January 11 - Family Game Night!

Board games were a big part of my childhood.  I remember finishing up dinner around the dinner table, clearing off the plates, and then setting up Monopoly.  Or Battleship, Clue, Sorry, Trouble, the game of Life. In total, entire days of my childhood were spent dealing out Uno cards.  In total, weeks of my childhood were spent playing my mother in Othello.

I've never beaten my mother in Othello, and I am fairly certain that I never will.

Elizabeth and I have stockpiled quite the collection of board games over the years, and I've been excited to start playing them with our children.  We've attempted Candy Land on various occasions, but it mostly just leads to Elliot wanting more candy...is this a common theme that other parents out there have witnessed?

Last night, we introduced Elliot to a game that we thought was right in his wheel house.  It was all about colors and parts of the body, things that he's pretty good at recognizing.  The game, of course, was Twister.

Elliot really enjoyed playing with his Mom.

I don't quite know what this was...

...but I thought it was hilarious.

Elliot demonstrating a new Twister move: Forehead on Yellow.

Really getting into it. The tongue in the cheek shows tremendous effort.

Father and Son twistin'.

We had a blast last night introducing Elliot to this game.  He picked it up really quickly, moving around the colored dots right after a direction was called out. He even got to call out some directions on his own, and I was amazed when I heard him say "Right hand on green!" and it was what had shown up on the spinner.  There's a lot of brains in that big noggin' of his.

Family game night was something that I cherished and I can't wait to continue as a tradition for my own family.  It's a time that doesn't require a screen. All it requires is people you care about, and the readiness to laugh at and with one another.  

I see many games of Twister in our future, along with all the others on our game shelves. Games like Cranium, Apples to Apples, and Cribbage.  Mancala and Mastermind.  And of course, Othello.

Maybe one day, he'll take on his Mia in that one.  I'm fairly certain she'll win.