into the tween mind, and  I’ve upped my hugging activity significantly in the weeks since I’ve read that letter. It’s funny, because I remember hanging around with other mothers, and their big, huge kids would climb up into their laps, or I’d  pictures of moms with huge kids on their laps, and it seemed sort of weird to me.  And I don’t think my girls would tolerate it in mixed company. But around the house, lately  I’ll just grab them and squeeze like crazy. The girls know that they can always cry “Banana” if they really don’t want the cuddles.

But, come to think of it, these days they rarely do say  “Banana.”

We got the game Set for Christmas, and I’ve been meaning to post about it, because it’s a good one.

Set is a strange game. We heard about it from my niece, whose math teacher would let the kids play it in class sometimes. Of course, that gives you the vague impression that it’s educational, and it feels weirdly educational. But not in a bad way. We’d have a whole group of us staring at the cards, and I’d swear I could feel wheels turning somewhere in my brain. New neural pathways developing.

Basically, you lay down 12 cards like this:

And then you look for a set. There are four different categories: color (purple, green, or red), shading (solid, half-shaded, or white), number, and shape (diamond, over, or squiggle).  In order to create a set, you have to find three cards that are, for each of the four categories, all the same or all different. If you find a set before the other players, you collect those cards.

There are at least two sets in the group above. Scroll down for the sets.

It takes some time to get the hang of it, and frequently you’ll be sure you have a set until someone points out that you’ve got 2 out of 3 of something.  In my limited experience, young kids often perform better than their elders. So it’s a nice equalizer. It can also be played as solitaire, and everyone plays simultaneously, so there’s no need to negotiate turns. All of this makes it fun.

Anyway, we liked it, and when I just set up that link, I noticed that Amazon has 319 reviews with an average review of 5 stars. In other words, pretty good. But then I noticed that there was one 1-star review, so I just had to check it out:

 Yeah, spending time staring at cards until your brain hurts. It’s not fun. I can’t imagine making your kids do this. You are terrible parents if you buy this for your children.

Doesn’t he so sound like someone who doesn’t have children yet? Gosh, weren’t we good at telling people how to parent back then? The review made me laugh and feel nostalgic all at the same time.

Here are two sets from the group above:

The J update: She’s in misery. It’s 10:30 pm and she’s been lying in bed for two hours not sleeping because I thought that I’d get clever and try a medicine this afternoon that wouldn’t knock her out like Benadryl. She doesn’t look so bad, but she’s itching and I’ve already hit her with every cream and oral medicine that I can, so she’s out of luck. It’s definitely not insect bites or chicken pox, the doctor feels absolutely certain that it’s an allergic reaction to something and remains pretty firmly in the poison ivy camp. Interesting since Jennifer in my neighborhood’s been suffering the exact same symptoms. . . maybe there really was something floating in the air recently. Whatever. I want it gone. Doc says poison ivy stuff lasts a week. Ugh. Thanks for all the healthful wishes.

While I was trolling for pictures of my firstborn’s snarled hair, I stumbled on bunches of photos from little games  that I’d play with the girls when they were little, and I thought that they might help some folks out there with babies and toddlers while away the long not-exactly-winter. For a little while, we had a stash of photo paper and color printer, so I’d print pictures galore. If you order all of your pictures, you can have some extras like these on the computer waiting for the next time you need to order a few extra pictures to make the price per print go down. I’d recommend printing the pictures out wallet-sized and then laminating them for maximum use.

One game we liked to play (this was probably starting when M was about 1 year old) was scavenger hunt. I had a bunch of pictures of household objects, like this bath toy:

or this measuring cup.

Then when I needed a minute to myself, I’d send her on a hunt. For this one, it helps to include objects that aren’t always in exactly the same place, like a shoe or a toy.

The variation on home scavenger hunt is the grocery store edition. I took pictures of items that I buy frequently at the store, and then a daughter would be in charge of whatever photo cards she had.

MMMmmm. . . love me some Cabot anything.

And we go through a surprising amount of Kalamata olives.

I also took pictures of various places that we’d visit regularly.

The girls loved the Crossings.

This was more an attempt to communicate better than a game. When the girls were very little, we’d talk (and by that I mean, I’d conduct monologues while they’d look attentive and occasionally babble) about what our plans were for the day.

How is it that Hannaford never recruited her as their poster girl?

Later, I was trying to teach them about the calendar and our routine, and I’d post the pictures on a little poster board.

Huggin' the old-school Tyke. Anyone else remember Marcy & this mangy puppet?

This reminds me that at some point in each girl’s toddlerhood I created a visual clock with explicit instructions not to get out of bed until after 6 am.

Our midwife's office

And, okay, this wasn’t part of any game, but the midwife picture reminded me, and I couldn’t resist.

How cute is this girl? Can you guess what she’s doing?

. . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . .

Got it?

She’s checking the imaginary baby’s heartbeat!

That’s a toy mixer that she’s using at a fetal doppler thingy.  She was dragged to many appointments. Usually by the end she’d be astride my hips, wedged in the increasingly small space between my pregnant belly and my thighs.

Cute W got into the photo fun act, too. When M was driving her riding toys too recklessly, he made her a little fake driver’s license. Then when she’d crash or speed too quickly, he’d take her license away and tell her it was suspended.

Anyone else have fun with photos?

Besides freeze dancing and general running and squealing, we planned two activities for J’s party. Once again, they were both all J’s idea.

First, she came up with Pin the Spider on the Web. We had a witch hat planned to assist in the blindfolding process, but it didn’t really happen. And each spider was labeled with a guest’s name. We had a huge web decoration stretched out onto the wall, and the little spiders had painters tape to stick them onto the web.

They looked cute all ready on a platter. The silver was tarnished which, I reasoned, just made it all seem more Halloweeny.

Here’s J moments before M accused her of cheating. Hmmm. . . .

We saved Bobbing for Apples for last in case people got wet. I expected that some of the girls would be anti-bobbing. I mean, it wasn’t too long ago that many of these kids were afraid to put their faces into the water at the pool. But they were unbelievably enthusiastic. We had J’s and M’s robes on hand to try to keep the girls as dry as possible, but those girls decided to go deep. I mean, seriously deep. And when they’d come up, apple trapped in teeth, they were triumphant.

I guess there’s a reason why Bobbing for Apples is a classic.

After reading about our Small World game for Big Kids, Jahnavi asked for suggestions for games for kids who are 3 or 4 years old. Alas, it’s tough to find a game for the preschool set that’s much fun for parents. Really, any fun at all. My kids liked Hi Ho Cherry O and Candyland. Classics, although the actual games are pretty dreary except that the kids take such delight in playing them. We all liked playing Poppa’s Pizza Topple, although the pieces are too slippery-slidey, so it was only fun once we’d roughed them up enough to be able to play a decent game. Later there two games that both kids loved-loved-loved for a long, long time: Guess Who and Zingo. They still play Guess Who sometimes. Both of these games were improvements over Hi Ho and Candyland, although since I’ve played them about a thousand times, and somewhere in the three hundreds it became pretty tiresome.

How about the rest of you, dear readers? Any suggestions on games for the preschool set?

Okay, you may recall that I was irritated about the “I’m too pretty to do homework” shirts at JC Penney recently, and so I thought I should point out that Pigtail Pals has a “response” shirt that reads “Pretty’s got nothing to do with it” with all sort of other girl qualities instead. This is the same woman, Melissa, who wrote the Waking Up Full of Awesome post that someone may have passed along to you already. So there’s a “Full of Awesome” t-shirt, too.

Another link I came across recently (sorry–can’t remember where) is this What’s in Breast Milk poster that compares the ingredients between breast milk and formula. Interesting.

And speaking of choices for newborns, The Bloggess wrote a hilarious (and possibly offensive, depending on your sensibilities–I’m just warning you) post on circumcision for The Stir on Cafe Mom.

Cute W loves games. He’s always finding a new game to try with the girls.  He particularly likes strategy games, which can be a tough sell for them. But a new favorite with M is Small World. It’s recommended for ages 8 and up, and I think that’s pretty accurate. J finds it intimidating, but she finds many games intimidating. This is partly because Cute W and M are both cut-throat, trash-talkin’ competitors.

I finally tried it recently, and I liked it, too. Maybe because I won! Yeah, yeah, beginner’s luck. Basically it’s a world domination game.  Every games is different because there are different combinations of races (like Amazons or Dwarves) and special powers (like diplomacy or wealth). It’s sort of complicated. No, it’s really complicated. The game includes extra cheat sheets so that you can keep track of who you are and what you can do.

So, you play a round, attempting to take over as many territories in the small world as possible, and then you make money based on how much territory you’ve got. Part of the strategy is to hide your coins so the other players won’t realize how well you’re doing. If it’s obvious that you’ve got lots of money, they might gang up on you. I hid coins behind a hand towel.

I was surprised by how much fun this was. It was similar to Sleeping Queens, one of our very favorites, in two ways. First, it seems complicated, but then it seems natural and fun pretty quickly. Second, even though there’s strategy involved, there’s enough chance to make it possible for a 9-year-old to beat a 40-year-old. Which is the way M likes it.