What it is: An alternative way to set up a white elephant gift exchange, where you basically set it all up yourself. Sounds less fun than the normal way? It doesn’t have to be!

Best for: About 10 to 20 people

What you need: A very generous host!

So rather than looking at this as a white elephant gift exchange, think of it as a fun way to give a gift to a group of people (co-workers, family members, etc.). If it’s Christmas or some other gift-giving occasion and you want to give a gift to everyone in a group in a fun, unique way, this might be it!

This game works the same way as a white elephant gift exchange, with all the same rules. The only difference is, you will supply all of the gifts yourself.

The gifts can be whatever you want. They can be inexpensive or they can be nice. It’s often fun if they’re all the same type of gift with different patterns or themes, but they don’t have to be.

We played this most recently at a family Christmas gathering. My husband and I decided to set it up as a fun game for everyone. We bought a bunch of pairs of wacky/unique socks, enough so everyone would have one. Then we wrapped them all with different wrapping paper, put them in the middle of the room in the evening after Christmas dinner, and played! Everyone ended up with a pair of silly socks. We tried to include a variety, so some were laughable, some were cool, some were neat, and a few were pretty undesirable but in a funny way.

It was a good game because everyone (kids and adults) could participate together. And because we didn’t have too many kids, and there wasn’t too much overlap in the socks the adults wanted and the socks the kids wanted, there were minimal tears. (Minimal. Unfortunately not no tears.)

Like a good white elephant exchange, it’s fun if some of the items are kind of eccentric (there were many options for that when it came to silly socks). We’ve also done it with wall calendars. Wall calendars are another great gift idea, because you have a huge range of styles to choose from, from serious (motivational quotes) to beautiful (beaches and mountains) to specific interests (movies and video games) to just silly (cats doing yoga).

You can also set up the game with items that are unrelated to each other. My mom has done this for our family’s Christmas gifts for the past few years, and we all have a blast. Each gift is unique (exercise equipment, kitchen supplies, just funny stuff), but they’re all nice, and people still steal and scheme, but everyone walks away with a gift in the end.

It’s a neat activity that turns a group gift into a game (so not only do your family/friends/co-workers get a gift, they also get laughter and memories, which are probably even better). Other theme ideas for gifts might be candy, treats or food, gift cards, nostalgic toys, or even more “boring” things like office supplies. Have a variety of pens and pencils of varying quality, and shake it up by throwing in a few truly absurd writing utensils that are sure to make everyone laugh. What other ideas can you come up with?

Variations: You can read about the normal white elephant gift exchange here. There’s also some other activities, Christmas gift pass and mystery gift pass, that involve less stealing and conniving and might be better suited for young children. You could easily adapt the mystery gift pass to play with adults as well, and it might also be a fun way to give a group of people a group gift. Have fun!

What it is: A fun variation on normal dodgeball.

Best for: A big group of players in a gym, or a big room without breakables inside

What you need: Dodgeballs! We have been playing with these Rhino Skin balls, which are great because they have enough heft to travel well, but they’re made of foam and don’t hurt at all. You can play with other balls, too.

How to play: The name of this game pretty much says it all. It’s dodgeball, but instead of playing on teams, all players are playing for themselves.

To start, put all the dodgeballs on the floor in the center of the room. It’s good to have more balls than players. Have all players start the same distance away from the balls on the floor. Someone yells “Go!” and everyone rushes for the dodgeballs (make sure you don’t run into each other).

All players are free to grab as many balls as they want, then they usually back away from everyone pretty quickly.

Let’s follow one player, Nina, on her journey through the game. At “go,” Nina rushes forward and grabs two balls. Then she quickly backs away from the other players. According to the rules, before she’s allowed to throw a dodgeball at anyone, she has to touch one of the walls.

She does so, backing up until she feels the wall behind her. Then she is on the offensive, ready to strike. And on the defensive, too, because there’s a room full of players who could strike her at any moment.

Say Nina gets a good throw in and pegs Ralph. Ralph immediately sits down in place and tosses away any balls he was holding in his hands. Nina pauses for two seconds to smile and give an excited little hop, but it was two seconds too many. Another player named Duncan throws a ball that hits Nina in the arm. She is out.

Nina sits down right where she is, rolling away the ball she was still holding. At the same time, Ralph, whom Nina pegged a few seconds ago, gets to stand up and rejoin the game. That’s the main rule of the game: if the person who pegged you gets pegged and sits down, you can pop up and play again.

So Nina, who was pegged by Duncan, watches him closely. A few minutes later when a player named Kelly pegs Duncan and he has to sit down, Nina jumps up, grabs the nearest ball, and starts playing again.

Play continues like this. When you get pegged, you sit down. When the person who pegged you sits down, you get to stand up and keep playing.

When does it end? When there’s only one man standing. Essentially this means that the last player has personally pegged every single other player in the game. That player wins, and you can start a new round! Heads up, the rounds can get pretty long.

All the normal dodgeball rules apply. If you catch a ball, the person who threw it at you is out. Throwing balls above the shoulders is not allowed.

If you want to see a sample game, here you go! We played at our parents’ place, which includes a giant warehouse room perfect for playing dodgeball in. (Queen music is optional.)

Another name for the game that I just made up is Hunger Games dodgeball (pretty good though, right?). I like this game better than normal dodgeball because there’s a little less pressure; you’re not going to let any teammates down if you mess up because you don’t have any! Have fun playing!

Variations: For another spin off the classic game of dodgeball, try glow in the dark dodgeball! Or for little kids, try playing on a playground for fun.

What it is: A dress-in-disguise mall scavenger hunt modeled after the seek-and-find children’s books (which, I never knew until now, are originally the British Where’s Wally? books, only Where’s Waldo in the US and Canada. Who knew?)

Best for: Large groups divided into teams of 3 to 5 players; it would be a perfect church youth activity

What you need: A shopping mall and volunteers to dress up in disguise, stickers or stamps for each volunteer, and a paper and clipboard for each team of players

How to play: You’ll need to do some prep work before the actual event. In advance, find five to ten volunteers (like adult leaders) to dress up in disguise and walk around the mall. If you’re playing true to the name of the game, have them dress up as Waldo from the Where’s Waldo books, or with pieces of a Waldo costume, like thick-rimmed glasses, a red and white beanie, a red and white striped shirt, and a walking cane.

The night of the activity, give your Waldos and/or Wendas each a sheet of stickers or a stamp and ink pad. Then have them split up and walk around the mall. I would require them to stay either in the main hallways or in small stores right off the main hallway, stores players could quickly glance in. (So no department stores.)

On the night of the event, divide up your players into teams of 3 to 5. Give each team a clipboard and a piece of paper.

Gather all players together in the food court of the mall and explain the rules. They will walk around the shopping mall and try to spot the Waldo characters in disguise. Depending on how good your Waldo costumes are (meaning if they’re not very good), you might want to tell your players the names of the volunteers dressed as Waldo to make it easier for them. You should also tell the players how many Waldos there are. The teams have the goal of spotting all the Waldos in disguise and getting a stamp or sticker from each. You could also have teams take a picture with each Waldo. At the end of a predetermined time, like one hour, all teams will meet back in the food court. The team with the most stickers or stamps wins!

So then teams split up and do their hunting! The Waldos are free to walk around the mall. When a team approaches them, they hand out a stamp or sticker. The team with the most stickers or stamps, or the first team to return with all of them, wins!

Variations: Since the Where’s Waldo books aren’t as popular as they used to be, you might want to use another disguise. I would keep the disguises on a theme. Here are some other ideas. You could have your volunteers:

• Wear different brightly-colored wigs
• Dress up as characters from a movie like Harry Potter
• Dress up as super heroes (either real or made up)
• Wear all one color from head to toe

What other ideas can you come up with?

This game could create some great photo ops, so be sure to take advantage of them!

What it is: An activity where you throw marshmallows at each other!

Best for: A larger group, any age

What you need: 

• Marshmallows! The big kind works best.

How to play: Really I can’t make it much simpler: throw marshmallows at each other!

Marshmallows are fun because they’re harmless, and yummy. Also relatively easy to clean up. You can play indoors or outdoors.

The first time I remember playing, we were on a family reunion and I saw my mom emptying some bags of big marshmallows into a tray. I went up to ask her what she was doing and she threw a marshmallow in my face! Once I got over the initial shock, I laughed as everyone joined in, throwing marshmallows all over the room. It was pandemonium. And a lot of fun.

Just watch out for players who try to stick the marshmallows in their mouths or bite them in half before throwing them, because then the marshmallows get sticky.

You can also play with mini marshmallows and DIY marshmallow guns made of PVC pipes. Here’s a tutorial I found online. That works well for a big group outside and is a ton of fun. Again, watch out for those people who stick the marshmallows in their mouths before shooting them, resulting in sticky marshmallow wads stuck to everyone’s clothes and hair. (Ew!) That might be against the rules for you, your call.

So grab a bag of marshmallows and organize a marshmallow fight!

What it is: It’s not the card game – it’s a quiet game of perception and memorization

Best for: Any size group, with players old enough to write

What you need:

• Paper and a writing utensil for everyone
• A tray or flat area to display items
• Items to display and memorize. It works great if there’s a theme to follow, like items from a diaper bag if it’s a baby shower, or jewelry and accessories for a princess themed party.

How to play: First, assemble your items. The number of items you have will vary depending on the age of your players and how hard you want the game to be. Let’s pretend you’re playing the game at an art themed birthday party. You might gather items such as these:

• An orange crayon
• A blue marker
• Watercolor paints
• Big paint brush
• Small paint brush
• Sheet of paper
• Pencil
• A red colored pencil
• Eraser
• A purple bottle of paint
• Pencil sharpener
• One paper towel
• A piece of green construction paper
• A yellow pipe cleaner
• Two googly eyes

Seat all your players in a room. Give each a piece of paper and something to write with. Then bring out your items. It’s handy if you have them on a tray or a table. Set a timer and give your players a set amount of time to study the objects. Depending on the age of your players and the number of your objects, this might be one minute, three minutes, or even 30 seconds.

When the timer ends, remove all the items from your players’ view. If they’re on a table or on the floor, you could throw a towel or sheet over them.

Set another timer and give your players a chance to write down as many of the items they can remember. Again, you could give them one minute, five minutes, or whatever you think is appropriate.

After everyone has had a chance to write down as many items they can remember, show the items one by one. Anyone who wrote down the displayed item gets a point. You can offer two points to players who remember something about the item, too; for example, if they wrote “orange crayon” instead of just “crayon.”

After players tally up their own points, ask things like, “Who remembered at least 10 things? Who remembered at least 12? Who remembered more than 15?” until you narrow down enough players and eventually find the player or players who remembered the most. They get a prize!

It’s a great shower or party game. Have fun!

What it is: Basically a mother/daughter version of the Newlywed game where mothers and daughters are quizzed to see how much they know about each other. Perfect for a mother/daughter activity.

Best for: A group of 4 to 10 mother/daughter pairs

What you need:

• The printable game (included below for free)
• Pens or pencils

How to play: One person will need to host the game and print the file beforehand. The included printable has purple (player) pages and orange (host) pages. Print one copy of the purple pages for each mother/daughter pair. Print one copy total of the orange pages.

After you print, cut all the pages in half. Each half-sheet represents a round. On odd rounds (1, 3, 5, 7), daughters silently answer questions about themselves and mothers are quizzed aloud on the answers. On even rounds (2, 4, 6, 8), mothers silently answer questions about themselves and the daughters are quizzed aloud.

You will probably want to play at least one odd round and at least one even round. You can read through all of the rounds and choose your favorites ahead of time, or play them all!

After you’ve printed, chosen your rounds, and organized your papers, invite your players to start!

Starting with Round 1, give each daughter a copy of the purple Round 1 half-sheet. Make sure they write their names at the bottom, and have them silently write the answers to the questions (moms, no peeking!).

After the daughters fill out their questionnaires, collect them and invite all the mothers to sit at the front of the room. Use the host’s Round 1 page to ask the mothers the corresponding questions to the daughters’ questionnaire.

First, read the first question to the first mom and have her answer out loud. Then read her daughter’s answer out loud. If the mom’s answer matches her daughter’s answer, put a check mark next to the question. The mother gets a point. Move on to the next mom until all moms have had a chance to answer question one. Then move on to question two, and repeat until you’ve gone through the whole round.

The mother who scored the most out of the 6 points possible in the round wins the round and a point for her and her daughter.

Then move on to Round 2. Give the purple Round 2 questionnaires to the mothers and have them quietly write in their answers. Collect them, invite the daughters to the front of the room, and ask each daughter each question, one at a time. The daughter with the most correct answers (answers that match her mother’s answers) wins the round and gets a point for her and her mother.

After you’ve played all the rounds you wish to play, the mother/daughter pair who’s won most of the rounds wins and gets a prize!

Printable: Here’s the printable you need to play the game!

Variations: Instead of declaring a winner after each round, add up all of a pair’s points, mother’s and daughter’s, from all rounds. The pair with the highest overall points wins.

You can also declare a winner within each pair – whoever got the most questions right, the mother or the daughter, wins (and the loser needs to pay more attention when their mother or daughter talks).

I also have basically the same style of game for couples and for bridal showers.

What it is: A way to play pictionary that works best with specific categories, like idioms or, in this post, movie titles. It’s not as competitive as regular pictionary and takes a lot more creativity!

Best for: Older players (teens or above) because of the difficulty involved

What you need: 

• A wipe-off board and dry erase marker, a chalkboard and chalk, or a paper pad and marker; basically a surface to draw on that all players can see

How to play: Just like in regular pictionary, players take turns drawing silently, trying to get other players to guess a word or phrase.

In what I’ve dubbed “mixtionary,” it works better if players come up with their own ideas of what to draw and if you don’t have a timer. You might not even want to keep score. It’s just a fun way to see who can creatively get others to guess a word or phrase in a challenging way, because instead of drawing any picture, your challenge is to illustrate the individual sounds of the phrase, mixing pictures to put together the entire phrase.

So in this post, I’ll use movie titles as an example. (Also, mostly family/PG movie titles.) Can you guess this one?

If you need a hint, cows say MOO, and the picture of the lawn mower is pointing to the LAWN…

Mulan!

See how the pictures make up the whole phrase? Here’s another one:

In this example, you can see how letters can come into play. Considering how difficult this game can be, I recommend allowing letters (instead of in regular pictionary where letters are usually against the rules).

In this game, use a bubble letter, like the first E, to indicate that the letter should be pronounced individually, like “eee.” Use normal letters, like the “er,” to indicate that the letters should be read instead of pronounced individually, like the end of the word, oh, “Potter,” for instance.

Want another? (Excuse my sloppy drawing by the way; this is my go-time pictionary drawing style. No time for fancy pictures!)

I’m not going to give away that one… How about some more?

In this last example, notice how you can use more complex equations to dissect sounds. So you’ve got your first picture, then a little equation, a picture of the EARTH minus the H sound (leaving you with “urt”). Plus the last picture… Can you guess the movie title?

This one’s a little tricker. Remember, a bubble letter means you pronounce the letter, like “ess.” A regular letter means you read the sound the letter makes. Another point is that if there’s a plus sign or a minus sign, it indicates that those two sounds are part of the same word. But if there’s no plus or minus sign between pictures, that indicates a word break. So in the above example, since there’s no plus sign after the T, the first and second lines are separate words.

How about one more?

See how the game works? You can play with movie titles, book titles, maybe even idioms. Since you won’t be able to illustrate all movie titles this way, it’s best to let players think of their own, or if you have a big list (like my word generator provides) allow skipping until players find one they feel like they can illustrate.

OK, finally, to end, here’s one last hard one that, I admit, is a big stretch and maybe nigh unto impossible, because it’s kind of an obscure movie to begin with. Guess it correctly in the comments, or guess all of the previous pictures, and I’ll give you a free escape room kit from my site!

(Here’s your one clue. See how there’s no plus or minus signs? That means it’s three separate words.)

Variations: For more variations on the classic game of pictionary, try musical pictionary or pictionades. If you’re looking for lists of movies or other pictionary words, check out my printables page or the word generator.

Good luck, and happy playing!

What it is: An easy game of teamwork, following orders, and posing as quickly as possible

Best for: A big group of boy/girl pairs

What you need:

• A big open area to play

How to play: I learned this game at EFY, a week-long religious camp for teenagers. Boys and girls house separately but are put in co-ed groups, attend dances together, and are encouraged to talk to and get to know each other as much as possible, so this game fit right in.

In the game, pairs of players hit poses as quickly as possible. There are three poses.

Bird on a perch, where the boy kneels and the girl sits on his knee:

Monkey in a tree, where the girl hangs on the boy’s back:

Baby in a cradle, where the boy stands and holds the girl in his arms:

To play, each pair stands together in the open play area. A caller calls out two or three poses in any order, and the pairs must hit each pose in order, ending on the last pose and holding it. The last pair to hit the last pose is eliminated. Play continues until only one couple remains, the winners!

So, for example, the caller might call out, all at once, “Bird on a perch, baby in a cradle, monkey in a tree!” Each pair must first hit the bird on a perch pose, then the baby in a cradle pose, then the monkey in a tree pose. Last pair to hit the monkey in a tree pose is out. The caller is also the judge who decides who was last.

The caller can come up with any combination, like “Baby in a cradle, bird on a perch, monkey in a tree!” Or “Monkey in a tree, bird on a perch, monkey in a tree!” For added difficulty, call out more than three poses at a time!

What it is: A game where players step on balloons tied to each other’s ankles!

Best for: 5 to 12 players

What you need:

• String
• One balloon per player per round
• A big open space to play (indoors is ideal)

How to play: To set up, tie a balloon to each player’s ankle with a short piece of string. There should be at least a few inches of string from the ankle to the balloon so the balloon can bounce along the ground.

Have all your players carefully stand at the edges of the play area. At “go,” all players rush forward and try to stomp each other’s balloons so they pop. When your balloon pops, you’re eliminated from the game. Go sit or stand along the sidelines and watch until there’s only one player remaining with a balloon on their ankle: the winner!

Some rules: No touching the balloons, and you might want to set up clear guidelines up front about pushing or shoving.

Variations: This game is similar to floppy sock tag, but for sure a lot noisier!

What it is: A quiet, low-activity big-group game of speed

Best for: Older kids and up, and at least 10 players

What you need:

• A dice
• Two balloons

How to play: Divide your players into two even teams. Have one team sit cross-legged on the floor in a line, side by side, creating one long line. Have your second team sit the same way, with their backs to the first team’s backs. So you should have two parallel lines, one line for each team, with their backs to each other.

Next everyone holds hands with the two teammates on either side of them. Go to one end of the lines where each team will have an end person. Say, for example, Team 1 has Nicolas and Team 2 has Inez. Give Nicolas and Inez each a balloon to hold in their free hand. They should hold the balloon in their hand but keep their hand and balloon down on the ground beside them, not in their lap.

Go to the other end of the lines, which will be the starting point. Eric on Team 1 and Louise on Team 2 are there. You as referee sit next to Eric and Louise with a dice in your hand. Start rolling the dice, making sure to hold it where only Eric and Louise (by turning their heads) can see it.

As soon as you roll a 1, Eric and Louise each squeeze their teammates’ hand. Those teammate number 2s will pass the squeeze on to the player next to them, and so on and so on down the line, until, like an electric current, Nicolas and Inez will feel their hands squeezed.

As soon as Nicolas or Inez feels a squeeze, he or she holds up their balloon high as quickly as possible. The first team to raise their balloon wins. (You as referee make the call.)

Have everyone rotate (so Eric and Louise would move to the end of the line, holding the balloons, and those teammate number 2s move up to be the first in line, the players watching the dice). Then go again.

That’s your gameplay! Play until each player has had a chance to be both the balloon-holder and the dice-watcher, then tally up each team’s points and declare a winner!

One rule is no talking is allowed. Players should not be clued in that an electric current has started before it reaches them. (So Eric and Louise should refrain from gasping in excitement if the referee rolls a 1.)

Variations: Instead of rolling a dice, you could also flip a coin. When it lands on heads, the first players start passing the squeeze down.

And instead of having players hold up balloons, you could put only one hand-sized object, like a water bottle or a tennis ball, at the end of the line, equidistant from Nicolas and Inez. Whichever of them grabs and holds up the tennis ball first wins.

What it is: A simple game of chance where you try not to get a face full of water

Best for: A small to big group

What you need:

• Small cup
• Water to put in the cup
• Slips of paper
• Drinking straw (optional)

How to play: Fill your cup with just a tiny amount of water. You could even dip a drinking straw in another cup of water, put your finger over the top, and release the water in the straw in an empty cup.

Choose one person to be It. How about José? Everyone else sits in a circle around the room and José stands in the middle and holds the cup of water.

José chooses a category. You can use the categories list in the word generator (or the categories post has some lists, too) for ideas if you want.

Let’s say the category José chooses is mythological creatures. José announces the category to everyone, then secretly thinks of an item in the category, like a dragon. He writes down “dragon” on a slip of paper, folds it up, and puts it down where no one can read it.

José then starts with one player, like Evie. Standing in front of her with the water cup ready, he has her name an item in the category. Evie says “hippogriff” so José moves on to the next player, Sophia. She says “Big Foot.” José moves to the next player, John, who says “dragon.” So John gets a face full of water. José just tosses it in his face. Then José shows everyone the paper with “dragon” on it, to prove that he did indeed come up with that word beforehand and not just pretend he had picked dragon because he doesn’t like John.

So, in summary, the player who names It’s pre-selected item gets the cup of water in their face. Then that person gets a turn to be It and think of a new category.

You can add a rule that, if any player takes more than 3 seconds to name an item, they get the face full of water. Also, the person who’s It keeps going around and around the circle until someone guesses the item.

Enjoy the suspense that comes from hoping a cup of water doesn’t get thrown in your face!

What it is: A get-to-know-you game, a game to get people to share facts about themselves

Best for: A shower or a class or other group get-together where players are meeting each other for the first time

What you need:

• A roll of toilet paper

How to play: To start, have everyone sit down in a circle. Hand the toilet paper roll to one player and tell them to take as much as they think they will need and keep it. If they ask, “What’s it for?” just say, “Take as much as you think you will need.” Don’t give any guidance as to how much toilet paper they should unroll.

After the first player unrolls their toilet paper, tell them to hand the toilet paper roll to the next person and pass the message down to take some toilet paper, again with no guidance on how much toilet paper to take, just “Take as much as you think you will need.” Don’t tell players what it’s for. If they ask, say a game and nothing more.

Once all of your players have a wad of toilet paper, announce how the game works: each person must go around the room and share facts about themselves, one fact per square of toilet paper they unrolled. Some players might have taken big wads, while some might have taken just a few squares. Either case, each square of toilet paper equals one fact.

You could have some questions handy to ask in case people run out of ideas. Check out the word generator or the get to know you questions post for some ideas!

It’s just a simple activity to, well, trick people into sharing lots of facts about themselves.

Variations: Instead of toilet paper, you could use a jar of small objects, like coins, M&Ms, or paper clips. Still tell players to take as many as they think they will need. The toilet paper throws in a humor factor, though.

Best for: A small group of players (3 to 6), big kids to adults

What you need: 

• All-purpose baking flour
  
• A cup
• A penny
• A pie tin, cookie sheet, or baking dish
• A butter knife

How to play: To set up the game, pack the cup tightly with flour. Then carefully turn the cup over in the pie tin and gently pull it back, leaving a cup-shaped stack of flour in the middle of the pie tin. Then very carefully place the penny on top of the stack, right in the middle, like this:

To play, players take turns slicing a chunk of flour away with the butter knife while everyone watches. If a player tries to slice away a chunk that’s too thin, the rest of the players can vote to make the player go again.

Eventually the penny will fall. The last player who touched the flour stack before the penny falls loses and, as punishment, has to dig the penny out of the flour using only their teeth. They’ll inevitably end up with a white powdery face, so you might want some paper towels (and a camera) handy. If you want to play again, set up a new stack with new flour and go for it!

I’ve played this game as part of a trivia game, too. Players had to answer questions, and if someone answered a question incorrectly they had to cut away a slice of flour. If you answered the question correctly, you didn’t have to cut away the flour and so didn’t have to risk getting flour all over your face/in your mouth. 

If you don’t like the idea of putting a piece of money in your mouth, you can play with a piece of candy like a Sweet Tart or a jelly bean. The money is just more difficult, resulting in more laughs (except for the poor person with their face in the flour).

Speaking of the poor person with their face in the flour, someone inevitably will try shoving their head from behind as they bend over the flour pile, pushing their face into the flour, making an even bigger mess, and possibly losing the penny even more. If you want your players to play nice, make sure you set up your rules (like no touching the flour-digging player) at the beginning.

What it is: An active game involving hopping and rock-paper-scissors

Best for: A big group (at the very least 8 players) in a gym

What you need:

• 20 to 30 hula hoops
• Optional: Painter’s tape to secure the hula hoops to the floor
  

How to play: This game is easily demonstrated through a video, so let’s just start with one right off the bat:

Now that you get the idea, lets talk specifics! First, setup. Place or tape your hula hoops on the ground, creating one long trail of hula hoops that can wind and curve across the gym. There should be room on each end of the trail for a line of players to stand.

Divide your players evenly into two teams and send each team to line up at either end of the hula hoop trail. Then you’re ready to start the game!

Let’s say on Team 1 we have Simon at the front of the line, and on Team 2 we have Mary. At “go,” Simon and Mary start hopping down the hula hoop trail, landing once in each hula hoop. When they meet each other, they play a quick round of rock-paper-scissors. (If they tie, they play again quickly until someone wins.)

Say Mary wins. The loser of rock-paper-scissors (Simon) then leaves the hula hoop trail, going back to the end of his team’s line. Mary gets to continue hopping up the hula hoop trail, trying to get to the opposing team’s starting point.

As soon as Simon leaves the trail, the next player in Team 1’s line (we’ll call him Jacob) starts hopping down the trail. When Mary and Jacob meet, they play rock-paper-scissors. Say Mary wins. Then Mary continues hopping down the trail, Jacob goes to the end of his team’s line, and Jacob’s team sends another player hopping right away.

The game ends when someone reaches the end of the hula hoop trail (the starting point for the other team).

It’s a great game because it works for any age. If your players are too young to play rock-paper-scissors, have a buddy walk with them and play rock-paper-scissors for them. And there’s really not much skill involved. Sure, some kids might be faster hoppers than others, but anyone (even the youngest players) can win at rock-paper-scissors. So it’s a great mixed-age group game.

Also, it’s so fun! For some reason players just get so excited when a teammate wins at rock-paper-scissors. Much cheering occurs. So much suspense! So much intensity! So much hopping! This game is a keeper.

Source: I learned about the game from Eric Branch. His video of his gym class playing is great! It went viral. Thanks for the great game, Eric!

What it is: A long-term game of stealth and elimination

Best for: A big group of players at an event or place together over several days or longer, like at a dorm over a semester of college, at a week-long camp, or at a family reunion

What you need: In this variation, you need stickers – the circular red, yellow, green, and blue label stickers work very well. You’ll need a few stickers per player.

How to play: This game is meant to be played over several days or even weeks. Players eliminate others from the game until the group of players gets smaller and smaller, resulting in only one champion.

You’ll need a moderator to set up the game and not play because it involves creating top-secret targets.

If you’re the moderator, first get a list of everyone who wants to play. Players need to commit; you can’t have players just deciding to drop out after a while. So get your list of committed players.

Randomly assign each player another player’s name (this will be the player’s target). You want to make sure no one is assigned their own name, and that all of the names assigned create a big “loop.” For example, if you have Harry, Ginny, Fred, Hermione, Ron, and George playing, you don’t want the assigned names to look like this:

See how that creates two separate circles? Instead you want one big loop, like this:

The easiest way to do this if you have a lot of players is write each player’s name on a separate strip of paper. Shuffle them well and then draw the first one. Write that player’s name down.

Then draw the next name and write that name as player 1’s target:

Write player 2’s name down on the next line:

Draw the next name:

Go until you’ve used up all of your names. For the last name on the list, assign them player 1 as a target.

Then you need to top-secretly deliver the targets to your players. Write each target’s name on a piece of paper and deliver it to the correct player, making sure no one knows who has who. Each player should know the name of their target and that’s it.

You’ll also need to deliver your method of elimination – we’ll call them “death stickers.” Give each player a strip of stickers. Tell your players to have the paper with the name of their target and their death stickers on their person at all times, or as much as possible.

When everyone has their assassination assignment and their death stickers, the game can start! Here are the rules:

• Players eliminate their targets by secretly sticking a sticker on the target’s body somewhere.
• If you are caught in the act of sticking on a sticker, it doesn’t count.
• When an assassin eliminates a target, the assassin receives the eliminated player’s target as their own.
• Players can eliminate only their own target, not anyone else’s.

You might need to make additional rules for your specific players and situation, like no killing people in the dormitories or during Potions class.

Let’s take a sample game with our players up above, even though a real game would ideally have many more players.

Harry’s target is Ginny. He confides this to his friend Ron. Ron’s target, however, is Harry. So Ron lies and tells Harry he’s targeting Fred. They agree to help each other.

Harry tries to find an opportunity to eliminate Ginny. This turns out to be not too hard since she has a crush on him. He finds a chance to talk to her alone in the corridor, and then, when she turns her head, he sticks a death sticker on her shoulder. Ginny doesn’t notice and after a moment Harry points it out. Ginny is horrified to realize she’s been eliminated. (Harry feels a little bad, but he’s determined to win.)

Ginny’s out of the game, and she hands Harry her slip of paper with her target’s name on it and her extra death stickers. Harry is a little surprised to learn his new target is Fred. (Remember, Ron told Harry that Ron’s target was Fred.) Harry immediately is distrusting of Ron and, when Ron asks Harry who his new target is, Harry lies and says he has George.

Hermione, meanwhile, is working on a way to eliminate Ron. She finds a relatively easy way to do this by sneakily pushing his books on the floor. When he bends to pick them up, she sticks a death sticker on his back without him noticing. Ron is bummed, but gives Hermione his slip of paper with Harry’s name and his extra death stickers.

Harry thinks he’s found a way to sneak up behind Fred and eliminate him, but when Fred turns around Harry realizes he’s actually stickered George. It doesn’t count since George isn’t Harry’s target. George has now figured out that Harry is targeting Fred and agrees to help him if Harry will help George eliminate his target, Hermione.

After class one day, Harry pulls Hermione aside to ask her a question about his History of Magic essay. George, meanwhile, is sneaking in the corridor behind them. He stealthily sticks a sticker on Hermione’s arm, but not stealthily enough, because Hermione catches him in the act. George’s attempt fails and now Hermione knows to be on her guard around George.

Since George wasn’t successful in eliminating Hermione, he decides to break his pact with Harry and tells Fred that Harry has his name. Now Fred knows to be on his guard around Harry, and Harry starts finding it very difficult to eliminate him.

Hermione finds a chance to eliminate Harry when he’s tired after Quidditch practice one evening. Now Hermione’s new target is Fred. Before Fred can realize Harry’s out of the game, Hermione eliminates Fred, too, leaving only George and Hermione in the game.

Harry and Ron agree to help Hermione, but George has Fred working for him. It takes several days of stalking and stealth before Harry and Ron distract Fred and Hermione has a clear shot at George in the common room. He doesn’t catch her sticking on her death sticker, and a few moments later she points it out. George hands Hermione his slip of paper, which actually has Hermione’s name on it. This means that Hermione has won.

(Go, Hermione!)

So alliances might happen. Be prepared for betrayal, conspiracies, and deceit. Some players will be more skilled than others. And only one champion will remain in the end…

Good luck, agents.

What it is: A challenge where players race each other to see who can be the fastest to eat a dangling donut

Best for: 5 to 8 players

What you need: 

• One donut per person
• String to suspend the donuts with
• A long stick like a mop or broom handle

How to play: First, you’ll need to do some set up. Count out a donut for each person who’ll be playing. Then cut an approximately two-foot length of string for each donut.

Tie a string through the whole of each donut, careful not to pull too tight so as to not rip the donut. Tie the other end of the string around the pole and space the strings at least a foot apart from each other.

To start the game, have two people hold the pole so the donuts hang at mouth-height of the players. It’s better to be slightly too low than too high.

Have all players come and stand in front of a donut. It might be good to have strings of varying lengths so players can select, based on their height, which donut hangs best next to their mouth.

Once each player has a donut, have all players put their hands behind their back and say go!

Then all the players race to see who can eat their donut the fastest. The trick is no hands are allowed, so players can use only their mouths to eat. With the donuts hanging freely, this is trickier than it sounds! Good laughter is sure to ensue from all spectators.

The first player to finish their whole donut without dropping any on the floor and chew it up and swallow the whole thing wins! (If it drops on the floor, you’re eliminated.) Then the winner gets to eat all the rest of the donuts! (kidding)

If you live in Texas, make sure you use Shipley’s donuts. They’re totally the best.

Have fun!

What it is: A reverse of the game catchphrase. Instead of one person talking while everyone else guesses, it’s the opposite; everyone talks while one person guesses. (Head on over to catchphrase if you don’t know how to play.)

Best for: 5 to 10 players

What you need: 

• A list of catchphrase words or, even better, an app or website like my word generator would be really handy.
• A chalkboard, dry erase board, or TV screen to display words on

How to play: First, your setup. You need some surface to display words on where everyone in the room can see it, except for one person who will sit with their back to the word. We’ll call that person Dave.

If you have a board to write on, have Dave sit with his back to it and have a list of words ready to write on the board.

We’ve played before with my word generator app and an Apple TV. We just Airplay the app up to the TV so it’s easy to tap and display new words. (If you have an Android you can also cast to, for example, a Google Chromecast.) Dave would sit or stand to the side of the TV, with his back to it.

As part of your set up, you can also divide your players into two teams.

Dave’s team goes first and, as said, sends Dave up to sit with his back to the TV (or board). Write or display your first word on the board or screen, say “go,” and start a 30-second or 1-minute timer. Dave’s team reads the first word, which is “monster.” Then they all try as fast as they can, with talking only and no acting, to get Dave to guess the word.

• “A big hairy thing that chases kids and hides in closets!”
• “Sulley and Mike from that Pixar movie!”
• “Kids are scared this is hiding under their bed!”
• “Oscar and Elmo and Grover from Sesame Street are all…”

It will probably be pretty crazy, as you can imagine, with everyone shouting. Just like in regular catchphrase, players aren’t allowed to say any form of the word “monsters” or any word that contains “monsters” (like Monsters, Inc.).

As soon as Dave says “monster,” write or show a new word on the board or screen. Everyone keeps going until the timer runs out. Then tally up the points Dave’s team got (the number of words they guessed correctly) and let the other team have a turn.

It’ll be crazy and include a lot of shouting, but that’s all part of the fun!

For a list of word ideas to use, check out my online word generator or download the app (available for iOS or Android), or visit the catchphrase post or the printables page for some PDFs you can download.

Variations: Catchphrase, of course, is a variation. The game celebrities also has some catchphrase elements to it.

What it is: A lung-powered cross between air hockey and ping-pong, played around a table

Best for: 4 to 8 players, divided into two teams, and any age

What you need:

• A table big enough for all your players to gather around
• A ping-pong ball
• A drinking straw for each player (optional)

How to play: First, set up your playing area. Divide the table in half, one half for each team. If your table has a seam down the middle, that’s nice and convenient. You could also use a strip of masking tape. Then have your players surround the table. You want players’ heads to be at table level, so the best way to do this is have players kneel around the table. Young children might stand. If you’re using a coffee table, maybe players could sit.

If you don’t have enough players to completely surround the table, stack books or lay another type of barrier across the open sides.

Once you have your teams assigned and your players in place, put the ping-pong ball in the middle of the table and say “go.”

The object of the game is to blow the ping-pong ball off the opposing team’s side of the table. So everyone bends down, takes a deep breath, and blows! The ping-pong ball will shoot around the table, being blown around until it sneaks past a player onto the floor. That player’s team loses the round, the other team gets a point, and a new round can start.

You can let players blow into straws (thick smoothie straws work especially well) if you want to let them more precisely direct the direction of their blowing. No straws works just fine, too. Try both ways and see which one you like more.

One rule: Players are not allowed to touch the table at all. So no hands on the table, and no pressing your body against the edge of the table to keep the ping pong ball from falling. (If you find the game too difficult this way, you can modify the rules to fit your players.)

It’s a game so fun, it will take your breath away! (Sorry. I couldn’t resist.) Seriously, though, it can involve a lot of exhaling. Make sure no one passes out! (Though I often end up laughing so hard I can’t blow the ping pong ball anyway!)

What it is: A mash-up movie guessing game that takes some creativity

Best for: Teens to adults

What you need: 

• You might find the IMDb or a list of movie titles helpful

How to play: Can you name this movie?

A snobbish phonetics professor agrees to a wager that he can take a flower girl’s innocent pet cocker spaniel and make her presentable in high society before a streetwise downtown mutt falls in love with her first.

Sound a little wacky? Well, it’s not a real movie. It’s a mash-up! A made-up summary of a combination of two movie titles that share a word…

My Fair Lady and the Tramp!

The summary combines parts of the movie My Fair Lady (1964), a movie about a phonetics professor passing off a flower girl in high society, with Lady and the Tramp (1955), a movie about an innocent pet cocker spaniel falling in love with a streetwise downtown mutt.

That’s the game! Take turns with your friends coming up with summaries of mashed-up movies and see if you can guess. See how wacky they get. Do you want some more examples?

A high school student time travels to a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, where rebels are battling against a mean bully and his fleet of star ships, so they must stop the Empire from preventing his parents from meeting and falling in love.

A father and daughter attempt to defend their flock of orphaned Canada Geese from idiotic burglars during the holidays.

The Soviet Union’s best submarine captain in their newest sub violates orders and heads for the U.S., while a coal miner’s son with an interest in rocketry attempts to track down the sub and find out if the captain is trying to defect or start a war.

And then, finally, one from my brother-in-law that’s a bit of a stretch and might be a little tricky…

“Crouch, I say, crouch! Now you—hide!”

Guess all four movie titles in this post and I’ll give you a free escape room kit from my site!

Or do you have a movie title or summary to share? Post it in the comments! Maybe you can come up with a summary for one of these wacky combinations:

• The Corpse Bride of Frankenstein
• Black Beauty and the Beast
• October Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
• The Great Escape to Witch Mountain
• A Little Princess Bride
• We’re Back to the Future
• It’s a Wonderful Life is Beautiful
• Treasure Planet of the Apes
• Star Wars of the Worlds
• Shark Tale of Two Cities
• Finding Neverland Before Time
• She’s the Man for All Seasons
• The Swan Princess Bride
• Forever Young Frankenstein
• Mighty Joe Young Indiana Jones
• Jungle 2 Jungle Book
• Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey to the Center of the Earth

One last bonus, here’s a printable list of more mashed-up movie summaries with answers. You can give the list to a group and see who can get the most right. It would be a great movie night activity!

Best for: All ages, and pretty much any group size

What you need: 

• A roll of masking tape

How to play: Start by tearing a small strip of masking tape for each person. Loop the strips to make a piece of tape sticky on all sides, then have each person stick the piece of tape right on the end of his or her nose.

Game play is very simple. Two players walk up to each other, press the tape on their noses together, and pull back.

The tape pieces will stick together and one person will end up losing their tape, with both pieces sticking to the other player’s nose. The person who lost their tape is out of the game. Meanwhile, the person with two pieces of tape goes up to challenge another player. If they keep their tape, they go on and challenge someone else. Any player who loses their tape is eliminated. Eventually the winners will collect bigger and bigger wads of comical-looking tape on the ends of their noses, until the last two players face each other and one person is left with a giant wad of tape on the end of his or her nose, the winner!

Rules: Except for at the beginning when players are first sticking the tape on their noses, they are not allowed to touch the tape with their hands at all. At the beginning, they are free to press their tape on their nose as much as they want. When two players approach each other to touch tape, they aren’t allowed to touch each other (to prevent cheating).

It’s a short, simple, kind of silly game that will probably get lots of giggles. It would be a very interesting icebreaker, but it’s also fun for a family reunion (it works great with mixed ages) or a group of people who know each other well.

What it is: A toss-and-catch game played outside with water balloons

Best for: At least 4 players

What you need: 

• Players will form pairs, and each pair needs a beach towel
• A good supply of water balloons, because hopefully a lot of them will pop and get your players wet (because where’s the fun if that doesn’t happen?)
  
• Optional: A volleyball net or homemade volleyball net (e.g., a line strung across the yard)

How to play: So first let’s cover a basic water balloon toss. Two players toss a water balloon back and forth with just their hands, trying not to miss or they’ll get splattered with water.

With this version, players don’t use their hands but a beach towel instead. Players form pairs of two, and each pair holds a beach towel. Players hold the short ends and spread out the beach towel between them like this:

If you put a water balloon in one pair’s beach towel, they can lower their beach towel and, by lifting their hands quickly, pop the water balloon into the air. If they aim towards a second pair of players, that pair can catch the water balloon by cradling it in their own beach towel.

So that’s one way to play, if you only have four players. Two pairs of players toss a water balloon back and forth to each other, catching it in their beach towels, trying not to let it pop.

You can also play with more people and set up your game more like a traditional volleyball game, even over a real volleyball net. Put an even number of pairs on each side of the net to form two teams. Then play just like normal volleyball. Instead of trying to pass the water balloon to someone, the players who pop the water balloon into the air will try to land it on the other team’s side and make it pop.

If a water balloon lands on the ground or pops on a team’s side, the other team gets a point. If a pair of players tosses a water balloon out of your pre-set game bounds, the other team gets a point. It is legal to toss the water balloon to another beach towel on your own side, as long as you don’t let it drop. You can play to a max point value or until you’re out of water balloons. Switch up the teams or pairs every now and then if you want!

It’s a less skilled version of volleyball with hopefully more laughs, and a good chance to practice teamwork, with players working in both pairs and teams. Also, hopefully you’ll get wet. Best played on hot, sunny days. Have fun!

Best for: Teens and above, and at the very least six players (preferably more like 12). You also need an even number of players and one player to be the referee.

What you need:

• A playing area: somewhere large and flat like a gym, a large room, or a big slab of concrete
• A way to mark squares on the floor. Painter’s tape or masking tape is great for this (or chalk if you’re outside).
• A pen and paper to keep score
• Optional: A way to distinguish teams from one another. Three bandanas of one color and three of another (or scrimmage vests in two colors) would work great for this.

How to play: First, prepare your playing area.

You want a giant human-sized tic-tac-toe board on the ground. You can start by taping out your typical tic-tac-toe board with strips of tape. Aim to have each square about 3 feet by 3 feet.

Now, in the middle of each of your nine squares, tape a smaller rectangle, just big enough to hold one pair of feet.

If you want, you can skip the first step and forego the long tape lines. The most important part is a 3 by 3 grid of small rectangles just big enough for one person to stand in. Also, tape two lines parallel to and on opposite sides of the grid, spaced a few feet back from the grid:

Next, prepare your players.

First divide them into two even teams. If you have scrimmage vests to wear, assign each team a color and have them put on their vests. Next, give each player a number. Assign a number 1 on each team, a number 2 on each team, a number 3 on each team, and so on. So each player will have, on the opposing team, a counterpart with a matching number. Each player needs to remember his or her number. You as a referee might want to write down the numbers on a piece of paper so you know which numbers are assigned to players.

Have the teams stand behind the lines on opposite sides of the grid, like this:

If you’re playing with bandanas, assign each team a color and put the bandanas on the floor between the teams and the grid.

As a referee, sit or stand off to the side so you can clearly see the grid and both teams. Now you’re ready to start!

To begin, call out three numbers. The three players with those numbers on each team run forward, grab a bandana (if you have bandanas), and try stand on open squares to form a three in a row. The first team to get three in a row wins! With two teams competing for open spots, though, there’s a fair amount of running, teamwork, and communication involved. Still, it shouldn’t take more than a few seconds until one team has made three in a row.

The only row teams are not allowed to use is the one closest to them:

Any other row of three is fair game, for example:

Once one team has scored, mark them a point, send all the players back, put the bandanas back on the ground, and call three more numbers for the next round.

It’s handy to have all the players’ numbers written down because you can mark how many times you call each number so all the players get an even amount of playing time.

The bandanas or scrimmage vests are handy because they make it very easy for players to see and remember whose team they’re on. If you’re using bandanas, players can also hold their bandanas up in the air as soon as they form a row of three, making it easier for you as referee.

After a while you can change up teams, if you like. At the end of your desired playing time, tally up the points and declare a winner!

It’s a simple game, rule wise, with enough strategy to keep it interesting but fast-paced enough to keep it fun. It’s a great game for a big youth group to play.

Enjoy!

Variations: Another variation of the classic tic-tac-toe is 3D triple-decker tic-tac-toe. Ultimate tic-tac-toe brings even more strategy to the game.

What it is: A hilarious game! It’s quick-paced, low-strategy, and involves big groups, shouting, and finding your two teammates as quickly as you can.

Best for: A big group, I would say at least 12. You also need players in multiples of three.

What you need:

• You will need specific word lists to play this game. But I’ve got you covered! At the end of the post are some free downloadable lists you can play with.
• Other than that, you need a big area to hold all of your players and, depending on how you play, seats around the outside to sit in. There don’t necessarily have to be enough seats to hold everyone, and they can be couches, chairs, benches, anything.

How to play: To play three deep, first, make sure you have the correct number of players. You need players in groups of three, so 12, 15, 18, etc.

The word lists have words in sets of three, like pig, horse, cow (farm animals), or Spanish, French, Italian (languages), or square, circle, triangle (shapes).

Everyone will end up getting one word, and their goal is to find their two matching counterparts as quickly as possible. The last group of three to find each other is eliminated.

To start, cut your word list into paper strips and fold them. (There are instructions down below about the best way to cut up the word list.) Put the paper strips in a bowl and let everyone pick one.

Let everyone read their word quietly to themselves. Then call “go” and the pandemonium begins.

Everyone starts shouting their word as loudly as possible. Players can use hand motions, too. Inevitably all the players end up in a big clump as everyone mingles, trying to find their two matching buddies as quickly as they can.

As soon as a group of three has found each other, they move to the edge of the room and take a seat, but all in one chair on each other’s laps (this is where the “three deep” name comes from). You’ll notice on the paper slips there are letters next to the words: B, M, and T. These stand for bottom, middle, and top. The person with the B slip sits on the chair. The person with the M slip sits on that person’s lap. And the person with the T slip sits on that person’s lap, creating a stack, three deep.

Now, you might not want to play with players sitting on each other’s laps. That’s okay; you can do a variation. Instead of players sitting on each other’s laps, you could have them all sit at the edge of the room on the floor, cross-legged, back to back (to back). Or you could have them go and stand three in a row with their backs against the wall. The important thing is to give them a place to go and a position to stand or sit in that is easily recognizable as done. If you just told them to form groups of three standing up, for example, it doesn’t work so well because you can’t easily tell which group is last.

Anyway, if you choose to play with a no-sitting-on-laps variation, you can use this version of the word lists that have 1, 2, and 3 next to the words, instead of B, M, and T.

Once everyone has found their groups of three, eliminate the group that was last and go again! Prepare new word slips in a new bowl, yell “go” and start again. See if you can keep playing until only one group remains.

Preparing the game: Preparing the word slips the right way will make your job as host a lot easier. I made a video showing the easiest way to prepare these:

Alternatively, instead of handing out new words after each round, you can reuse them. Have everyone who wasn’t eliminated hand their paper slips back and forth to each other. Have them do this while mingling around, passing slips several times, trying to switch things up enough. The words won’t be new, but hopefully there’s enough randomizing to make a new unique round.

Printables: Here are the printable word lists you can use to play the game. There are two versions: one with the slips labeled B, M, T if you’re playing with sitting on laps, and one labeled 1, 2, 3 if you want to play with a variation with no lap-sitting. There are word lists divided by difficulty level (easy, medium, and hard) and some other categories as well.

I also have a version of the game for Christmas, and one in Spanish!

Source: I found out about the game from this post from the blog 71 Toes. She even has a video that illustrates the game very well.

Best for: Teens to adults

What you need:

• Only a list of words (and I’ve got plenty for you)

How to play: You play password with two teams of two. There’s one word (the password) that one player on each team knows, and both are trying to get their teammate to guess the word first by taking turns giving one-word clues.

Here’s how it works.

Let’s say our players are Ben and Brooke (on one team) and Dan and Donna (on the other team).

Each team chooses one player to go first. We’ll say Ben and Dan. Using a word generator or paper slips or cards with words written on them, one word is chosen, the word that will be the password for both of them. We’ll say it’s “key.”

Ben and Dan both know the password, while it’s kept secret from Brooke and Donna.

Once Ben and Dan both know the password, the game can start. One of them will go first, say Ben. He gets a chance to get his teammate Brooke to guess the password. The trick is, Ben can only give a one-word clue. He might say “lock.” With her one-word clue, Brooke thinks and makes a one-word guess as to what the password might be. She might say, “door?” Because she guesses incorrectly, it’s now Dan and Donna’s turn.

Dan can now give Donna a one-word clue. He might say “metal.” Now Donna has the benefit of knowing Dan’s clue (metal) as well as Ben’s (lock). But she might still guess incorrectly and say, “safe?”

Now it’s Ben’s turn again. He thinks hard and gives the clue “unlock.” It’s Brooke’s turn to guess, and now she has three clues to work with: lock, metal, and unlock. That might be enough for her to correctly guess, “key?”

Play goes back and forth between the two teams, as many turns as it takes, until someone guesses the password. Once someone correctly guesses the password, the round is over, that team gets a point, and you start another round. Switch roles first, so Brooke and Donna are giving the clues and Ben and Dan are guessing. Every two rounds, switch which team goes first.

That’s the basic gameplay! It’s simple and might even seem boring, but it can actually get really funny. You might have seen the game played on the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon.

Depending on how you play, the game might also be a fun test as to how well two players know each other. If you are OK with using shared knowledge as clues, the more you know about your partner and the way they think, the better chance you have of figuring out their clues. For example, once when my husband and I were playing, the password was stomp. The other team had given the clue foot, and it was my turn to give my husband a clue. Our three-year-old daughter was going through a very stubborn phase where she was apt to throw mini tantrums, so I only had to say Annelise for my husband to know exactly what I was talking about.

As for what words to use, the word lists for catchphrase, either easy or medium, might work well. My online or app form word generator is a great resource. Multi-meaning words like organ and wave are always interesting, because the clue-givers can say any one-word clue they want, even if they use a different definition of the password that has previously been used. The same goes for words like coach or bruise that can be either verbs or nouns.

Rules: Like in catchphrase, rhyming words are not allowed as clues. So, for example, if the password were sassy and someone, after a few rounds, tried to use the word Lassie as a clue, that would be against the rules, because sassy and Lassie have no relation except for the fact that they rhyme (well, unless you have a pet dog named Lassie with some serious sass). The same goes for using clue words simply because they have the same first letter as the password.

There are lots of other rules that many readers have shared! Check out the comments below for some. I think when you play with your friends and family, if you are serious about the rules, clarify them all with everyone beforehand and be prepared to settle disputes if they arise.

Variations: The game is similar to catchphrase.

Best for: Two people or a small group, probably ages 8 and up

What you need: Nothing but your brains!

How to play: The basic gameplay is simple: one player thinks of an object and the other players try to guess what it is. For this game, it’s best if there’s a pre-determined category, like food, people, animals, etc. The category that has worked the best for us is people.

But let’s play with food and say Julie thinks of banana bread.

She’s playing with Laura, who, unlike in twenty questions, makes guesses by naming a specific food. For example:

Laura: Is it an orange?

To give Laura a clue, Julie gives a statement starting “No, because…” Like this:

Julie: No, because it doesn’t grow on trees.

Laura guesses another specific food, and then another.

Laura: Is it lemonade?

Julie: No, because you don’t drink it.

Laura: Is it pizza?

Julie: No, because it’s sweeter.

Laura: Is it a strawberry?

Julie: No, because it’s manmade.

Laura: Is it a cookie?

At this point, when Laura’s guess is pretty close to Julie’s item, Laura can give a clue in the form of “No, but…”

Julie: No, but it is a baked good.

Laura keeps guessing until she gets it.

Laura: Is it…oh, I don’t know, banana bread?

Julie: Yes! Wow, good guess!

It can actually be a challenging game. It can be hard to come up with specific guesses when you know so little about the object in question. It can also be difficult to come up with clues that aren’t too easy and aren’t too hard. And it actually hasn’t worked too well with my young children. Carson, my six year old, often looses interest in guessing because it’s too hard or, when it’s his turn to give the clues, gives ones like these:

Me: Is it an eraser?

Carson: No, because it doesn’t erase things.

Me: Is it a stapler?

Carson: No, because it doesn’t staple things.

See my problem? So I would say this game is better suited for older children to adults who want a more challenging version of twenty questions with more thought involved.

Variations: This game, in addition to being like twenty questions, is also pretty similar to the game breakfast combo. (It actually started out as me trying to come up with a version of breakfast combo that my young children could play, because my husband and I play it together but it’s too difficult for them.) If you want another twenty questions variation that’s great for young kids, try poodle, which just might also get you laughing!

What it is: A people-watching game. If you’re thinking from the title that it’s a mean game, don’t worry. It’s not supposed to be at all.

Best for: One, two, or three people.

What you need:

• A place to people-watch. So a mall or airport or a big event like a sports game where there are lots of people to observe.

How to play: When you’re somewhere crowded where you want to pass the time, people watching is a great activity. It can be fun with friends, too. In this game, you look at the clothes other people are wearing and ask yourself, “Would I wear that?”

The goal isn’t to be mean or to judge others. It’s to think about yourself and what styles you like to wear, what you’d be willing to try, what you could or couldn’t pull off, what you think looks good on you and what doesn’t. So I guess it’s not so much of a people-watching game as an…outfit-watching game.

It might be informative, too. Maybe you might get some ideas about clothes you’ve always liked but haven’t ever tried. Maybe you just realize things about your taste that you’ve never noticed before. (For example, I realized that the harder it is to identify a color, the more I like it. Bright, obvious, bold royal blue – ew. But a shirt that’s kind of grayish-purpleish-brownish or maybe orangeish-pinkish-tanish? Love it.)

Variations: There are lots of variations to people-watching – basically sitting somewhere and watching strangers walk past. You could try to guess where they’re from or where they’re going (perfect for in an airport). You could try to invent a crazy exciting backstory for them. You could make it more of a scavenger hunt with a list of things to find. I’ve made some printables for a people-watching scavenger hunt you could play in an airport and one you could play on a date night.

What it is: A throwing and catching game for a small group. Players try to keep the ball away from one player (the “monkey”).

Best for: A small group, maybe 3 to 5.

What you need:

• A ball to throw and catch. It could be a kickball or an inflated ball. You could even play with a soccer ball that you kick and receive, or a frisbee or some other object.

How to play: Monkey in the middle is one of those simple games that’s easily variable. Players toss or kick a ball back and forth between them, but one extra player (the “monkey”) is left standing in the middle. The other players try to keep the ball away from the monkey. The monkey tries to grab the ball, earning him or her a place on the outside of the circle.

When the monkey grabs the ball, the last player to have touched it is now the monkey. You can decide on more specific rules, too. Does the monkey have to grab the ball, or will simply touching it count? You can adjust the rules and playing size to the ages of your players.

This is often one of those games that happens naturally to pass the time or (unfortunately) to bully someone else by keeping something they want away from them.

Don’t play like that. We all know it’s not nice.

But when played with people who agree by common consent to play, it can be a fun game that lasts for a while.

speed!

There is a commercial game called Bananagrams that’s essentially the same thing. I learned this game as Speed Scrabble first, and I’ve also heard it called Take Two.

Best for: A small group of people, maybe 4 to 6 players.

What you need:

• Letter tiles from a Scrabble game (but you won’t need the game board)

How to play: To set up your game, have everyone sit around a table or in a circle on the floor. Turn all of your Scrabble tiles face-down in the center of the circle and mix them all up. Then have each player pull out two tiles, keeping them face-down.

Someone starts the game by saying “go.” Then everyone turns over his or her pieces.

Each player will be building their own mini Scrabble grid in front of them. So when you turn over your pieces, start spelling with them as fast as you can. Once someone successfully uses all their tiles (and for this first round, that’s just two tiles), they shout “go.” Then everyone reaches forward and grabs another tile from the pile. Now you have three tiles, and you use all of them to build another Scrabble grid. Then, just like in the last round, whoever uses all three pieces together in one unbroken grid first calls “go,” and everyone takes another tile.

Each round you’ll get one more piece, making the grid larger and more complex. You can add the tiles you draw onto your existing grid, or, at any time, you can rearrange the whole thing. To call “go” you just need to use all of your tiles, and they all need to be connected in one unbroken grid.

This short video demonstrates part of a game and should make it a little clearer:

The goal is to use all your pieces, not leaving any out. The person who completes their whole Scrabble grid first when no more pieces are left wins. So it doesn’t matter if you’re ahead or behind for most of the game – all you need to do is be the first to finish and you win.

As for rules, blank tiles are wilds; you can use them for any letter. But it has to be the same letter for the whole Scrabble board, just like in real Scrabble. (But if you do decide to start over and change everything, you can switch the letter the wild stands for.) Players can challenge others’ words if they don’t think they’re real, and at the end the winner has to go through each of their words, proving that they didn’t cheat. It’s also often fun for everyone to say all their words out loud at the end, too.

Variations: Although I haven’t played with most of them, the Wikipedia page on Scrabble variants lists some other variations of Speed Scrabble that sound like they could be fun.

By the way, this post contains affiliate links. Thanks so much for your support!

What it is: A version of the six degrees of Kevin Bacon game – you’re basically trying to find links between actors via the movies they star in.

Best for: A small group, maybe up to six players. Two players work fine, too. You could even play by yourself.

What you need: Just your brains! If you want/need to cheat, IMDb would be a good resource.

How to play: My siblings and I would play this game on car trips or to kill time. We would start with someone naming an actor or actress. For example, Kate might name Anne Hathaway.

The next player, Michelle, would name another actor that Anne Hathaway appeared in a movie with. For example, Anne Hathaway appeared in Ella Enchanted with Cary Elwes. The next player might say that Cary Elwes appeared in The Princess Bride with Billy Crystal. It can be entertaining to simply name actors and movies and come up with a big long chain. This is also how you could play competitively. If someone on their turn can’t think of an actor and/or movie that hasn’t already been said, they’re eliminated from the game. The last player left wins.

In our version of the game, though, we played cooperatively. Our goal as a group was to get back to where we started (so in this game, Anne Hathaway). The whole loop might look like this:

• Anne Hathaway appeared in Ella Enchanted with Cary Elwes.
• Cary Elwes appeared in The Princess Bride with Billy Crystal.
• Billy Crystal was in in Monsters, Inc. with John Goodman.
• John Goodman appeared in The Borrowers with…with that boy who helped the Borrowers…what was his name? [Quick IMDB check] Bradley Pierce.
• Bradley Pierce appeared in Jumangi with Robin Williams.
• Robin Williams appeared in Night at the Museum with Dick Van Dyke.
• Dick Van Dyke appeared in Mary Poppins with Julie Andrews.
• Julie Andrews appeared in The Princess Diaries with…Anne Hathaway!

It can take a while, but that’s all part of the fun. We really didn’t play that seriously. Half the time we didn’t even know the actors’ names: it was “that guy from ___, the villain, you know?” And our loops probably could have been done more efficiently, but we didn’t care if it took a while. (Also, side note, it can take a while/be harder if you’re keeping your blog family-friendly by trying to name only PG or G movies.)

There are some rules you might want to consider. Can you mention a movie or actor if they’ve been said before? (We said no.) Does voice talent in animated movies count? (We said yes.) Does it count if you don’t know the name of the actor? (We said yes, because we weren’t huge movie buffs.) Do multiple movies in a series (for example, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets) count as the same movie? Do cameos count? Do TV shows count? If so, do guest stars count? Things like that.

Hope it can be an entertaining game for your and your family or friends!

What it is: A talking and guessing game for a large group of people. You’re assigned a character or person and you have to ask questions to other players until you figure out who you are.

Best for: A medium to large group of people, maybe 10 to 20.

What you need:

• You’ll need names of characters or people written on cards. These can be themed, like all Star Wars names or all Disney princesses. The broader the theme, the more difficult it will be. You can make your own cards (3×5 cards work great) or I provide some free printable cards at the bottom of the post.

How to play: Before you start, tape a different card on each player’s forehead with masking tape. Do it carefully so they can’t see the name. Once all of the players have a card taped to their forehead, announce the start of the game.

Players are free to mingle throughout the room, talking to each other and trying to figure out which character they have taped on their forehead. They’re allowed to ask yes or no questions, but that’s all. Once they guess correctly, they can remove the card and go stand to the side until everyone guesses their card. (Or they can continue to mingle, answering others’ questions to help them guess.)

Encourage players to move around and mingle and talk to more than one person. It can be a good way to get a variety of clues, and it makes the game more of an icebreaker. Also, sometimes some players may not be familiar with all of the names on the cards, so you might have to talk to multiple people to get enough clues to guess who you are.

If you want an example, let’s say you’re playing in a group where everyone has a Disney character taped to their forehead. Here are some of the questions you might ask and the answers you might receive:

Am I a hero? Yes…

Am I American? Not applicable.

Not applicable? Well, you speak Standard American English, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re American (especially in animated movies, right?).

Am I a person? Yes.

Am I from the past or the future? Present…maybe sort of past?

Am I a boy? Yes.

Am I CGI or animated? CGI.

Am I Woody? No.

Buzz Lightyear? No.

Am I the main character? Yes.

Do I have super powers? Um…no, I would say no.

Am I a grown man? Yes.

Do I play sports? No.

Do I save a girl? Yes.

Do I have a co-star? Yes, several.

Do I have a sidekick? Not really.

Do I sing any songs? No.

Thank heavens.

I’m good, right? At heart…

Am I not good on the surface? You could say that.

Do I have a love interest? No.

Um…give me a hint. Maybe you’re bad guy…but that does not mean you are bad guy…

Have you guessed it by now? (Side note: it’s one of my favorite Disney movies.) Leave a comment if you have!

Printables: I made a couple printables to get you started if you want to play this game. There’s a list of female and male Disney characters. (I broke it out by gender in case you have an all-girls sleepover party or something, or if you want to match gender to players.) I only used animated Disney movies, I included Pixar, and, though I didn’t include every movie or every character, there are definitely some obscure ones in there. Each card has the name of the character as well as the movie to make identifying the character easier. If there are some that you think are too difficult or that your group won’t be familiar with, just leave them out.

There are six cards to each 8.5×11 page. Just print and cut along the dotted lines. I would recommend printing on cardstock. Or, you could cut out the cards and mount them on 3×5 notecards.

Female Disney Character Cards

Male Disney Character Cards

If you play, let me know how it goes! Or let me know if you have any requests of character lists you would like to use. Happy playing!

What it is: A really simple game kids can play in a car. It’s not so much a game as an…activity to pass the time? Or a way to tease/persecute the person sitting in the middle of the backseat.

Best for: Three or four children, however many are sitting in the backseat of a car.

What you need:

• A car with a backseat and a road to drive on. The road also needs curves – sharp turns on residential streets are best. Highway driving, not so much.

How to play: In this game, players basically use the momentum of the car to squish each other.

It’s simple. When the car makes a left turn, everyone in the backseat leans as hard as they can to the right. When the car makes a right turn, everyone leans as hard as they can to the left. In theory I guess the passengers are just responding to the natural forces of momentum, but it’s more about exaggerating and slamming into each other as hard as you can.

This game is the least fun for the person in the middle. The people on the edges get smashed against the windows, true. But half the time they get to be the ones doing the smashing. That poor middle-seater? They just get smashed and smushed each and every turn the car makes. Same applies to the smallest person playing. I was younger and smaller than my cousins who taught me how to play. Guess who was smushed the most? Luckily, I’m the oldest of my siblings, so when it came time to teach my younger sisters how to play, I experienced sweet recompense.

The thing is, even when you’re getting squished, it’s kind of a fun game. And luckily the game never lasts longer than a car ride, so if you’re in the middle, the next time you get in, you can hustle for a window seat.

Good luck, and I hope you don’t get squished too bad.

What it is: A variation of twenty questions. It’s a little more complicated than twenty questions and involves more thought for both the guesser and the one answering the questions. So if you like twenty questions but it’s getting a little old, this’ll probably be the perfect game for you to try.

Best for: Two players.

What you need: Nothing! Those games are the best.

How to play: Just like twenty questions, this game starts with one player (we’ll call him Josh) thinking of an item to guess. Unlike twenty questions, it’s best if this item is pretty specific. So some good examples might be things like this:

• Your iPhone
• A garbage sack
• The shirt I’m wearing
• A Garmin GPS

Some not-so-good examples:

• Clouds
• Rocks
• A house

Does that make sense?

So, let’s say Josh is playing and he’s thinking of an item, and he comes up with his iPhone. Then the person he’s playing with, Paige, gets to start guessing, with the goal, of course, of guessing that the item is Josh’s iPhone.

In twenty questions, Paige would ask yes or no questions and try to deduce what the item would be from the provided clues. In breakfast combo, Paige just goes ahead and starts guessing things. They can start out random. It’s also good if these guesses are more specific rather than broad. So…

Paige: Is it a fireplace?

Because this is the first guess, this is what Josh says:

Josh: It’s more like a fireplace than anything you’ve guessed so far.

Then Paige gets to guess something else.

Paige: Is it a turtle?

Now Josh needs to decide if the item, his iPhone, is more similar to a turtle or a fireplace. Say he decides it’s more like a fireplace.

Josh: It’s more like a fireplace than a turtle, but, like a turtle…

And then Josh would fill in a clue, something that his iPhone and a turtle have in common. It could be anything he comes up with, like:

Josh: It’s more like a fireplace than a turtle, but, like a turtle, I’ve seen it.

So then Paige gets to guess something else.

Paige: Is it a campfire?

Josh answers the same way he did before.

Josh: It’s more like a fireplace than a campfire, but, like a campfire, it needs to be started.

Paige guesses again:

Paige: Is it a Sega Genesis game system?

In this case, Josh would probably decide that his iPhone is more like a Sega Genesis than anything else that Paige has guessed. So he says:

Josh: It’s more like a Sega Genesis than anything you’ve guessed so far.

(Here you can add a slight variation. Josh can either say the above sentence and leave it at that, or he could provide a reason, e.g., “It’s more like a Sega Genesis than anything you’ve guessed so far because it’s manmade.” The second option makes it easier for the guesser.)

Play goes on like that, with Paige guessing specific objects and Josh responding. If the item Paige just guessed is closest to the item Josh has in mind, Josh says, “It’s more like [current guess] than anything you’ve said so far.” If the item Paige just guessed isn’t as close to the item as something else she’s previously said, Josh says, “It’s more like [previous guess] than [current guess], but, like [current guess], [something current guess and item have in common].

As you might guess, it’s often just as challenging for Josh to come up with answers as it is for Paige to guess. It’s fun because it does provide some new variety to the classic game of twenty questions. It’s a great game to play in the car (which is where Paige and Josh play it most).

Variations: As stated, breakfast combo is a variation of twenty questions. It’s also very similar to no, because. For another, more creative/silly variation of 20 questions, try poodle!

Best for: A big group of teens. You need two or three minimum on a team, but what you really want is multiple teams of three or more players. Then the teams can all compete against each other.

What you need:

• To start, each team just needs one thing: a penny.
• This scavenger hunt also involves going door-to-door, so you either need to be in a neighborhood where the teams can walk the whole way, or you might want cars with drivers.
• If you’re playing with teens, you probably want an adult chaperone with each team, too.

How to play: To start, give each team a penny.

Then explain the game. Each team will take their penny and start going door-to-door. When they knock on a door and someone answers, they ask one simple question:

We’re doing a scavenger hunt activity. Can you give us anything bigger or better?

And they show the penny. Their goal is to exchange the penny for anything bigger or better that the homeowner wants to give them. Since this is so open-ended, it often leads to some funny results. You usually just end up with junk people want to give away, but that can make it funny, too. It might be an old stuffed animal, or a can of soup, or an empty cardboard box, or an ugly wooden chair.

Hopefully the people whose doors you knock on find it kind of entertaining, as well. You can leave them with the old item, or, if they don’t want it, you can take it with you. If someone doesn’t want to give you anything, just move on. Be courteous, kind, and grateful to everyone.

At the end of the predetermined game time, everyone meets back where you started to decide who has the biggest or best item of them all. You can award prizes if you want, maybe one for the biggest and one for the best, maybe one for the quirkiest and one for the most valuable. The end is the best part, with everyone telling funny stories and talking about all the crazy or random stuff they picked up that night. It’s a great time for refreshments or dessert, too! (And…you might need to end the whole night with someone making a donation trip to Goodwill.)

One option I wanted to mention: If you don’t want your teams going to strangers’ houses, you can always pre-arrange for them to go to homes of people you know. If you’re doing this with a youth group at a church, for example, you can let members of the congregation know beforehand that the youth will be doing this activity. Then you can assign each team their own houses to visit, or leave it up to the teams to visit whomever in the congregation they want.

I have some fun memories from playing this in my own youth group. Hopefully it can be a fun experience for you, too!

Variations: If you’re into scavenger hunts, I also have a post on photo scavenger hunts, and a series of posts for a two-person date night scavenger hunt.

What it is: A Thanksgiving tradition my mother-in-law always does. It’s a talking reflection activity, a great way to develop grateful hearts because it goes beyond the typical “Name one thing you’re grateful for this year.”

Best for: A group of people, any size, at a Thanksgiving dinner.

What you need:

• Slips of paper with different items you can be grateful for written down on them. I provide a free printable below. When my mother-in-law does it, they’re always cute crafty papers punched out the shape of leaves or shaped to look like little pilgrim boats or something. Mine are a kind of cheap imitation, but if you print them on cardstock and cut them out I think they might look okay. Feel free to use some of my word ideas and make your own cards as cute or as plain as you would like them to be.

How to play: The tradition is pretty simple. At Thanksgiving dinner, each guest will be given one card with different items you can be grateful for written on them. These can include things like family, home, food, sunshine and some that are more specific (like a random act of kindness). After everyone has eaten, go around the table and have each guest tell a story or explain the time they were most grateful for the item on their card.

My mother-in-law usually preassigns the cards by setting them at place settings. You could also have guests randomly draw a card. But I like having them at the place setting at the beginning of the meal because it gives everyone a chance to think (this is one of those things that you need to think about). One thing to be aware of, some of the topics could be sensitive or difficult for some guests, so allowing trading is always a fine idea.

The stories can be longer or shorter; they might just be a few words. But I’ve found that it’s really a great activity that leaves everyone feeling grateful for the blessings we do have, because a lot of times the time when we were most grateful for something is the time we didn’t have it. There’s something about hearing others’ stories or grateful experiences that is very powerful. I love Thanksgiving at my in-law’s because we do this each time.

If you want an example, say I were given the card food. I might tell about the time when I had finished labor and delivery with my first child, and I was amazed and happy and exhausted and I hadn’t eaten in twelve hours. And then my new son and I made it to our recovery room and he was all swaddled and clean and my husband was there, and I got to order lunch! And the hospital food tasted so good, and I don’t think I had ever been more grateful just to have food to eat. The experiences can be as simple as that.

Printables: Here is the printable I made! I’d recommend printing on cardstock. Feel free to pick and choose. The items should be pretty universal, except for the last three pages. Those pages are specific to the Latter-day Saint or Mormon culture (the church I belong to). Feel free to use or not use those pages as you see fit.

What it is: A version of pictionary where you draw and get other players to guess song titles instead of just regular terms.

Best for: Any group of people, from 2 to more than 20. Pictionary is very adaptable.

What you need:

• A drawing surface, like a whiteboard and dry erase marker, or a chalkboard, or a big pad of paper and marker

How to play: You basically play just like pictionary (visit that post for in-depth instructions) but with song titles! So how does this change the game? First of all, they might be harder to draw than regular Pictionary terms. Let’s take an example. “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King” from The Lion King. How would you draw that song title so that your friends would guess it? You could draw a singing lion cub with a speech bubble and a king’s crown inside it. You could draw a bunch of African animals all dancing around like in the scene from the movie. You could draw a clock with a slash through it (for “can’t wait”) and a king’s crown. However you want to! Possibilities are endless. The point is, it might be a little more involved than regular pictionary, and that’s all part of the fun.

Because phrases might be harder, it’s nice to allow a longer time limit, maybe a couple of minutes. Or maybe don’t play competitively and don’t have a time limit at all!

And then I think you should totally assign bonus points to someone who can not only guess the song, but starts singing it as well.

Variations: I have a free printable word list below with Disney song titles. But you could play any number of variations. 90’s music, oldies, country, musicals…there are all sorts of categories of music out there! You don’t need a list to play, either. Just have players think up their own song titles to illustrate.

As for variations on pictionary, there’s pictionary telephone, pictionary charades, and mixtionary. You can also play pictionary with any group of words. It’s a great game for holidays. On my printables page, I have free printable word lists in all sorts of categories, including for most major holidays. The word generator has even more word lists.

Printables: And here’s the list of Disney songs! I won’t say it’s comprehensive, but it’s pretty long. There are some obscure ones on there. So if you’re not a Disney song know-it-all, just skip the ones you don’t know. Enjoy!

Disney Songs List

What it is: The wonderful game every child thinks he or she invented.

Best for: A small group, or a group to fit however big your playing area is.

What you need:

• You’ll need a place to play. For me and my siblings and cousins, this was always an indoor game, played in a large living room or bedroom (much to our parents’ chagrin). You could easily play outside as well. A playground would be ideal.

How to play: There’s one rule. THE FLOOR IS LAVA! Don’t touch it!

Ah, this is such a fun game. Kids just love to climb and jump, and pretending the floor is hot lava gives you an excellent excuse to do so. So jump from couch to couch, throw down couch pillows to use as stepping stones, step on the coffee table, just don’t touch the floor!

If you play outside, you can make the grass lava, or the concrete, or whatever you want. You can have some spots of ground be safe spots.

Too bad this game, when played indoors, always makes grown-ups so mad. It’s so fun! I remember playing with my siblings and cousins at my grandparents’ house all the time. We played in the upstairs kids’ room, a room with four sets of bunk beds and couches and a chair: a truly perfect setup for hot lava. But if we were too loud as we leapt from furniture to furniture, our parents would hear the banging downstairs and tell us to stop. Once I remember playing in college (you’re never too old for the classics) in our dorm common room, where we took off couch cushions and made paths across the floor, until a resident assistant told us to stop. So much fun!

Variations: Lava monsters are a great variation to have. Either start with one or two at the beginning of the game, or make any player who accidentally touches the lava become a lava monster. The goal of a lava monster is simple: drag other players into the lava, mua ha ha! (This can be literally dragging, or a simple one-hand tag will do.) When players are captured by the lava monster, they become lava monsters, too!

I know you played this as a child, so do you have any variations to share? Or favorite experiences playing? I’d love to hear; leave a comment!

What it is: A group game where one player, the murderer, squeezes people’s hands to “kill” them, trying to kill as many as he can before his identity is discovered. So, whereas the other murder game is all about your eyes, in this one you use your hands.

Best for: A group of about 10, though a little more or less is fine.

What you need: 

• A way to pick a murderer: either a deck of cards or slips of blank paper (or something else you come up with).

How to play: This is another fun variation on the murder game theme (in time for Halloween!). To start, you need to choose a murderer. If you have a deck of cards, pull out one card for each player. Make them all non-face cards, except for one. Shuffle and have each player pick a card, face down. Whichever player draws the face card will be the Murderer. You can do the same thing with slips of paper. Just draw an X on one and fold them all up.

So now one player should be the Murderer, but only he or she knows. To everyone else it’s a secret. Now have all your players sit in a circle on the ground, cross-legged. Then players all hold hands to form a circle, but it’s important that players hide their hands, to the best of their ability, behind backs or under legs. You don’t want your hands just sitting on laps where everyone can see them.

Then announce the start of the game, at which point the Murderer can start in with the dirty work, mua-ha-ha.

The Murderer “kills” people by squeezing the hands of the players next to him. So let’s say Aaron is the Murderer. To his left is Kate, and to his right is Juliet. Aaron, after waiting several seconds, might start by squeezing Kate’s hand three times. Then Kate would “pass” the squeeze to the player on her other side by squeezing his hand two times. That player would pass it on by squeezing only one time. And the player who receives one squeeze…is dead.

Which brings us to: optional dramatic deaths. The game gets extra fun if, whenever you “die,” you die a dramatic death: fall on the floor, gasp, shout out your famous last words, etc. Adds in an element of humor and drama. At the minimum, just announce you’re dead and leave the circle.

That’s basically the only game play. The Murderer squeezes hands of the people next to him, both to his right and to his left, and the squeezes get passed around the circle, going both directions, and any player who receives only one hand squeeze dies and leaves the circle. So the circle keeps getting smaller and smaller. The Murderer can kill as quickly or as slowly as he wants.

As for the other players, their objective is to guess who the Murderer is before they all end up dead. Players do this with a simple accusation: “Kate, are you the Murderer?” Since Kate’s not the Murderer in this game, she shakes her head no, and then the player who made the false accusation has to leave the circle. Figuring out the Murderer is trickier than you might think, because players have no idea where the hand-squeezes originate from, and when you watch a player die on the other side of the circle, you might not even know from which direction the killing strike came.

The game ends when someone correctly accuses Aaron as the Murderer, or when Aaron kills everyone else. Whew!

Variations: Have you tried the winks version of murder? There’s also mafia, a game with a similar theme.

What it is: A group game best played late at night, often at sleepovers. Players try to discover the identity of a secret “mafia” amongst the group before they’re all eliminated.

Best for: Teens or older in a group of at least 8.

What you need:

• Traditionally you play with a deck of cards, though you could accomplish the same thing with some slips of paper and a pen. And that’s it!

How to play: This game is a little involved (though probably not the most complex game I’ve posted), so I’ll do my best to explain it.

First of all, choose one player to be the narrator. This player will volunteer to sit the game out and be the moderator, running the game so everyone else can play.

After you pick a narrator, you start by handing out parts. In this game, each player is given a role to play. Let’s run over the roles real quick.

• Mafia member: A player who tries to kill all other players and eliminate them from the game before his or her identity is discovered.
• Detective: A player who has a special skill in guessing who the mafia is and tries to protect the citizens.
• Citizen: Anyone else; players who just play the game, hope not to die, and try to help discover who the mafia is.

Games with large groups will often have two detectives and two mafia members.

So at the beginning of the game, you’ll have players draw cards to determine who are mafia, who are the detectives, and who are the citizens. You can accomplish this by pulling out cards from your card deck. Assign the different roles to cards: so Kings could be detectives, Jacks would be mafia, and anything else would mark a citizen. If you have a smaller group, put one detective card and one mafia card in your deck. If you have a larger group, try two of each.

Once players have picked their roles, it’s important they keep them a secret. No one should know who had what role. But tell players to hang onto their cards and keep them hidden; eventually during the game, everyone will end up revealing his or her card.

So now that you have your players and you have your roles, the game can start. The narrator starts the game, usually by telling a story, if you’re really into the game like that. The story is about the players and a scenario they’re in and might start out something like this:

“It was a dark and stormy night, and the members of the Jones family were gathered together on a camping trip. That night as everyone gathered around to roast hot dogs and tell ghost stories, the clouds gathered and lighting flashed ahead. Spirits were high around the campfire, though, but no one knew that someone in the party had evil intentions…”

Each round the story is different and it doesn’t really matter; it’s just part of setting the mood for this kind of creepy game. (That’s why it’s good to pick a narrator who can pull off this mood-setting story-telling role.)

So let’s set up a sample game. Say James is the narrator and is starting the game. He starts telling his story, setting the scene, and ends the first segment with the end of a day, saying something like

“…so everyone finished eating their hot dogs and returned to their tents to sleep.”

At that point, all of the players close their eyes and keep them closed until otherwise instructed by James, the narrator.

Then James will say something like:

“But late that night, two members of the mafia woke up with a dark and evil plan. Mafia members only, open your eyes and look at me.”

Then the two players who drew Mafia cards open their eyes and silently nod to James to show who they are. Let’s call the mafia Steve and Marco.

So Steve and Marco open their eyes. James will go on:

“Now the two mafia members will silently agree on one person to kill tonight.”

Then Steve and Marco point, shake their heads, and nod until they agree on one person to “kill.” Let’s call her Lara. After they have, James resumes narrating:

“Now mafia, close your eyes. Detectives only, open your eyes.”

The detectives open their eyes — we’ll call them Katie and Chloe. The detectives then silently point, shake their heads, and nod until they agree on one person to accuse as a member of the mafia. Say they point to Joe. Once they do, the narrator silently shakes his head, indicating that Joe is not a member of the mafia. Katie and Chloe close their eyes and James resumes narrating.

“The next day dawns cool and misty, and everyone wakes up and opens their eyes…”

(everyone opens their eyes)

“…to find that last night, there was a MURDER.” Duh-duh-duh.

Then James can explain that as everyone wakes up, they find that Lara has been murdered in the night. He can go into as much gruesome detail as he wants in describing the murder; it just depends on the narrator and how into the game he or she is. At the least, he needs to announce that Lara died. Lara can also dramatically act out the death if she so chooses.

At this point, all the players get a chance to discuss out loud who they think the mafia members might be. Then they can accuse one player of being a mafia member. If they’re right, that mafia member is eliminated and the citizens and detectives are one step closer to winning the game. If they’re wrong (say if they think Joe is a member of the mafia), Joe is eliminated and the mafia is one step closer.

The discussion period is where the bulk of the game takes place, and where things can get pretty heated. (Also, this often argumentative phase of the game is why I think many people either love or hate this game.)

So how does the discussion phase look? Anyone can talk, anyone can voice an opinion, and everyone must come to an agreement (or at least a majority vote) about who to accuse. The one rule is, no one is allowed to say what their role is. James, the narrator, plays the role of mediator, keeping people focused and reigning in any too-heated discussions.

As for the two mafia members, they’ll want to protect themselves, of course. The trick is, they don’t know who the detectives are, and if the detectives are onto them or not.

After everyone agrees on who to accuse, that person must reveal their card and their role and then exit the game. Then the narrator starts another nighttime phase of the game, where everyone closes his or her eyes, the Mafia gets another chance to kill someone, and the detectives get another guess at who the mafia are.

Say during the next round, the detectives guess that Steve is a member of the mafia. The narrator nods his head yes. Now the detectives are at an advantage: they know a member of the mafia. But during the next discussion round, they have to carefully use this knowledge. They can’t outright say they’re detectives, you see. They can’t state that they know Steve is a mafia member. But they can persuade and lead the discussion, hoping to sway the citizens their way.

If anyone speaks out too vocally against a member of the mafia during one round, the mafia always has the option of killing them during the next night phase of the game, so the detectives will want to be careful. But the mafia members can’t make the murder too obvious or everyone else will be onto them… See how it’s a game of mind tricks, deceptions, and secrets? It often evolves into backstabbing and throwing people under the bus, which is all part of the fun.

One last thing: what happens to the players who die? They become “ghosts” and can stay in the room, watch the game, and even keep their eyes open during the nighttime phase, but they’re not allowed to make a sound. If they don’t have that much will power, kick them out of the room.

The game ends when either the mafia are both killed, or when they’ve killed both the detectives (or is it when they’ve killed everyone? Maybe you could play either way). What a creepy game for your Halloween party this year!

Variations: Along with the murder theme, there’s a murder: winks version game and a hand-squeezing version that are both a lot of fun.

What it is: A group game where you try to eliminate other players by winking at them. So, despite its spooky title, really it’s just a game that’s all about your eyes.

Best for: Anywhere from a small to a large group. Ten or more would probably be ideal.

What you need:

• Just players and a way to randomly select one player to be the Murderer. This can be slips of blank paper, a deck of cards, anything so long as the identity of the Murderer can be a secret.

How to play: First, set up your playing area by sitting everyone in a circle. This can be cross-legged on the ground or in chairs/on couches. Everyone just needs to be able to see every other player.

Then, choose one player to be the Murderer. If you have a deck of cards, pull out one card for each player. Make them all non-face cards, except for one. Shuffle and have each player pick a card, face down. Whichever player draws the face card will be the Murderer. You can do the same thing with slips of paper. Just draw an X on one and fold them all up.

When you pick the Murderer, only the Murderer should know their identity. It should be a secret to everyone else.

So once the Murderer is established, have everyone sit in a circle and announce the start of the game.

For the Murderer, the objective is to murder (i.e. wink at) as many people as possible before being caught. The Murderer can wink at whoever they want whenever they want as often as they want.

For everyone else, the objective is to not die and to catch the Murderer as quickly as possible, thus saving as many lives as possible. You catch the Murderer by calling him or her out.

So let’s set up a sample game. Bobby is the Murderer, and only he knows that. Close after the start of the game, Bobby winks at Monica, who lets out a scream and falls on the floor.

That reminds me: optional dramatic deaths. The game gets extra fun if, whenever you “die,” you die a dramatic death: fall on the floor, gasp, shout out your famous last words, etc. Adds in an element of humor and drama. At the minimum, just announce you’re dead somehow and leave the circle.

After Monica dies, another player, Alex, was watching and thinks he saw a fourth player named Lindsay wink at Monica. So Alex says, “Lindsay, are you the Murderer?” To which Lindsay has to say, no, she’s not. At that point, Alex dies from his false accusation, so now two players are out. Bobby goes on winking at players when he can catch their eye contact, killing as quickly or as slowly as he wants. Both lead to a different game dynamic.

The game ends when someone says, “Bobby, are you the Murderer?” Or, in rare cases, when Bobby kills absolutely everyone else. Then Bobby wins.

It’s a kind of balancing game: for Bobby, he doesn’t want to necessarily kill too fast or too obviously. But if he doesn’t go fast enough, it gives players more time to discover him. For everyone else, they don’t want to spend too much time making eye contact with anyone just in case it’s the Murderer. But the game involves looking in eyes to try and figure out who is winking at whom. I like this game a lot; it’s suspenseful and fun.

To start another round, draw cards again to pick a new Murderer and go!

Variations: There’s another version of this game that’s a lot of fun. And along the murder theme, you can always try mafia!

Best for: A big group, probably around 10.

What you need:

• A wipe-off board, the small-ish kinds you can hold in your hands.
• A dry erase marker and eraser
• A specialized list of Star Wars actions to act out. I provide one below.

How to play: First divide your players into two teams. Like in a regular game of pictionary or charades, each team takes turns drawing/acting for their team members only to guess.

So let’s say team 1 is up: the Rebels (who are of course playing against the Empire). Unlike regular pictionary, the Rebels will send up two players, Han and Chewie (I’m sorry, I can’t resist). One player will hold the wipe-off board and marker (Han, since Chewie’s hands are too furry). Chewie will stand next to Han and be prepared to act.

Like in pictionary and charades, no talking is allowed during the turn. At  the start of a timer, Han and Chewie pull a slip of paper with their first action to act out. It might be using the Force to lift an X-wing.

At “Go!” Han and Chewie start. They work together as a team, with Han drawing and Chewie (and also Han) acting to get their team members to guess the word.

So Han might draw an X-wing on the wipe-off board, then hold the board down low to the ground. Meanwhile, Chewie would hold out his hands, pretending to use the Force, and Han would slowly raise the drawing of the X-wing up off the ground. Get it? It’s a combination of acting and drawing that does it.

When your team members guess, try to be pretty literal with the answer matching the phrase on the card (for example, just saying “X-wing!” for the above example wouldn’t cut it). You want your team members to say the whole phrase.

When Han and Chewie finish their first phrase, they draw and act another, and keep going until the timer runs out. Oh, another rule: Han and Chewie also can’t talk with each other. So they can’t prepare or plan in advance. It’s about thinking fast and acting together as a team.

The Rebels get a point for every phrase they successfully guess during Han and Chewie’s turn. Then it would be the Empire’s turn. At the end of the game, whichever team has the most points wins.

It’s up to each team which combination of players they want to send up in groups of two. You can change the pairs of two each round, or keep them the same. Just make sure to give everyone an equal opportunity to go up.

Are there any rules I’m forgetting? Oh, I would suggest a longer time limit for the rounds for this game: maybe 1 to 2 minutes. Since the phrases are more complex, it’s nice to allow time to draw something good or act out multiple parts to a complex phrase.

Variations: For more variations on the classic game of pictionary, try mixtionary or musical pictionary.

Printables: And finally, the phrases! These were fun to compile. I did a lot of research (involving a Star Wars marathon and a lot of spell-checking on Wookieepedia). I hope you enjoy them!

Star Wars Actions

]]> https://www.thegamegal.com/2014/10/27/pictionades-pictionary-meets-charades-star-wars-version/feed/ 4 3278 https://www.thegamegal.com/2014/10/26/rather/ https://www.thegamegal.com/2014/10/26/rather/#comments Sun, 26 Oct 2014 15:37:06 +0000 https://www.thegamegal.com/?p=3328 What it is: A hypothetical talking game where players choose which of two scenarios they’d rather do.

Best for: Any number of players. It’s a great two-player game.

What you need: Nothing! Aren’t those games the best? It can be nice if you have a pre-made list of “would you rather” scenarios. Guess what? I made one! You can download it for free below.

How to play: Basically players take turns asking each other questions starting with “Would you rather…” and ending with two different scenarios. Like, “Would you rather have to wear ski goggles for the rest of your life…

…or have to wear a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle mask?”

(p.s. is Donatello your favorite?)

As demonstrated, the questions are usually a little wacky/silly/absurd. (In some variations, they’re also gross/weird, but I don’t like those questions as much.)

Some other examples of would you rather questions:

• Would you rather live to be 90 with great health or live an extra ten years past 90 with not-so-great health?
• Would you rather live off of bread only or live off of anything but carbs?
• Would you rather be respected but feared or laughed at and loved?

The questions can be thoughtful, silly, or completely hypothetical. It’s fun for players to think up their own questions, too.

Once someone asks a question, everyone else must answer the question. Then another player gets to ask a question.

Another variation for a large group is to have one player draw a question (like from the list I made below) and answer it alone. Then another player draws another question and answers it for themselves, and so on. This could work well if you have so many people, it’s hard to have everyone answer each question.

Printables: Here’s the list of Would you rather questions I came up with. It’s two pages long, so not a ton, but definitely enough to get you started or get you thinking of ideas. Once you get playing with a good group, the ideas usually start coming to players. It’s a fun talking game to play.

Would you rather

What it is: It’s more of an activity or tradition than a game, but it’s a great Halloween tradition that I remember from throughout my childhood.

Best for: A whole neighborhood or community of some sort! The only requirement is everyone needs a front door. You can play with a neighborhood, a city, a church community…you could even play with dorm rooms in a college dorm.

What you need:

• Several copies of a Boo! printable, like the one I made below
• Two plates of treats or bags of candy to get the tradition started

How to play: To start, print out two copies of the Boo! printable below. Then prepare two plates of Halloween goodies, like cookies or cupcakes that look like spiders or something cute like that. (Bags of candy work, too). Then choose two neighbors or friends to Boo first.

This is a ding dong ditch activity, or a knock and run. If you don’t know how those works, you might want to read this post to get an idea.

At night, drive to your chosen friends’ houses one at a time. Carefully sneak out to the doorstep, leave the cookies and a copy of the Boo! printable, ring the doorbell, and RUN! Hurry back to the car and drive away before they see you! When they answer their door, they’ll find a plate of treats and the papers. One page is a sign with a ghost that says “WE’VE BEEN BOO’D!” The other is a paper with some instructions that starts out with this:

So when your friends get the paper, they hang the “WE’VE BEEN BOO’D” sign on their door or in their front window, choose two of their friends, and leave treats on their doors within two days. That way, the Boo sign spreads throughout the neighborhood or community exponentially until Halloween arrives! Then it’s fun to trick or treat or drive through the neighborhood and see how many people you spread the Boo to.

It’s not too late in the year if you want to start this! To give it a jump start, you might want to start out with five families or so, just to help get the ball rolling.

Printables: Here’s the printable. It has two pages: one with the instructions, and one with a ghost that says “WE’VE BEEN BOO’D!” This is the sign that people will hang in their front windows or on their doors after they’ve been Boo’d.

Enjoy, and happy Halloween!

Disclaimer: As with all games on this site, please be thoughtful when picking out activities and make sure it is age appropriate for your audience. This game is funny, but cramming tons of Skittles in your mouth at once is not for the young’uns. Stay safe!

What it is: A game about cramming as many skittles candies into your mouth as possible. Kind of silly and maybe, depending on your point of view, a little gross, too.

Best for: A big group, like at least 8. And probably best played late at night at a party or sleepover.

What you need:

• A bag of skittles candy, the big kind, one you can reach your whole hand into

How to play: First, have everyone sit in a circle (in chairs or on the ground, it doesn’t matter). Pull out your bag of skittles, open the top, and hand it to your first player (we’ll call her Ashley). Ashley reaches her hand into the bag and pulls out two skittles without looking, no peeking allowed.

If Ashley’s skittles are two different colors, like red and orange, she pops them in her mouth and leaves them there. No chewing, swallowing, or spitting out allowed. Then she passes the bag to the next player, Anthony.

Anthony draws two skittles and the same rule applies. He draws two different colors, so he puts them in his mouth and leaves them there, no chewing or swallowing.

Let’s say the whole first round, all around the circle, proceeds like this. Each player pulls out two skittles of different colors and must hold them in his or her mouth without chewing.

Now it’s Ashley’s turn again, and her skittles are all soggy and she’s really wishing she could chew them up. She reaches her hand into the bag and pulls out…two reds! Two skittles of the same color! It’s Ashley’s lucky day because two skittles of the same color means she’s allowed to chew up and swallow everything in her mouth: the two red skittles and the ones from the last round (and any other rounds).

The catch is, Ashley doesn’t have forever to chew and swallow. She has to stop chewing when it’s her turn again, or when someone else draws two skittles of the same color, whichever comes first. That may not seem like a big deal, but when you’ve been playing for a few rounds and you’ve got eight skittles in your mouth, trying to speed-chew them isn’t the easiest thing in the world. Then if your chew-and-swallow time is over because someone else drew two of the same color, you’re stuck with a wad of half-chewed-up skittles in your mouth to hang onto until you’re lucky enough to draw two of the same color again.

The player who lasts the longest without gagging or spitting out their skittles wins! (Or, this is one of those games that’s kind of played without a winner.)

OK, I admit it, typing this up is kind of making me gag. But it’s one of those gross silly games that can be fun under the right circumstances. Just don’t play around my grandma, who doesn’t approve of candy and who once claimed she could hear our teeth rotting as the game progressed.

Which brings me to, brush your teeth after.

[whispered creepily] Taste the rainbow.

Happy playing!

What it is: A very flexible game with lots of adaptations.

Best for: A group of about 4 to 10.

What you need: You’ll need a list of categories (I’ve provided one below) and possibly a timer and pens and paper.

How to play: Basically the challenge is to try and think of as many items in a category as you can. An example category would be fast food.

And items in the category? Chicken nuggets, tacos, hamburgers, hot dogs, French fries, McDonald’s apple pies, chicken sandwiches, and on and on. How many things can you think of?

Variations: There are many different ways you could set up your game. Here’s a few to get you started.

Like the game Scattergories (commission link), you can name as many items in a category that start with the same letter. Choose a letter from the alphabet, draw a category, set a timer, and go! For example, if the category were male names and the letter were C, you could write any of these:

• Carson
• Caleb
• Cole
• Christian
• Connor
• Carter
• Cameron

You can play on teams, individually, or as a whole group. At the end of the game, everyone takes turns reading all their answers aloud, where questionable answers can be submitted to the group to see if they’ll be allowed or not. (For example: “Camille? That’s a girl’s name!” “But I totally knew a guy named Camille once!” “OK, fine, we’ll allow it.”) If you’re playing against each other, the person who writes down the most names wins. (One variation is to have everyone cross off any name that someone else wrote down, too. That way the person with the most unique answers wins.)

You could also play the above version, but without the restriction of a letter of the alphabet. Any boy name, for example, would work for the above example. Then follow the same rules for the rest of the game.

Another variation which works really well for car rides or killing time can be played one word at a time. In this variation, you pick a category and then take turns saying something from that category, one player at a time. The first person who can’t think of a word that hasn’t already been said is out of the game, and you start a new round with a new category. (The game first letter, last letter is an even more challenging variation of this.)

You could of course use your list of categories to play the pool game categories or a similar game.

What other rules or variations can you come up with?

Printables: Here’s the list of categories! It’s a few pages long, so hopefully it gives you lots of categories to choose from for all of your game-playing needs.

Categories

What it is: Essentially a get-to-know-you version of the game fruit basket.

Best for: A large group, probably at least 10 players. The game is designed to get to know things about strangers you might not know at all, but that doesn’t stop you from playing with a group of people who know each other well, either.

What you need: You’ll need a circle of chairs, one for every player in the game minus one. (So if you’re playing with 16 people, you’d need a circle of 15 chairs). Couches and other seats can work, too, as long as there are 15 distinct places to sit.

How to play: Start off with one player, like Matt, standing in the middle of the circle. He starts out as It. Everyone else sits around the circle. To start the game, Matt says a trait or characteristic out loud that might apply to one or more people in the circle. For example, he might call out, “Anyone who’s been on a ride in a hot air balloon.”

Other things he could call out:

• Anyone who’s tasted octopus
• Anyone who’s lived outside of the United States
• Anyone who really loves to read

Once Matt says “anyone who’s been on a ride in a hot air balloon,” everyone in the circle who’s been on a hot air balloon immediately jumps up and tries to run and claim a new seat. Matt runs along with them, trying to find a seat, and the new person left standing without a seat is the new It. (If it’s Matt, he just goes again.)

Say Julie is the new It. She would say something new: “Anyone who can do a cartwheel.” Immediately everyone who can do a cartwheel jumps up and must find a new seat, including Julie. Play continues until you want the game to end.

A couple of rules and pointers. You may be thinking, but people could lie! Yes, yes they could. If Julie called out, “Anyone who owns a season of Fraggle Rock on DVD,” and no one else seemed to be jumping up and you were a little ashamed to admit that you actually do own Season 1 (as I may or may not…), you could stay put and no one would be the wiser. But, come on, where’s the fun in that? It’s a get to know you game, no one will judge, and everyone will be happy to know each other better. So don’t be afraid to be honest.

Also, you’ll realize that the more people the statement applies to, the more people will jump up. So it’s fun to kind of vary the statements from things like “Anyone who has synesthesia” (my husband does, by the way) to “Anyone who’s flown on an airplane.” That way some rounds have tons of people jumping up, and some rounds maybe just have a few or one. That’s OK; all are fun ways to get to know the other players.

Also, in the original game fruit basket, there’s one special round you can call where everyone has to jump up. I think that’s a fun way to play, so you could set a special trait that applies to everyone in your group, and the player who’s It would have the option of calling that at any time. So for example, if you’re playing at a company party and you’ve got a lot of workplace pride, the apply-to-everyone call could be, “Anyone who works for the best company in the world.” Other examples:

• Anyone who’s related to me! (for a big family reunion)
• Anyone who loves Fraggle Rock! (for a Fraggle Rock fan club meeting)
• Anyone who’s sitting down!

Just find something that everyone has in common and have that be your standard everyone-gets-up call.

Alternately, players in the middle could have the option to come up with their own applies-to-everyone phrases if they wanted to.

Variations: I’ve already linked to the normal version of fruit basket. This is also a kind of similar game to newspaper. And finally, you could take out the running and competition and just say these types of traits or experiences out loud and have people stand or raise their hand if the statement applied to them. It would take out a lot of the fun, but it would still be a relatively unique way to get to know each other and could be played easily in any situation (on a bus, in an auditorium, etc.)

Printables: If you need help coming up with things to say, I made a printable list for you! You could look at this ahead of time for ideas, or the person in the middle of the circle could always have it to look at for reference; however you want to play.

Get to know you traits

Happy playing!

What it is: A reverse game of hide and seek where, instead of one person seeking while everyone else hides, you have one person hiding while everyone else seeks.

Best for: At least 6 players or so, up to a group maybe twice that size.

What you need: A place to play. This is an ideal indoor game, but could also be played outside in a yard or park as long as there are lots of good places to hide.

How to play: First, set the boundaries for your playing area. Then choose one player to be It. We’ll call him Tim. Everyone else but Tim closes their eyes and counts out loud together to a predetermined number, like 50. (The larger your playing area is, the higher the number can be.) While everyone is counting, Tim goes and hides. He can choose anywhere he wants, like inside a blanket closet, for example. Then he sits quietly and waits.

After the rest of the players are done counting, they call out, “Ready or not, here we come!” And then they start to seek. The seeking is done every-man-for-himself style: no teams, just individual players looking for Tim by themselves. Everyone tries to find Tim first.

Say Anna is the first player to open the blanket closet and find Tim. First of all, she’ll want to make sure no other player is watching her. Then as quietly as she can, she slips into the blanket closet and hides along with him. Now Tim and Anna both are as still and quiet as they can be, still trying to avoid being found.

Maybe Louis is the next player to happen along and find Tim’s hiding spot. Now he squeezes in, too, and the three of them hide until they’re joined by a fourth, and a fifth… And everyone hides right along with Tim. If the blanket closet runs out of room, players do their best to hide close by, but it’s best if everyone can fit into Tim’s original hiding spot. (Are you seeing why the game is called sardines now?)

The last person to find Tim is the new It, and a new round starts!

It’s a fun game and (good for adults needing some peace) a quiet game. It’s kind of eerie in a way, too, which I guess is part of the fun. But when there’s 10 of you and you’re all searching for one hiding person and you’re looking and looking and start realizing the other players searching with you are dwindling and dwindling, and you have no idea where they’re all disappearing to, and you keep searching, and finally you open the blanket closet to see all 10 of your friends crammed in there – yeah, all part of the fun.

It’s also kind of hilarious, trying to fit as many people as you can into what’s usually a small hiding place. Sometimes the hiding place is larger, though, like in a walk-in pantry, and that’s perfectly fine too (and a little easier). It’s always, fun, too, to hide along with a group of your friends and cover your mouths and try not to giggle. It takes some of the lonely suspense (which I’m not a fan of) out of the normal version of hide and seek.

Variations: For some other games along the theme of hiding and seeking, check out the classic hide and seek, as well as kick the can, hit the dirt, and capture the flag.

Man, typing all of this up is making me want to go and play! I haven’t played sardines in far too long.

Happy hiding!

What it is: An easy time-killing game where players test their psychic abilities…or at least pretend to have them.

Best for: A group of about 6 or more. I think the bigger the group, the easier it might be.

What you need: Nothing!

How to play: Psychic is pretty simple. Everyone plays together as a team. Players count from one to as high as they can by saying numbers out loud, one player at a time. If two players say one number at the same time, everyone has to start over at 1. The catch is, there’s no order in which players speak.

Here’s an example. Say Adam, Bridget, Caleb, Dan, Ethan, and a bunch of their friends are playing. Everyone’s sitting in random order around a circle. In fact, they don’t even have to be sitting in a circle.

When they’re ready to play, someone will say “go.” Then Adam says 1 out loud. Dan, across the circle, says 2. His friend next to him says 3. Bridget, three people down, says 4. Adam says 5. Someone else says 6. But then by chance both Caleb and Ethan say 7 at the same time. That means the whole group has to start over at 1. Pauses are allowed, but if two people speak at once, you have to start over. The goal is to see how high you can count to as a group.

I don’t think we’ve ever gotten higher than like 15 or so, the times I’ve played it. My husband played it in a really big group once and got into the 30s.

It’s a great game for killing time because you don’t need anything to play with. But if you did have a large group and wanted to organize a big game, I think it would be a fun challenge for everyone.

Oh, and I just couldn’t resist writing a post about fake psychic abilities without throwing this in:

What it is: A version of a scavenger hunt where you take pictures of things (and often yourself doing fun things).

Best for: A small to large group, maybe 4 to 10 people.

What you need: A camera and a list of things to take pictures of! (see bottom of the post for my free printable list).

How to play: Just like other scavenger hunts, the goal is to go down the list and cross off as many items as you can. Other than that basic rule, the game is super easy to customize however you’d like. Let me show you an example.

This is a scavenger hunt list I made for the mall. I might use it for a birthday party for a group of 13-year-old girls. If the group is smaller (say 5 girls), I’d give them all one list and set them loose in the mall to take their photos, telling them to meet back at the foot court in two hours or something like that. If the group were bigger (say 10 girls), I’d make two smaller groups of 5 and give each team a copy of the list. Then I’d make a contest out of it. The team who crosses off the most items in the allotted time period wins (with quality of the photos taken into consideration).

A great way to end a photo scavenger hunt is a photo slideshow at home. With technology today, it can be relatively easy to show pictures on an iPad or a laptop or even a TV, and then everyone can watch all the pictures and laugh and comment.

So basically, you need a list of things to take pictures off. Slightly embarrassing photo setups are always fun (like take a picture of your group dancing in the middle of the food court). Use my printables below or get creative and make your own! Then you set your ground rules, including things like:

• Duration of the game
• Boundaries
• Teams
• Whether you’re going for quality or quantity

Then play and have a blast! I think photo scavenger hunts work great for date nights or youth activities. Ha, actually, one of my and my husband’s first dates was a photo scavenger hunt that was such a phenomenal success, we realized how much we liked each other and ended up where we are now.

Happy photographing!

Printables: The photo scavenger hunts I’ve included are for different settings: at the mall (designed for teens or older), at the park (designed for kids or older), at home (designed for younger children), and an alphabet hunt (suitable for anyone). If you have a requests for another list, leave a comment and I’ll see what I can do!

Oh, P.S., for the alphabet scavenger hunt, what I was thinking is you take pictures of objects that happen to look like letters of the alphabet, either objects that you set up or that you just find (like two sticks crossed to make an X, or a door handle that looks like an S).

What it is: A good way to pass the time when you’re flying somewhere. Look for items on a list and cross them off when you see them.

Best for: One to 5 players.

What you need: A list of things to find in an airport! You could make your own, or I have some free printable ones below. Also a pen.

How to play: It’s easy! When you’re sitting in an airport waiting for your plane, or waiting in an extra long security line, or stuck somewhere with a longer-than-expected layover, pass the time by doing a little scavenger hunting. Make or obtain a list of common things you might see in an airport (the items could be as easy as an airplane or a person with a hat, for younger players; or much harder, like the Southwest Shamu plane). When you’re in the airport, keep your list and a pen handy and cross things off as you see them. First player to cross off all the items (or the player to cross off the most) wins!

Rules and Variations: This is a very adaptable game. It’s a great one-player or two-player game, and you can play competitively or cooperatively. You could even stretch out one game over a whole trip or multiple trips. If you want to play competitively, you probably want to set up some specific rules (when to start looking, when to stop looking, whether photographs of things count, etc.).

Printables: We’re flying this Thanksgiving for my sister’s wedding. (Incidentally, the airplane illustration above is in her wedding colors – I guess I have her color scheme on my brain after some fun clothes shopping for me, my husband, and our two kids.) In preparation, I made these scavenger hunts and I want to share them with you! Feel free to download and use. There are two lists: the first one is pretty easy, and the second one is harder. Just print, cut, and use whichever fits your needs! If you do use them, I’d love to hear any feedback on how they work. Happy flying!

Airport Scavenger Hunt

What it is: I Spy Bingo is a version of classic bingo. In classic bingo, everyone has a 5 x 5 grid of randomly placed numbers. Someone reads off a number at random, and players look for the number on their playing card and mark it off if they find it. Players try to get 5 marked-off squares in a row. First person to get 5 in a row (horizontally, vertically, or diagonally) shouts out “Bingo!” and wins. In I Spy Bingo, instead of listening for numbers called out loud, you’re watching for things you might see in real life.

Best for: 1 to 6 players.

What you need: Everyone will need a game card. You can make your own or use my free printable ones! (see end of post). Everyone will also need a pen or something else to use to mark off squares (like candy, especially M&Ms, which are our favorites). You also need somewhere specific to play: in this case, a Halloween costume party, or the day at school when everyone comes dressed up, or trick-or-treating night…basically anywhere you can see lots of people in Halloween costumes.

How to play: Halloween costume I Spy Bingo is pretty simple. Everyone gets a 5 x 5 grid of squares. In each square, write a costume you think you might see someone wearing this Halloween. (My free printable cards already have costumes written out.) Once you’re at your party or school day or wherever you’re going to play, just keep a lookout at all of the cool Halloween costumes going by and cross off any costume you see on your card. First player to get 5 in a row (horizontal, vertical, or diagonal) shouts “BOO!” (instead of “bingo”) and wins!

You can also play the blackout version – where you have to cross off all your squares, not just 5 in a row, to win. Other than that, you can set up your own rules however you’d like! Here are some suggestions.

On the printable cards I made below, some of the costumes might overlap (e.g., fairy and Disney character; if you saw someone dressed as Tinkerbell, that could count for both). But I say you can only use each individual costume to cross off one square on your card. However, it’s up to you if you want to use Tinkerbell to cross off fairy or Disney character, bringing in a slight element of strategy. But if you do see two or more Tinkerbells walking around on Halloween night (from what I can gather, it’s a pretty popular costume), you can cross off both. You might have to settle some disputes as you play (like whether Princess Leia counts as a Disney princess), but that’s all part of the fun.

You can set a time limit, or just make the game last the duration of the party. You can play at a costume party, at school, or Halloween night (especially if you’re the one stuck at home alone handing out the candy. Why not call up another friend at home and have them play, too? Text each other pictures of your finished card when you win). Play by yourself or with a small group; it’s a very adaptable game. You can even have prizes for the winner(s), like pre-purchased candy bars, or some sweet deal like winner gets all the Snickers bars of the Halloween candy haul. Make it fit your group and make it fun!

Variations: There are lots of variations to I Spy Bingo. In addition to holidays or holiday parties, you can play on a road trip, in the airport, at the mall while people watching… I have some other ideas I’m working on that I’m excited to post, so stay tuned!

Printables: To make your Halloween Bingo easy, here’s some free printables! The first one comes with 6 unique cards already filled out. (But even if you want to play with more than 6 people, it would probably work just fine as long as there’s enough variation in the costumes you all see). The second one is blank so you can fill in your own costumes. This would be a great way to play and encourage creativity. Just come up with some basic rules, especially if you’re playing with a lot of people, and let the fun begin!

Halloween Costume Bingo

Halloween Costume Bingo: blank cards

Happy Halloween! I hope you all enjoy!

What it is: A really easy, adaptable game for all sorts of circumstances. Mostly it’s fun to ask get to know you questions (especially quirky or unusual ones) to family and friends.

Best for: 6 to 9 players.

What you need: Mostly just questions to ask! I’ve provided a free printable list of some below. You could also think of your own. Or I know there’s many commercial sets of conversation-starter type questions you can buy. Optional: Paper and pens.

How to play: The ways to play with get-to-know-you questions are endless. The easiest way is to just take turns asking questions to each other and answering them. You can all sit in a circle and take turns picking a question, reading it aloud, and then each giving an answer in turn. You could also take turns asking specific questions to specific people only. I’ve even used questions like this as journal-writing prompts for myself when I didn’t know what else to write about. If you have a creative set of questions, the good uses for them go on and on.

One of the favorite ways I like to play this game with my friends and family is to answer questions and then guess who gave which answer. This can be done a few different ways. One way that works well with a big group (like from 20 to 30) is to use paper and pens and have everyone write down his or her answer to a question. Then gather up the questions, have someone read them out loud, and together as a group discuss who you think gave which answer (this can be done informally, hopefully with a good amount of laughter). With a big group like this, the best way to do it is to ask several questions at a time, maybe 5 to 10. You could even just hand out a survey with the questions already written down. Then have each player fill out the survey, gather them up, read all the answers out loud, and guess together as a group who filled out that survey. You could even eliminate the guessing part and just read aloud the answers for fun. This could be a great icebreaker game.

Another way to play that’s better with a smaller group (perhaps about 8 people) is to take turns and keep score. It might look like this: Adam is playing with his family. He picks a question, he asks it aloud, everyone write down his or her answer, and then Adam’s brother Stuart collects the cards and reads them to Adam out loud. After Adam has heard all the answers, he has to correctly match each answer with each player. He gets a point for each one he matches correctly. Whoever gets the most points after everyone gets a turn wins. We played this way with my husband’s family last Christmas, and it was sooo fun. We all laughed harder than we had in months! It’s a good way to get more competitive and encourage creativity (since you’re trying to avoid making it obvious which answers are yours). You could even do more than one question at a time.

Variations: What other ways do you like to play with get-to-know-you questions? They’re great discussion starters or time fillers. My husband and I love to ask them to each other in car trips or on out-for-ice-cream dates.

Printables: If you want to print out some questions you can use, I’ve made some free printables for you! Just cut along the lines and you’ll have strips of questions you can fold up and put in a bowl or have people draw. You could also just read them aloud or use the list for ideas. The second list has some simpler questions that might be better suited for young children. So enjoy!

Get to know you questions

Simple get to know you questions

HEY! Wait! I just had an idea! Does anyone want to play? What if I pick a few questions now and we all answer them? Everyone loves to answer fun questions about themselves, right? Well, let’s play! Join in with a comment if you like with the answers to the questions below! I’d love to hear your answers.

1. If money didn’t matter, what food or snack would you buy at the movie theater? Those nachos with the fake cheese! Mmm, fake cheese…usually so gross, but somehow when it’s at a movie theater or baseball game on nachos, so good. A close runner-up to the nachos is good old-fashioned movie popcorn.
2. If you had a month of free time to learn a new hobby, what would it be? Dancing! I’ve always wished I could dance.
3. What’s your favorite way to eat a potato? Twice-baked all the way!

What it is: It’s not really a game; this is more of a family tradition/activity. But it’s one that my family did for a good portion of my childhood, and one me and my siblings all looked forward to at Christmas time. It’s a fun gift-giving activity where, over the course of 12 days, you give gifts secretly to another family or friend. (We called it a ding-dong-ditch gift approach; I’ve also heard it called ring-and-run.) It’s a great way to feel the Christmas spirit of giving and service, and fun for kids, too.

Best for: Two families: your family to give the gifts and another family to receive them.

What you need: You’ll need 12 specialized gifts, one for each of the 12 days before Christmas. These can be highly variable or personalized depending on your family or the family you’re gifting to. You start with gift 12 on December 13 and work down from there to gift 1 on December 24 (one day until Christmas). When we did this tradition, we always used cute tags to mark each gift, and each tag had a number and said “Christmas is…” followed by a different noun, like “Christmas is joy” or “Christmas is love.” The last gift, gift number 1, always said “Christmas is Christ.”

On day 12, the gift would be 12 of something: maybe 12 oranges, or a dozen cookies. On day 11, it might be 11 small ornaments. On day 10, 10 candy canes, and so on. The exact gifts would vary by year and by the family we were giving them to, but one gift was always the same: on day 1, we gave a framed picture of Jesus Christ.

When we could, we matched the gift to the tag: for example, for “Christmas is giving” on day 4 we might give 4 rolls of wrapping paper. Not all of the days matched perfectly, but that was okay. Here’s a sample of what the tags and gifts might look like one year:

Again, the gifts varied year by year. We kept the family in mind. A lot of times we gave useful gifts. Some other gift ideas might be any baked goods (cookies, brownies, fudge), food (Little Debbie snacks, bread, popcorn, cans of soup, fruit, 2-liter bottles of soda), small toys, hot chocolate mugs, pads of paper, Christmas decorations, gift-wrapping tape, cookie cutters… even rolls of paper towels (useful!). You can get creative and give gifts you think the family would like and use. And they don’t have to be big, either. Even small things (like tape for wrapping presents or hot chocolate mix) can be a special gift, especially because this family will be receiving one gift every day for 12 days.

A tip on the gifts that my mom shared with me: she always tried to gather, wrap, tag, and prepare the gifts all before December 13, before we even started. That way we weren’t scrambling around last-minute getting gifts together. And, after you’ve secretly dropped off gifts for 5 days, it’s not like you can all the sudden stop or put it off a day; the family will be expecting you! But, come to think of it…I can remember at least a couple times when we kind of missed a day and gave two gifts the next day, or dropped it super late at night and didn’t ring the bell so they’d just find it in the morning. But we were a busy family of six kids…of course we weren’t perfect.

The delivery: After you’ve prepared your gifts, you’re ready to deliver! Start on December 13 with gift 12 so you’ll end on December 24 with gift 1. To deliver the gifts secretly, go to your chosen family’s house each night, then choose one or two people to sneak the gift quietly up to the doorstep, ring the bell, and make a run for it! Don’t get caught! On Christmas Eve, you can go as a whole family, ring the doorbell, show who you are, and present your gift of Jesus Christ, maybe with a message or a Christmas carol.

Printables: So because this tradition really is so special to me, I wanted to make it easy for others to do it, too. So I made these free printables of the 12 “Christmas is…” tags. Click the picture to download the PDF.

Now because I think you really do need to customize the gifts/days based on your family and the family you’re giving the gifts to, I left the numbers separate (on the last page) so you can cut the numbers out and paste them on the tag you want to use for that day. For example, say you just happen to have a Christmas CD with 12 tracks ready to give. Glue the “12” number on “Christmas is Music” and you’re set. So, even though the tags you’re printing don’t look like this now, when you cut out the numbers and past them on, the tags will look like this:

I also included a page of blanks in case you want to write in your own ending to the sentence “Christmas is…” Also, I’d recommend printing these on card stock, or mounting them on colored card stock if you print on normal printer paper. It’s nicer that way.

Variations: There are lots of ways you could vary this tradition. If you don’t like the ding-dong-ditch aspect, just give the gifts to your family openly. Or you could even do it with cards long-distance through the mail.

As for the theme, you don’t have to do the “Christmas is…” tags. You could use the song “12 Days of Christmas” as your theme instead. We never did it that way, but Natalie at Chronicles of a Babywise Mom has some great ideas on how to do it. In the same post she also talks about another variation that we never did but that sounds really neat: having each gift over the 12 days be a different piece to a new Nativity set you buy for the family. That way you can also include scriptures about the Nativity story with each piece. I think that would be a neat variation to do.

Finally, I came across this story about a family that does the 12 Days of Christmas for their neighbors. It’s a neat, touching story about loving our neighbors – what I think Christmas is really all about.

My memories: What makes this tradition so special to me is the memories I have of it. Each December, we’d sit in a family meeting and choose one family to secretly give our 12 days of gifts to. It might be someone we knew needed some extra love. It might be one of our friends from school. It might be someone we knew well or someone we didn’t know that that well at all. But we’d all decide together on who the family would be.

My mom would prepare the gifts, and then, starting on December 13, we drove as a family after dark to our chosen family’s home. Dad parked down the street, a few houses away, usually with the headlights off. One or two of us (we took turns each night) would quietly get out of the car with the first gift, sneak up to the family’s door step, put the gift down, and sprint away. Whew, the adrenaline rush! Then we’d jump back in the car and quickly drive away, hoping we weren’t seen. Dad always circled around the block slowly before we cautiously drove in front of the house to make sure the gift was gone. It was great fun for us as kids, and always left us very excited, with lots of stories to share. Of course, we had to keep the secret from the family if we saw them during the day, which was always fun, too. I remember once when we did my friend’s family, I was driving her to her house one night and pretended I didn’t know the way, just to throw her off the trail…as if I didn’t know; we had been driving secretly to her house at night for days! Some families got really into trying to catch us, too, and it would get harder and harder to ding-dong-ditch their house. (I remember one particularly zealous family; we had to recruit neighbors and friends to drop off the gifts to them because they waited so diligently by the door and chased us down the street.) Sometimes we were discovered, but we always tried to keep our identity a secret until the last day, Christmas Eve, which was always the best day.

On Christmas Eve, we’d drive as a family, but this time we all got out of the car together, walked to the porch, and rang the doorbell. When they answered, we presented the last gift, the picture of the Savior Jesus Christ, and sometimes sang a carol (but…probably not that often; my family’s not particularly well-known for our singing). Then it was fun and neat to admit our secret identity and talk to our family face to face. We always left feeling good and happy inside. It was part of our Christmas traditions for many years.

I hope you enjoy! If you want to start this tradition this year, December 13 will be your first drop-off day: you still have time! Merry Christmas and, however you celebrate the season, I hope you can find the joy and happiness that come not just from playing games and having fun, but from giving to others.

What it is: A gift exchange party activity, usually played at Christmas parties, where guests bring gifts and, through a series of complex rules, exchange them. Lots of laughs are usually involved. Be advised, it’s also a better game for teens or adults than kids, because, yes, some people are bound to end up with better gifts than others, and adults are less likely to cry and throw fits when that happens.

Best for: About 15 to 20 people.

What you need: First, you’ll need little slips of paper with numbers written on them, one number for each guest. Start at 1 and work up from there. Put the slips of paper in a bowl or hat for guests to draw from.

Next, instruct each guest who wants to play to bring a wrapped gift to the party. It is important that the gift is wrapped. It’s also often a good idea to set boundaries ahead of time for what the gift might be. In lots of white elephant exchanges I’ve been in, used gifts are fine (and even encouraged), but you could rule out used gifts if you wanted to. You can also set a monetary limit (like no more than five dollars).

If you’ve never done a white elephant gift exchange before, there seems to be a general perception of what makes a good white elephant gift. It’s often something quirky, random, regifted, and/or funny. That ugly fur hat you’ve had in the back of your closet but never worn, for instance, is sure to get a few laughs. Or a pair of ridiculous fuzzy slippers. Maybe a backscratcher shaped like a claw. Once I saw someone bring a live hermit crab (that was a surprise when it was opened). The point is, it doesn’t have to be expected or normal; the quirky stuff is often the most fun. There always seems to be a selection of more normal gifts, too (candles, bath salts, chocolate and candy…) and that’s fine and great. Personally, the only type of white elephant gifts I don’t like are obvious junk or trash (like dirty socks). To me, that’s just plain mean and you feel sorry for the person who ends up with it.

How to play: To start the game, have everyone put their wrapped gifts in a pile in the center of the room. Then have everyone else sit in a circle around the gifts.

Go around the circle and have each guest draw a number. Have them hold onto their slips of paper because it will be important to remember which number everyone has. The person who drew number 1 (we’ll call her Julie) goes first.

Julie starts by picking a gift, any gift she wants, from the pile in the center and opening it in front of everyone. As Julie is picking, no one else is allowed to say which gift they brought (but they can say after she’s chosen and started opening the gift). After she opens the gift, she holds it up for everyone to see and either admire (woah, awesome vintage Star Wars poster!), covet (I must have that five-pound bag of gummy bears!) or laugh at (haha, a Superman snuggie!).

Then whoever has number 2 (we’ll call him Jack) gets to go next. Now Jack has two options. He can either “steal” Julie’s gift, if he really wants that snuggie, or he can choose a new unopened gift from the pile, open it, and let everyone see. Let’s say he opts to open a new gift and gets a board game.

Now it’s number 3’s turn (let’s say her name is Katelyn). Katelyn gets the option of stealing Julie’s snuggie or Jack’s board game, or choosing a completely new gift. Say she wants Julie’s snuggie. All she has to do is walk over and take it (Julie has to let it go). But then Julie gets the option of stealing a different gift or opening a new gift from the pile. If she chooses Jack’s board game, then Jack gets the option to steal a gift or open a new one…and the round ends when someone finally opens a new gift from the pile.

That’s the basic game play, and you continue until the last gift from the pile is opened. Then everyone gets to take home the gift they’re holding, either excited (yes, I always wanted a snuggie!) or maybe a little bummed (man, I think I’ll just save this fake potted plant until next year’s white elephant and give it away then) or possibly full of regret (why didn’t I steal that bag of gummy bears when I had the chance?), but such is the nature of a white elephant gift exchange, and hopefully everyone still had fun. Now, to make the game possibly a little more fair and less likely to result in disappointment, read on to some of the rules and variations below.

Rules and variations: I think one universal rule is that there are no immediate steal-backs. So, for example, if Katelyn stole the snuggie from Julie, Julie couldn’t steal it back right away. If you wanted, however, you could allow Julie to steal it back during the same round, just not right away. (So say if Katelyn stole Julie’s snuggie, then Julie stole Brian’s Disney princess lunchbox, then Brian stole Ashley’s chocolate truffles, then Ashley stole the Disney princess lunchbox, then Julie would have the option of fairly stealing the snuggie back if she wanted.) That rule could be debatable, though…

Another pretty universal rule is that there’s no hiding of a gift after you’ve opened it. All gifts must be kept out and in plain sight of everyone. (This keeps that sneaky guy who opened the $10 gift certificate to Coldstone from hiding it under his chair undetected the whole game long just so no one will steal it.)

Another very common rule I’ve played with is to “freeze” a gift after it has been stolen a certain number of times, usually 2 or 3. So let’s say in your circle you have a super desirable gift, like a five-pound bag of gummy bears, that everyone wants. If you have a rule that gifts can only be stolen 3 times, whoever is the third lucky person to steal the gummy bears gets them for keeps. It would work like this: if Julie opened the gummy bears, then Jack stole them a few rounds later (one steal), then Katelyn stole them the round after that (two steals), then Isaac finally stole them after that (three steals), Isaac would get to keep them for the rest of the game; no one would be allowed to steal them away. This rule kind of also adds an element of strategy to the game. If you really want something, try to be the third person to steal it and you’re set.

Another rule I’ve played with is to, at the very end of the game, let whoever drew number 1 choose to steal any un-frozen gift in the circle if they want, because this person is kind of at a disadvantage, especially if they just happen to pick a lame gift (a ball of yarn? really?) and no one ever picks it from them. So let’s say Julie was the first person to go and picked a ball of yarn. At the end of the game, she would get the option to steal any un-frozen gift: say the nice boxed set of dominoes from Jack. Then you have two options. You can either have Julie and Jack do a straight-up trade, so Jack is stuck with the ball of yarn (sorry, Jack), or Julie can put the ball of yarn back in the middle of the circle, steal the dominoes, and then another round of stealing starts, with Jack choosing whatever un-frozen gift in the circle he wanted, until someone in the circle ends up taking the ball of yarn again and the game officially ends. The first option ends the game quicker; the second option can drag out the game longer.

Additionally, because in every game there usually is at least one gift that’s just kind of sad, and some poor guest opens it and gets stuck with it for the rest of the game, my mom always played with a twist that I liked; it makes the “loser” feel less jipped. My mom always prepared ahead of time one or two wrapped consolation prizes, usually just simple, ordinary things like candy or maybe a small gift card. Then at the very end of the game, everyone votes on the one or two worst gifts to end up with, and those people get the consolation prizes and feel not so bad about life.

I’m sure there are other rules you could play with that I’m forgetting or not aware of. Anyone else have another rule or variation to share?

For another way to play the game, check out batteries included white elephant gift exchange, which talks about hosting the game yourself and providing all the gifts.

(Oh, and side note if you’re curious, none of the sample people mentioned in this post are real people I’ve played with, of course…but some of the gifts are ;))

Best for: Group of about 5 to 8 people.

What you need: You’ll need actions or events to act out, whether they’re ones that you think up on the spot or have written down ahead of time (see the charades post or the word generator for some lists of things you can act out, or the end of this post for some printables). You’ll also need to play somewhere indoors with an enclosed room that players can leave.

How to play: First, choose a player to start the acting—we’ll call him Tyler. He goes first. Then the rest of the players choose a pre-defined order. Silently to himself, Tyler thinks of an event or action to act out (or draws one from a bowl or something). Say it’s capturing a wild snake. He doesn’t tell anyone what his action is. Then everyone leaves the room except for the next person in line, like Shannon.

Tyler silently acts out the action for Shannon while she watches. But while Tyler is thinking he’s acting out this:

Shannon might see something like this:

She’s not allowed to ask questions or guess or talk; she can only watch. After Tyler’s done or a predetermined time has passed, Tyler sits in the room and vows to stay silent (or leaves, if he doesn’t have enough willpower). Then the next player, Jill, enters. Shannon then acts out for Jill. But while Shannon’s thinking she’s acting out this:

Jill might see this:

As you can imagine, the actions change more and more with each step.

At the end, the last person, like Bill, has to guess what he thinks the event is, and then you can all laugh at how different it was from the original idea. And everyone in the middle can say what they thought the action was, too. You don’t really keep score or anything; just play for fun. So pick someone new to be the first person and start a new round!

Variations: If the game feels too slow or easy for you, you could set up a speed version where players only get 10 seconds or so to act out for the next person in line. That could increase the difficulty (and hilarity). You could also set up a sheet or a blocked off corner of the room so players don’t have to actually leave the room, just run behind the sheet, also making the game move a little faster. And for other acting games that are maybe a little less quiet and slow, check out charades, celebrities, and in the manner of the adverb.

Printables: I think this game would work best when played with specific actions, like the example capturing a wild snake. Or it would probably work well with harder charades words, as long as they weren’t too easy. So included below is the hard words list from the charades post, as well as a new list I made of actions. Try playing with either! And for more printable word lists, check out the charades post, or use my online word generator for word lists on the computer – or download the free app for electronic word lists on the go! I added the new actions list to the word generator, too, under the game “Charades.” Happy playing!

Charades word list – Hard words

Charades word list – Actions

What it is: A simple, flexible time-killing activity for anyone who loves music and guessing games.

Best for: 2 to 8 players.

What you need: Nothing!

How to play: This is just a simple guessing game involving singing, but singing a song only one word at a time. One person, like Lucy, starts out by thinking up a song. Then Lucy starts singing the song out loud, but only the first word.

So let’s say Lucy chooses the song “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” She would start singing the first note: “Take…” Then there are several different ways you can play. You can have other players guess what song Lucy is singing by adding what they think is the next word. Ryan, for example, might think Lucy is singing “Take on Me” (he’s an eighties fan). So Ryan would start singing “on…” Lucy could either shake her head no and let other players continue to guess, or, for a more fluid game, the song could change and now all the other players have to guess what Ryan is singing. The song might change several times as players take turns adding notes and words to what they think the song is. You can have play go in a circle, or just have players sing out in any order when they think they know the next word.

Variations: Another similar game you can play is when one person says a word (like take, for example), and the next player has to think of a song with that word in it. You can play with song titles or song lyrics in general. We played this a lot as just kind of a time-killer, not keeping score or having much structure, but just shouting out words and singing songs as they occurred to us.

Some more similar games are Name that tune and What’s the name of that song?

So if you like music and have friends who know a lot of songs, they can be some fun games to play to pass the time or try to stump each other.

Best for: As little as 2 or as many as a carful of people.

What you need: A journey in a car. A long road trip on roads you don’t drive every day works best. Then just a car and people to play! Optional: Paper and pen, or a way to keep score. (It was paper and pen when I grew up, but today it would totally be my iPhone.)

How to play: This game involves spotting and guessing the numbers on those road signs that say how many miles to a certain city, the green ones, you know? Like this:

The point of the game is to correctly guess the next mile number for a certain city, usually your destination.

So say your car is taking a trip to Dallas. Once you’ve seen one sign that says how many miles are left to Dallas (like Dallas: 215), everyone would take a guess as to the number that will be on the next sign that says how many miles to Dallas. Logically, this could be any number lower than 215. You can use your experience or knowledge or just luck to try to figure out exactly how many miles away the next sign will be placed. But I can tell you from playing this game as a kid, it’s not always what you think! It’s not like there’s always a pattern or a rule, especially as cities and landscapes vary (and this all just makes the game more fun).

So everyone puts in a guess for the number on the next mile sign – you can write them down or just have everyone remember. Let’s say a hypothetical car of people make these guesses:

• Jamie – 200
• Louis – 154
• Ann – 194
• Jeff – 172

Then everyone can go about other activities, but make sure at least one person is keeping a lookout for the next sign. Once it’s spotted (Dallas: 160), figure out who won that round. For us, the winner was simply the person who had the closest guess, whether it’s lower or higher. In the above example, this would mean Louis wins. I know a lot of times people play number guessing games like this and make a rule that the winner is the closest number that didn’t go under or something like that, but we liked to keep it simple. You can certainly play with rules as complicated as you like.

So Louis would win that round. You can keep a running score pad of who wins each round, or just play for fun and not keep score. But that round would be followed by another, and another, until you reach your destination. Even when you’re driving in the middle of nowhere, you can still play. The signs just might be really far apart, but that’s okay. Closer to cities, the signs might be only a couple of miles apart, and it’s always fun when that throws everyone for a loop. You can guess but you never know for sure, which is why it’s fun. The game is a good way, too, of tracking the distance until you reach your destination, maybe cutting down on the “Are we there yet?” questions.

Another thing: Our family road trips were often so long that we couldn’t play with our final destination right away. So we’d choose bigger cities on the way to play with until we were close enough to use the final destination. (For example, Dallas, then Oklahoma City, then Wichita…) Just make sure everyone agrees on the next city as you guess.

Rules: One rule we had was that everyone had to put in their guess for the next sign before too much time passed. For example, after passing a Dallas: 215 sign and then gathering up the next round of guesses, there were always some of us who liked to delay as long as possible, realizing that the more miles we drove, the better idea we’d have of the next number on the sign. But this was considered cheating, so guesses for the next sign had to be in before a specified time (like a minute). Otherwise your guess is invalid. However, if you wanted to do away with this rule, you definitely could: Then each person can kind of gamble as to how long they want to wait to guess. Wait too long and you might risk passing a sign without guessing at all. But wait long enough and you could have a big advantage over the other players. Come to think of it, I think we played that way sometimes, too. Either way is fun.

Also, when making guesses, no duplicate numbers: if you want to guess 160 but someone already guessed it, too bad. You have to choose a different number. (It was legal to guess just one number lower or higher, which was often a good strategy.) Guesses are first-come, first-serve, which was why we always said our guesses out loud at least, even if we didn’t write them on paper.

Variations: If you’re hardcore, you could keep score by not just writing down the winner of each round, but the number of miles by which each guess was off. Then at the end you total up each person’s miles, and the person with the lowest score wins. For example, take the above list of guesses again:

• Jamie – 200
• Louis – 154
• Ann – 194
• Jeff – 172

If the right answer was 160, that means each person would be assigned a number of how far they missed the mark:

• Jamie – 40 (200 minus 160)
• Louis – 6 (160 minus 154)
• Ann – 34
• Jeff – 12

Those numbers would be the scores you write down for each player for that round. To be honest, that’s way too much math for my taste ;-), but if you like a more competitive game and your addition and subtraction, it might be a fun way to play.

However you play, happy road tripping!

Best for: One person or a smaller group, maybe during a time when you need to be quiet.

What you need: Everyone needs paper and a pen or pencil. Optional: colored pencils, crayons, markers, or other supplies for making your dream house pretty.

How to play: Really, it’s a simple activity. You just draw your dream house! And when you’re a kid (or an adult), you can let your imagination run wild, which is where the fun comes in. I thought the best way to show this activity would be an example, so imagine how happy I was when, during the move my family recently completed, I was going through a box of old memories and found this:

I wish I had dated it! My best guess is that I drew it when I was 7 or 8? But this is exactly what I’m talking about! Usually my sisters and I drew kind of a floor plan layout like this, and of course our houses were always ginormous and held all sorts of cool extras. Which seemed to mostly be themed rooms: a party room, a toy room, a ferris wheel room, a rock climbing room, a pet room, a maze room, a museum room, a candy room, of course…oh, and a manatee room. (My sisters and I were in love with manatees. We thought they were the coolest things ever.) There also has to be a mini airport, of course, and indoor swimming pool. Anyway, I’m so glad I found this priceless drawing. Maybe I can convince my husband to build this floor plan for us one day.

And as a bonus, here’s another, more recent example. I think I drew this shortly after my husband and I were married; I was babysitting some younger cousins and wanted to show them one of my favorite drawing activities. So, since I was older this one is of course more realistic…(uh, kind of…)

Notice I kept the indoor swimming pool (this time with a dolphin) and now have a private helicopter pad instead of a mini airport. And complete with home theater, exercise room, large kitchen, hot tob, play room, and star-gazing deck, this dream home is perfect. Oh, and slides to reach the lower levels. Who hasn’t wanted a house with slides at one point?

Anyway, this second drawing shows another way you can draw your dream home: as a cut-away side view instead of a bird’s-eye view. And you can use words to label rooms (like in the first drawing), or you can just draw (like in the second). Either way, whatever you want to draw, go for it! Draw your dream home. Adding as many details as possible is always fun.

Variations: We often played this with sidewalk chalk, too, except it was more of a “draw your dream room.” Each of us would take one large square of the driveway (the squares formed by the seams in the concrete) and pretend it was our room, drawing in beds, dressers, rugs, and usually bean bag chairs and lava lamps (things we always wanted but never had), all from a bird’s-eye view. Then you can play house in your new room. My husband also played a similar game in talking version called build a cabin in your mind.

What it is: A very similar game to winks, just more physically active, with more physical contact.

Best for: A big group of 9 to 21 players (ish).

What you need: You’ll need an odd number of players, and kind of a bigger group. Also somewhere to play. You’ll basically be wrestling on the floor, so keep that in mind. I most often played in a carpeted building with a big room (lots of space, not many breakables). I also played in a bouncy castle once. That was fun.

How to play: Divide your number of players in two (except, since you’re playing with an odd number of players, one half will have one extra person). The bigger half all sits cross-legged in a big circle. Then all the rest of the players sit cross-legged in front of someone already sitting, creating an inner circle. But one poor person, like Jeremy, will be left sitting cross-legged with no one in front of him. He’ll start the game.

When everyone is ready to play and attentively watching Jeremy, he chooses the names of two people sitting in the inner circle and calls them out loud, like “Stephanie and Charlie!” Then Stephanie and Charlie both try to race across the circle and tag Jeremy’s outstretched hand. Whoever does so first moves spots and sits in front of Jeremy, and someone else will be left without a parter. Then it’s his or her turn.

But here’s what makes it hard: The people sitting behind Stephanie and Charlie (we’ll call them Parker and Julie, respectively) do everything they can to keep their partners from making it to Jeremy. That’s where the wrestling part comes in. It’s basically anything goes, except mean behavior: hitting, scratching, biting, you know. Oh, and tickling counts as bad behavior. Play nice.

So let’s say Parker and Julie are both trying their hardest to keep their partners in place, and Parker puts up a good fight, but Stephanie is just too tenacious and wiggles away to tag Jeremy’s hand. Then she gets to sit in front of Jeremy and it’s Parker’s turn to call two names.

There are some other rules you could add to adjust your game to the skills and desires of your players. First, it’s fun if the people in the inner circle and outer circle get to switch places; then they don’t get too tired of always being called or always being alone. So you could say that each time someone gets a new partner, they switch places, and each time someone in the inner circle fails to get away from someone in the outer circle, they switch places, too. (So, in the above example, once Stephanie got to Jeremy, they’d switch places so now Stephanie is in the outer circle, and once Julie successfully kept Charlie as her partner, they’d switch places, too.)

Then, if two pairs are wrestling for a long time and it looks like no one’s getting anywhere fast, you could call it a draw and make the two inner-circle players switch with the outer-circle players. Then Jeremy calls two new people.

I played this game regularly with some friends in high school, and it was a lot of fun. Definitely lots of physical contact. But it could be fun to play with just family, too, if your family is bigger.

Cautions: Because you’re wrestling on the ground, make sure that everyone plays nice and doesn’t hurt each other. But be warned that a few small injuries (especially rug burns) might be unavoidable.

Variations: Winks is a similar game, just not as active or full contact.

What it is: A night game, one you play outside when it’s dark in a big park and you have lots of energy to use up. For big groups.

Best for: A big group of at least 10 players.

What you need: Somewhere to play. A big park is perfect. You want somewhere fairly open, but you’ll also need landmarks (like trees or something). And the more people you have to play, the better.

How to play: First, set up your playing area. Choose an area of the park to be the home base (this can just be a spot of ground, or a tree or something). Then you’ll need to choose several landmarks around home base, maybe about three to seven, depending on the size of your playing area and desired difficulty of your game. These can be trees, playground equipment, etc. They should all be visible from the home base area, which should be in the middle of the play area.

Then choose someone to be It (say it’s Johnny). Johnny stands on home base and everyone else scatters and hides around home base, but not too far; you can set up boundaries for the game at the beginning. Players really shouldn’t need to stray beyond any of the landmarks. And they should also stay close enough to hear Johnny shout.

The point of the game (for everyone but Johnny) is to make it to each of the landmarks and finally to home base without being spotted by Johnny. The point of the game for Johnny is to spot everyone else.

Here’s how it works: Once everyone is situated and hiding around the playing area, Johnny shouts out a number, any number, like “Fifteen!” Johnny should be sure to shout loud enough so everyone can hear him. Then Johnny starts counting out loud up to that number, also loud enough for people to hear. And while Johnny counts, he closes his eyes.

When Johnny closes his eyes, that’s everyone’s chance to move. All the players get up from their hiding spots and book it to their next destination (maybe the closest landmark, or maybe another hiding point somewhere along the way, if the next landmark is far).

When Johnny reaches the number he said he would count to, he immediately opens his eyes, so that’s everyone else’s cue to hide lickety split. (If you’re close to a hiding spot, reach it; if you’re not, hit the dirt and freeze and hope Johnny doesn’t spot you.)

When Johnny opens his eyes, he can look all around the playing area, trying to spot players. If he does see someone, he shouts out to them (he doesn’t have to identify them by name) and they’re out of the game. For example, he might say, “I see someone hiding behind the tall pine tree!” The person behind the tall pine tree (you know who you are) would be eliminated.

(For those of you who don’t like games where players are eliminated, you could modify the rule to say that any player spotted has to go back to home base and start their quest to touch each landmark over, but can remain in the game. This will make it impossible for Johnny to “win,” though.)

Once Johnny is done spotting, he shouts another number and counts again. Johnny will want to choose a good mix and balance of high and low numbers to call out. If he picks a number too low, like three, maybe none of the players will be daring enough to move at all. That won’t do Johnny any good. But if he throws out a bigger number, like thirty, the players might get really daring and aim for something far – giving Johnny the advantage if the players miscalculate the distance to their next hiding spot. It might take some tries to figure out the ideal range of numbers for your playing area.

The whole time, Johnny never leaves the home base. All the other players try to strategically and sneakily make their way to each landmark and finally to home base. They have to touch each landmark on the way, and make it all the way to home base (basically right next to Johnny) before he sees them. The first person to successfully accomplish this wins. Then the winner gets to be it (or maybe choose someone else to be it, if that’s more of a reward for you and your friends).

If Johnny happens to eliminate all players before anyone can touch home base, he wins.

Variations: I’ve also heard this same game called “commando.” And I guess it’s kind of a (more intense) variation of hide and seek.

Best for: A group of about 10.

What you need: You’ll need paper and pens for everyone to write with. The paper doesn’t need to be big; in fact, index cards would be perfect.

How to play: To start, pass around pens and cards to everyone in the circle. This is a great, easy game for groups because you don’t need a certain number of players and no one has to sit out; everyone can play right away. Once everyone has a card and pen, tell everyone to write a question that begins with “What if…” at the top of the card. For example, “What if people had platypuses for pets instead of dogs?”

These questions can be as serious or as silly as you want them to be. In our games, they usually end up both ridiculously silly and about people in the room, like “What if Joe wore only corduroy clothing all the time?” At any rate, don’t be afraid to let your creativity show!

Then collect all of the cards, shuffle them up, and deal them back out to everyone randomly. If someone gets their own card by chance, you can let them switch for another one.

Once everyone has a card with a question that they didn’t write, tell everyone to then write an answer to the question, starting with the word “Then…” Again, these can be as silly or as serious as you want. If you got the question “What if we all had platypuses for pets instead of dogs?” you might write: “Then we’d all have to live next to rivers and streams.” Or you might write “Then Lassie would have turned out a whole lot differently.” The point of the game is to be kind of silly, so don’t be afraid to. Also don’t worry if you think you’re not terribly witty (as I always do in games like this), because it really won’t matter in the end. You’ll still be funny even if you’re not witty. I love games like that.

Then for the last part of the game, everyone goes around the circle and reads their cards, but here’s the catch: you’ll answer each question with a mis-matched answer. So here’s how it works. Say Mike’s playing and he was holding the platypus question. He’d read the question out loud: “What if we all had platypuses for pets instead of dogs?” But then the person to the right of Mike, we’ll call her Kim, would read her answer for her question, which might be: “Then the world would be a much better place.” Then Kim would read the question on the card she’s holding, “What if there were a Chick-fil-A on every corner?” and the next person in the circle would respond with their answer to their question. You’d go all around the circle until you got back to Mike’s answer: “Then Lassie would have turned out a whole lot differently.”

Usually hearing a question with the wrong answer is pretty funny, either because it makes absolutely no sense or it’s surprisingly true. So as you go around the circle, you’ll all probably laugh and joke (especially if  some of the questions are about people in the room) and claim the questions. A lot of silliness, but a lot of fun, too. Then if you like it, play another round!

Variations: This game reminds me a lot of paper telephone, probably because both games invariably tend to be about people in the room in ridiculous situations. So silly. But so fun.

Best for: Smaller groups, maybe 3 to 6 people.

What you need: Nothing! But a word list might be helpful.

How to play: This game is really simple, and you could make up more complicated rules if you wanted to. But basically someone says a word, any word, and another player has to respond immediately with the very first word that pops into his or her head (no thinking allowed). So a sample game between Mack and Jane might go like this:

MACK: Apples.

JANE: Caramel.

MACK: Christmas.

JANE: Lights.

M: Spider.

J: Eww.

M: Groundhog.

J: Bill Murray.

M: Slow.

J: Snail.

It’s supposed to be very fast, with only a fraction of a second between Mack’s prompt and Jane’s response. It’s best if Mack responds quickly, too; that gets Jane in the habit of responding quickly. The fun of the game comes in learning possibly interesting things about your friends or family (“Crush.” “Andrew–I mean,…uh…” “What?!”), or in laughing at the interesting, creative, or (il)logical associations our minds come up with. Your game might be interrupted with questions, explanations, or laughter, and that’s all part of the fun.

To help in thinking up quick prompts, feel free to use my online word generator.

What it is: This clapping routine game is set of hand routines involving snaps, claps, and slaps. You learn the routine, then the fun consists of doing it over and over, getting faster and faster. I learned and played the game at a summer camp for teenage girls. It was our favorite game to play in the mess hall while we waited for our food because it makes a lot of noise.

Best for: However many people you want. You could even play by yourself (but I’m not promising that would be as fun as playing with friends).

What you need: Preferably, a table. But if you don’t have a table or flat surface, your lap will do.

How to play: This is one of those games that would be really hard to teach in writing. So my sisters helped me make this short video that teaches you how to play.

You just have to memorize the clapping routines (it’s not that hard once you start), and then you can do them as fast as you can.

Variations: You can play either competitively or non-competitively. To play competitively, make it a game of elimination. Start by doing all six routines slowly, then do them again a little faster, then a little faster. Anyone who messes up at any point is out of the game. (You might need a judge to help decide this.) Or, don’t eliminate anyone and just play for fun, teaching any new friends who walk up to your table and wonder what in the world you’re doing.

Also, for a very similar game, check out the cup game.

What it is: A good indoor group game for all ages; it can easily be used as a get-to-know-you game, too.

Best for: A group of about 10 to 20.

What you need: Somewhere to play with enough seats for everyone, arranged in a more or less a circle. Also a rolled-up newspaper. (This will be used to lightly whack each other with and could easily be substituted with something else: a foam baseball bat, the cardboard middle of a roll of paper towels, etc.)

How to play: Let’s say you’re playing as a get-to-know-you game. First, have everyone sit in a circle. Then, since your players don’t all know each other, go around the room and have everyone say his or her name a few times, so everyone can start to learn names. If you have two people with the same first name, learn their first name and last initial.

Next, choose one player to be It (we’ll call him David). David holds the rolled-up newspaper and stands in the middle of the circle. David’s goal is to whack one of the other players with the newspaper, which will let him trade spots and sit down while someone else becomes It. But David can only hit certain players at certain times.

To start the game, choose one player, like Katie, to begin. She starts by saying the name of someone else sitting in the circle, like Greg. As soon as she says Greg’s name, David can hit Greg with the newspaper. But as soon as Greg says another name, like Violet, David has to target Violet instead. If David whacks Violet with the newspaper after her name is said but before she can say a new name, she’s It and David gets to sit down.

It’s a good get-to-know-you game for David because he has to remember everyone’s names so he knows who to tag. And it’s a good get-to-know-you game for everyone else because they have to remember each other’s names so they can call them out.

Variations: If you’re playing with a group of people and you all know each other, using your first names might be too easy. So make the game more fun by assigning everyone a state, or a fruit, or something else in a category of your choosing. Now everyone has to remember each other’s assigned names, making the game more challenging and fun.

You could make the game even more challenging by tying the name to the chair, instead of the person. So if David was it but tagged Greg and then sat down in Greg’s seat, David would assume Greg’s name until he moved to a different chair. Make sense? That might get confusing, but it could be a fun way to make the game more challenging.

This game is also a variation on the theme of signs, just not as quiet as signs.

What it is: A simple clapping routine that’s fun to do with a big group of people. You learn the routine and try to do it as fast as you can. I’ve played during summer camps in cafeterias at meal times. It makes a lot of noise, and it’s fun to do with a lot of people.

Best for: A big group of at least 10 people (but you can play with less).

What you need: You need a table to sit at and enough people to sit all around the table. Then everyone who’s playing needs a cup. It’s best if all the cups are identical. They should be small enough that they’re easy to grab. Plastic Dixie cups work okay, but sometimes they’re too lightweight. Ideally, you’d have a bunch of plastic restaurant tumblers, like the kind you get at one of those all-you-can-eat pizza buffets (CiCi’s, anyone?).

How to play: To get ready, have everyone sit around a table. The bigger the table and the more people you have, the more fun it is. And to work right, everyone needs to be sitting next to each other; no empty spaces. Then everyone gets a cup and turns it upside on the table right in front of them.

Now the best way to teach this game is with a video, so three of my sisters helped me make one. Just watch!

So when you really play, you’ll be sitting in a circle and be able to pass the cups all around, making the game a loop that goes on and on. You gradually get faster and faster, until no one can keep up and everyone laughs.

Variations: You could play more competitively and eliminate anyone who messes up, making the circle smaller and smaller, but for that you’d need to modify the group size around the table. The real fun is just in trying to go as fast as you can as a group. And in making a lot of noise.

Best for: About 4 to 8 players.

What you need: Just a swimming pool, one that you can easily swim across in one direction or another.

How to play: First, choose one player to be It – say it’s Roger. Roger gets out of the pool and stands on the edge, with his back facing the pool. All of the other players line up inside the water, holding onto the edge of the pool beneath Roger, like this:

Now Roger thinks of a category. It could really be anything, but some common categories include fruits, breakfast cereals, candy bars, car types, etc. It should be something that all players will know fairly well.

Roger announces his category out loud, and then all of the other players silently think of an object in that category. So if Roger’s category is breakfast cereals, Beth might choose Cap’n Crunch, and Sam might choose Rice Krispies Treat cereal.

Once all the players have their objects in their heads, they announce they’re ready and Roger can begin. He starts calling out breakfast cereals out loud. All of the other players wait until Roger calls out the breakfast cereal that they’ve chosen. Say Roger calls out Cap’n Crunch, Beth’s cereal. That’s her cue to begin swimming to the opposite end of the pool, away from Roger. Her goal is to make it to the opposite end without being tagged, and Roger’s goal is to tag her before she does. If he does tag her, she’s the new It. If he doesn’t, Beth gets to stay where she is and Roger gets out and continues to name items in the category.

So, because Roger’s back is turned, he won’t know to turn around unless Beth makes some noise. Being perfectly silent as you swim across a pool can be hard, but still, that’s her goal. (The best is if you can take one big breath, dip quietly under the water, and shoot across the whole pool without coming up for air.) If Roger ever hears a splash or a noise, he can turn around and check if anyone’s swimming across the pool. If anyone has left the wall, he can jump in to tag them. But if Roger turns around too often without cause, the other players can call him out on it.

Sometimes you might choose speed over silence: if you think you can get away from Roger quickly enough, forget being quiet and just go for it. Or, you might choose silence over speed, and ever-so-slowly work your way along the edge of the pool, hoping you can get far enough away without being heard.

Finally, more than one person might have chosen the same object in the category, but that’s okay; they’ll all just swim across at the same time.

The round ends either when Roger tags someone (then that person becomes It) or when all of the players make it to the other side of the pool untagged (then Roger loses and plays another round as It). For the next round, choose a new category and play again!

Variations: If you’re playing with young kids, you could play in the shallow end only, swimming (or walking) across the short end of the pool. Just be careful jumping in!

Best for: Group of 3 to 8ish.

What you need: Nothing!

How to play: Have all your players sit in a circle, or establish a clear playing order. Then proceed to tell a story, with each person saying one sentence at a time. Here’s the catch: each sentence must start with either “fortunately” or “unfortunately,” always alternating. So here’s how a sample game might go. The first player, Rachel, starts out the story by saying a simple statement of fact, like

One day I got a new puppy.

(The story can be in first person, but it doesn’t have to be.) The next player, Brad, would then add a sentence onto the story, but he has to start the sentence with “unfortunately,” like

Unfortunately, he ran away.

Then it’s Katie’s turn, but she has to start a sentence with “fortunately:”

Fortunately, he came back the next day with a 100 dollar bill.

The next player would say an “unfortunately” sentence, like “Unfortunately, the 100 dollar bill was a counterfeit and the cops nabbed me for it when I tried to use it to buy a pet canary.” As you can imagine, the game usually gets pretty silly pretty fast. And the stories tend to drag on without any clear ending, so just break it up when you want to start a new one. It’s a lot of fun, though, and good for car rides or killing time. Write your stories down or just tell them out loud; either way, have fun!

Variations: As said, this game is pretty similar to tell a story.

Example: If you want an example game, maybe you could watch the TV show I Shouldn’t Be Alive; sometimes I think those episodes tend to play out like a version of this game. (The man was starving in the jungle…fortunately, he found some berries…unfortunately, they were poisionous. But fortunately, he hunted a rabbit to eat…but unfortunately, he had no fire to cook it…)

Okay, for real, here’s a sample game from me and my husband. Oh, which reminds me of something else: if you’re playing with only two people (or any even number), it means the same people will always be saying “unfortunately” or “fortunately” sentences. Which could be boring or could be fun. But you could just switch it up halfway through if you want. For now, you can guess who had the “fortunately” sentences in this example, me or my husband:

One day a man was flying on an airplane. Unfortunately, the airplane was out of peanuts. Fortunately, the man was allergic to peanuts and so he was happy about that. Unfortunately, the man was also allergic to chocolate chip cookies, and the airplane wasn’t out of those. Fortunately, the man was the pilot, and so he wasn’t offered any of the cookies. Unfortunately, the pilot was so distracted by the conversation about the cookies he was allergic to that he didn’t see the huge thundercloud. Fortunately, the plane’s autopilot took control and did a barrel roll around the thundercloud. Unfortunately…

Well, you get the idea.

Best for: A big group of at least 10 players.

What you need: Slips of paper and pens to write with. And also a hat or bowl to put all the slips of paper in. And a timer.

How to play: First, write down names of people or characters on the slips of paper. You could prepare this ahead of time on your own (or print off mine!). Or, hand out a slip of paper to every person in the room and have everyone write down the name of someone famous (a person, alive or dead, or a character). You don’t have to have the same number of papers as players; that’s just a convenient way to set up the game. The more names you have written, the longer your game will be.

Once you have all your names written down, fold each one up and put them in the hat or bowl. Then divide your players into two teams (drawing a line down the center of the room is an easy way). Now you’re ready to play.

The game consists of team members guessing the names on the slips of paper throughout three rounds. The team who guesses the most names after the three rounds wins. Here’s how it works.

The first round is just like catchphrase. Team 1 sends up a player (say Jake) up to the front. Jake stands at the ready, and the designated timer person starts the time. (You can choose a time that works best for you, but about 30 seconds usually works well.) As soon as the time starts, Jake draws a name from the hat and starts getting his teammates to guess. Just like catchphrase, Jake can talk and say anything except the celebrity’s name, or any part of it.

So, if Jake drew the name Billy the Kid, he might say, “A famous outlaw from the American Old West!” but he couldn’t say, “An outlaw who was referred to as a kid!” because kid is written on the paper.

As soon as Jake’s teammates say “Billy the Kid!” Jake gets to draw another slip of paper. He goes through as many names as he can until the time runs out (no skipping allowed). Then save all of Team 1’s correct slips in a pile until the end of the round.

Next team 2 gets a turn, and you keep rotating teams and players until all the slips of paper have been guessed correctly. Have each team count up the correct names in their piles and write down each team’s total somewhere. Next, put all the slips of paper back in the hat. Then round 2 starts.

Round 2 is just like charades. Just like in round 1, players come to the front, draw slips of paper, and try to get their teammates to guess as many names as they can before the time runs out, but this time players are not allowed to talk, only act. So if Carlos drew Billy the Kid this time, he could pretend to draw a gun out of his holster to get his teammates to guess the name.

Round 2 should be somewhat easier because everyone’s heard the names once before. Just like in round 1, have each team save up their correct guesses and count up the total at the end. Then, put all the papers back in the hat for the third and final round.

Round 3 is similar to round 1. Players get their teammates to guess names by talking—but this time, players are only allowed one word. So if Jake happened to draw Billy the Kid again, he might say “Outlaw!” and wait for his team to guess the right name. Guessers have the advantage this round of having heard each name twice before, so memory comes to play as much of a role as guessing does. If Jake’s one word just doesn’t cut it and his team doesn’t guess it right away, they’re forced to keep guessing and thinking until the time runs out. Speed is still important, because Jake wants to get through as many names as possible before the time runs out. (You might find that a shorter time, like 10 seconds, works better for round 3.)

At the end of the round, count up each team’s names one more time, and then add each team’s totals from rounds 1, 2, and 3. The team with the most correct guesses overall wins.

Variations: You don’t have to play with people’s names. The game could also work well with movie titles, books, etc. Or you could easily put a themed spin on the game (historical celebrities, for example). I’ve also made a Thanksgiving version.

Printables: If you want a list of famous people and characters ready to go, just print out mine! Click the link below, print, and cut along the lines. And for more printable lists of people and also movie titles, check out the pictionary post. Enjoy!

List of famous people and characters

Best for: A group of about 6 to 12 people.

What you need: Nothing!

How to play: The basic game play consists of players telling three facts about themselves. Two of the facts must be true, but the third one should be a lie. Then the other players have to guess which one is the lie.

So here’s how you could set up the game. Have all of your players sit in a circle and choose someone to start, say Mark. Mark would then think of two true facts about himself and one lie, then say them aloud in any order, trying to conceal the lie as a truth. For example, Mark might say, “I can finish a whole large pizza in one sitting…

“…I’ve had my picture in the newspaper…”

“…and I’ve been skydiving.”

Then the rest of the players would be able to think, consult, and decide together which fact about Mark is false. If you want an easy, no-score game, just have the players discuss and guess, and then have Mark reveal the lie. If you really want to keep score, you could let all of the players guess individually. Whoever is right gets a point; whoever is wrong doesn’t. You could also give Mark a point for every person he fooled. Whether you’re keeping score or not, after Mark reveals the lie, then the next player in the circle takes a turn.

Strategies: When you’re giving your three facts, since you’re trying to fool the other players, it’s good to disguise the lie as a truth; that is, something that people would believe you’ve done. Alternatively, you could try to disguise your truths as lies (so say things you’ve done that are kind of unbelievable, kind of like Mark did). Also, I’ve seen people play where they name very common things as their truths and lie, making it pretty difficult to guess. But either way, you’re trying to say things about yourself that others don’t know, making this a good get-to-know-you game.

Variations: If you wanted, instead of having players reveal their lie right away, you could have everyone in the circle say their truths and lie, and then go back around the circle a second time and let people reveal what was true and false.

Best for: A group of about 8 to 10 people (though you can play with many more).

What you need: Words to act out (check out my word generator for an electronic list, or the end of this post for word lists you can print out). Optional: A timer or stopwatch and paper to keep score on.

How to play: The object of the game is simple: players take turns acting out words, with no talking or sound effects. Other players try to guess the word, and the team or player who guesses the most wins.

For example, if you’re playing with a big group of people, you could have two teams. Team 1 sends up their first player, Tucker, to act out a word. Say Tucker draws a slip of paper with the word astronaut written on it.

Tucker would then have to act out the word as fast as possible in a way that his teammates could guess. He might take slow, exaggerated steps, as if he were walking on the moon, then pretend to put up a flag and salute to it. Anything to get his teammates to shout out the word astronaut. As Tucker is acting, his teammates start shouting out guesses. Tucker can modify his actions based on the feedback of his team, but the one thing he can’t do is talk or make any noise.

(Another possible rule: It’s debatable whether Tucker can point to things, like the framed picture of Neil Armstrong his uncle has on the wall. This was often against the rules when we played, but you can decide what’s best for your game.)

After Tucker finishes acting out his word, he sits down and a player from Team 2 gets a turn.

That’s how the game play works, but you can set up the actual game however you want. You could have two teams or more, or no teams at all. You could keep score or just play for fun. You can have a timer and set a time limit on each player’s turn; as many words as they can act out and get their team to guess, they get points for, but once the timer runs out, their turn is over.

You can also easily make this a themed game. Just use words related to Halloween for your classroom Halloween party, or summer words for your end-of-the-year summer bash, or a list of your niece’s favorite things for her seven-year-old birthday party.

Variations: There are lots of other variations on this simple acting and guessing game. You can try telephone charades, celebrities, in the manner of the adverb, and even Star Wars pictionades (a game of my own invention).

Printables: Need a printable charades word list ready to go? Here you go! Click the links below to open the word lists, then just print them and cut along the lines for paper strips of words ready for acting. Have fun!

Charades Word List – Easy Words

Charades Word List – Medium Words

Charades Word List – Hard Words

Charades Word List – Really Hard Words

What it is: I know there are a lot of games called chicken, but this one is the one we always played in the pool growing up. It’s a fun and rough (and therefore slightly dangerous) pool game.

Best for: 4 to about 8 players.

What you need: Just a pool and some people to play. It’s best if you have people of varying sizes/ages.

How to play: The game is played in the shallow end of the pool with at least four players (but up to, oh, like eight or ten, if you wanted). Players form pairs and try to eliminate the other pairs from the game.

In this game, let’s say there are four players: Jim and his younger sister Susie and their cousins Leo and Travis. Jim and Susie are one pair. To get ready to play, one of them (probably Susie, assuming she’s smaller) will sit on the other’s shoulders. Jim would stay standing in the shallow end. Leo (say he’s smaller) would also get on Travis’s shoulders, like this:

Then someone yells “go!” and the game begins. The point is for each pair to knock the top player off of the other pair. This is done primarily by Susie and Leo grabbing, pushing, shoving, and pulling each other (but no hitting, kicking, or biting). Travis and Jim also play strategic roles in maneuvering around each other and could even try to trip each other if they were really aggressive.

As you can imagine, it’s a pretty rough game. (We played with my cousins a lot, and I don’t think our parents ever liked it, but we played anyway.) It’s kind of one of those anything-goes games. And I guess not much of a game for strategy…the biggest or toughest players usually win. But it’s fun because different combinations of pairs can lead to different outcomes (for example, say Travis is really strong, but Leo’s kind of a wuss, or the other way around.)

The game is over when one of the top players falls off their partner’s shoulders and into the water. (It’s debatable whether a team getting dunked, even if the top player stays on top of the bottom player’s shoulders, counts as losing or not.) We also had some pretty fun ongoing games with lots of pairs (where anyone could attack anyone else), and then if you fell down you got right back up again and jumped back into the fray.

Disclaimer: Though I’ve never personally known anyone to become injured in a game of chicken, please be careful when you play. Letting especially big or aggressive kids play with smaller kids might be dangerous…so make sure everyone is safe, aware, and kind.

What it is: Basically the same game as watermelon, just with different equipment. A rough-and-tumble, physically active game played in the pool with big groups. Best for teens and older.

Best for: About 10 players to however many you can comfortably fit in a pool.

What you need: First, a swimming pool. Second, a clear plastic 2-liter soda bottle. Finally, at least, oh, I’d say ten people to play.

How to play: First, get your equipment ready. Make sure your 2-liter soda bottle is actually clear (not tinted green) and empty. It’s also best if it has a white cap. Rinse out the bottle and remove the label as completely as you can. Finally, fill it to the top with clear water.

Optional: Find two pool floaties (the small, simple ring kinds).

There, now you’ve got your equipment. Out by the pool when you’re ready to play, divide your players into two even teams and your pool into two equal sides. Each team gets a side. If you have pool floaties, put them right outside the pool at each team’s end. (The floaties will make the goals.) All of the players get into the pool and hold onto the edge of their side of the pool, with their backs facing the middle.

Then someone who’s not playing (or one player who volunteers to sit out at first in order to start the game) stands outside the pool and tosses the 2-liter bottle into the middle of the pool. As soon as everyone hears it splash, the game begins.

The object of the game for each team is to get the bottle into the opposing team’s goal (which is the floaty, if you’re using floaties, or just the outside edge of the pool, if you’re not). To do this, players simply find, grab, and swim with the bottle. Which isn’t quite as easy as it sounds, because for the defense, almost anything goes—
except no biting, kicking, scratching, drowning, otherwise hurting, or getting out of the pool. Other than those things, players are pretty much free to do what they can to score, or to keep the other team from scoring.

The twist in this game is that a clear 2-liter soda bottle filled with water is halfway buoyant and very hard to see under water, so finding it becomes as much of a challenge as maneuvering it. Multiple times within a game, the bottle might become lost, and everyone will focus on finding the bottle. (When you do find it at that point, try to refrain from shouting “I found it!,” which will only get you tackled, and instead see if you can quietly sneak it into the other team’s goal to score.) Teams are free to set up their own strategies as they see fit, if they want a strategy at all. You might pick at least one designated goalie. (But the goalies can’t park it too close to the goal and refuse to move all game long.)

Once a team scores, switch sides and start again. Play for a designated amount of time or to a certain score. Caution, though: this game can get exhausting, especially if you’re a go-getter about it.

Variations: Of course, watermelon is a fun, somewhat sillier variation. But I have great memories of playing bottle with my hardcore friends in high school in my family’s pool during summer nights. Ah, memories.

Best for: Big group of at least 10 players.

What you need: You’ll need two flags. And you’ll need somewhere to play. While a forested area or park is often fun for regular capture the flag, flour bomb capture the flag works best in a flat, open area, like a big parking lot or a field or yard. Oh, and it’s also best when played during the daylight.

Then you need people to play, preferably all wearing dark-colored clothing. You could have one team in black shirts and one team in navy blue shirts, for instance. But the different colored t-shirts aren’t necessary. White t-shirts, however, make this game not nearly as fun.

Finally, you’ll need flour bombs. You’re going to want at least as many flour bombs as you have players, but it would be better to have double that, maybe more.

So, what’s a flour bomb? It’s just a handful of flour packed inside a tied-off portion of panty hose.

When you throw the flour bomb at someone, it leaves a white mark on their shirt. Think of it as a painless, easy, kid-friendly version of paintballs.

To make your flour bombs, gather up as many old pairs of panty hose as you can find, or purchase some cheap ones. Cut each leg into, oh, three or four pieces. Then make sure that each piece is closed at one end (the toe pieces will already be like this; for the middle pieces of the leg, just tie a knot in one end). Then carefully put about a cup of flour into each portion of panty hose and tie off the other end. Try to make your bombs as packed as possible, not too floppy. And voila! You have flour bombs. They’re pretty messy to assemble and store, so don’t try to make them in your living room. And it’s nice to store them in a big bucket.

How to play: Game play is the same as regular capture the flag, with one difference: instead of tagging other players, you peg them with flour bombs. To start, at the beginning of the game, put all of the flour bombs on the dividing line between the two teams. Have players line up on their side equal distances from the dividing line. When someone yells “go,” all players can make a run for the flour bombs and grab as many as they can. Then hang onto your flour bombs until you want to use them to peg someone. When you’re out of flour bombs, pick up more from the ground.

You can’t peg members from the opposing team while they’re on their side, of course. And you can’t be pegged while you’re on your side. The white marks left by the flour bombs will help settle disputes as to whether someone was pegged or not (which is why white t-shirts are just no fun). Also, if you’re wearing dark shirts, you can all line up at the end of the game and see who got pegged the worst.

You might want to outlaw gathering and hoarding flour bombs, too (or maybe that’s fair game in your game; you decide). And one important rule: No pegging players’ faces or heads. Though when we played, the end of the game often turned into simply a free-for-all peg-each-other-with-flour-bombs activity, which inevitably turned into a free-for-all open-the-flour-bombs-and-dump-them-in-each-other’s-hair flour fight. Ah, good times. This was an annual tradition for my youth group at church. Lots of fun.

Variations: Ooh, I’ve never played this way and I’m not quite sure how it would work, but wouldn’t it be kind of fun to somehow add colored chalk to your flour so each team could have their own colored bombs? That way might even be fun with more than two teams (and definitely white t-shirts). There are also other variations of regular capture the flag, like playing at night with glow sticks.

What it is: A fun variation of tag that gives players more of a chance to rest between runs. The game is played using pairs, which is why we always called it missionary tag (missionaries often preach in pairs).

Best for: An even number of players in a big group (like at least 10).

What you need: Just a big, open space outdoors to play. An open grassy area is best.

How to play: First, have all your players find a partner in order to form pairs. (The pairs will switch up a lot as the game goes on, if that makes it less stressful for any of those who are afraid of commitment.)

Let’s say Rick and Tammy form a pair. Next instruct all your pairs to stand side-by-side, linking arms as shown.

Rick and Tammy are ready to go.

You should be playing with an even number of people, so everyone should have a partner. Each pair should stand spaced out from the other pairs in a circle, or just kind of a spaced-out jumble works, too.

After all your pairs are set, choose one pair to be It and the first person that It chases. We’ll say that T.J. starts out as It, and Jenny starts out as the person T.J. chases.

T.J. gives Jenny a few seconds’ lead, during which Jenny takes off running from T.J. Soon T.J. follows. If he tags Jenny, she becomes It and immediately starts chasing T.J.

But Jenny can escape from T.J. by running up to any pair in the game and linking arms with one of the partners. For example, say she runs up to Rick and Tammy and links arms with Rick’s free arm. As soon as Jenny hooks arms with Rick, that means the third player – Tammy – is T.J.’s new target to tag. So Tammy better run away ASAP, or T.J. will tag her and she’ll become It.

Any player being chased by the person who’s It can hook on to any pair at any time. The only rule: you can’t hook on to a pair right next to the pair you just left. It’s a lot of fun and a game you can play for a lot longer than normal tag since you get a chance to rest. Enjoy!

Variations: If you’re playing with a really big group, you might want to try having more than one person being It and more than one person being chased at one time. It adds to the excitement of the game and keeps things moving at a faster pace.

What it is: A funny variation of telephone, played on paper instead of out loud. It’s a great game for creative teens or adults and can be quite entertaining. It’s always been a favorite among my family and friends.

Best for: Group of about 6 to 10.

What you need: Each player will need a piece of paper and a pencil or pen to write/draw with.

How to play: First set up the game by sitting all of your players in a circle indoors. This game might be hard to play around a table because each player needs to keep their paper secret from their neighbors, so playing in a living room on couches and chairs works great.

Then hand out paper and writing utensils to all the players. Have everyone write his or her name in small print at the bottom right of the page.

Everyone starts by writing a sentence at the top of his or her paper. It can be something random, true, abstract, from a song lyric, or about someone in the room. Here are some examples:

• The kids all danced around the large oak tree.
• The dog chased the carefree butterflies to the end of the rainbow.
• If all the raindrops were lemon drops and gumdrops, oh what a world it would be!
• Ted can’t find the right shoes to wear to prom.

Once everyone has a sentence at the top of his or her paper, everyone passes their paper to the player to their right.

Then everyone illustrates the sentence give to them with a small picture right underneath the sentence. So, for example, if Mary were given the sentence “The kids all danced around the large oak tree,” she might draw something like this:

Once everyone has finished drawing their sentences, everyone folds the top part of the paper over so it covers the first sentence, but not the picture. Then again, everyone passes their papers to the right.

Now everyone receives a paper with just a drawing visible, and everyone writes the sentence that presumably could have led to that picture (usually with some humor thrown in). For example, Bob, given the above picture, might write this sentence underneath: “Once there was a family of tree huggers.” Then everyone folds over their paper so only the last sentence is visible and passes the paper to the right.

And that’s basically how the game works. Everyone continues alternately writing sentences and drawing pictures, always covering up everything but the latest sentence or picture and passing to the right. Continue writing and drawing until you run out of room, or until everyone gets his or her paper back (that’s why you wrote names at the bottom at the beginning).

After everyone’s done writing and drawing, everyone unfolds the paper he or she has and begins to read and laugh at all the sentences and drawings, especially how in the world the first sentence turned into the last one. Then you can go around the circle one by one as everyone reads a paper out loud, or you can just pass them around so everyone can see the drawings clearly.

And then play another round!

Strategies: Really, the point of the game is to evoke laughter, so good strategies include being creative and off-the-wall with your sentences and pictures. Oh, and don’t worry, no artistic talent is required. It’s always kind of funny (or against the rules, depending on your viewpoint) when someone writes a sentence about a picture and throws in something that wasn’t there before, just to heighten the random factor. And when we play, most papers inevitably end up about people in the room, even if they don’t start out that way.

Example game

This game might be hard to visualize if you’ve never played it before, so here’s an example from a real-live game, to show you how one sentence can turn into a picture that can turn into a totally new sentence and on and on:

The kids all danced around the large oak tree.

Once there was a family of tree huggers.

After watching Fern Gully, Mrs. Mullen’s fourth grade class hurried out to the playground for a live reenactment.

The boys saw a picture of a girl and ran frantically to the park.

Many thanks to my sister and cousins for letting me use their artwork.

You can see some other game samples here.

What you need: Words to guess (either written down on strips of paper, or perhaps generated by a handy online word generator someone made) and a timer.

How to play: The point of the game is to get your team members to guess the target word by explaining the word to them out loud. The trick is, you can’t say the word (or any variant of the word) or you lose the round.

So to start, prepare a bunch of words or phrases on slips of paper (see below for some pre-made printable word lists, or use my online word generator). You could divide these into categories (famous people, foods, sports, household items, animals) or just mix them all together.

Put your papers into a bowl or hat and then situate all your players. Divide everyone up into two teams and have everyone sit in a circle, alternating members from each team (if you can find a way to divide teams like boys versus girls, then it’s good because it’s very easy to remember who’s on your team).

Choose one player, like Marty, to start. Marty takes the bowl of words, draws one, and immediately starts to describe it while at the same time someone starts the timer (for as much time as you all choose). As soon as Marty starts describing, his team members can start shouting out guesses (while the opposing team stays silent/watches the timer). Marty can say anything as long as it’s not the word written on the paper or any variant of the word. (The opposing team members sitting next to Marty can look over his shoulder and make sure he doesn’t say any words he’s not allowed to.)

Say Marty’s first word is baseball bat.

He could say:

“A long wooden thing you use to play a sport!”

However, he could not say:

“A long wooden thing you use to play baseball!”

Or even:

“A long wooden thing you use to hit a ball!”

Because he can’t say any variant of anything written on the slip of paper. Marty could get creative, though, and say something like:

“The mammal that has wings and is black and flies around at night eating insects!”

And when his team members shout, “bat!” he could say:

“Okay, that same word, but used to describe something long and wooden you use in a sport!”

As Marty’s team members guess, he can provide feedback and keep talking, as long as he doesn’t say any word on the paper.

Speed is definitely the key, because Marty’s goal is to get through as many words as he can before the timer runs out. Each word his team guesses correctly gets them a point. When the timer runs out, pass the bowl to the next person in the circle, and they get a turn to draw words and describe them while their team guesses. Play moves like this around the circle, with lots of describing and shouting out answers involved. It’s a lot of fun.

The team with the most points in the end wins. You can have players just save their papers until the end to count points, or have someone write down the score after each round, for those players who like to know they’re winning (or not).

Rules: Rhyming words are not allowed as clues. So, for example, if the word were plum and someone tried to use the word chum to get a teammate to guess it, that would be against the rules, because plum and chum have no clear relation except for the fact that they rhyme. The same goes for using clue words simply because they have the same first letter as the word. (So if the word were plum, saying, “Princess! Poultry! Pumpkin!” and accentuating the “p” sound would be against the rules.)

Strategies: Since speed is so important in this game, the faster you can give hints that will help your team members guess, the better. Well-known phrases or song lyrics are great, for instance. For example, if the word were snowman, instead of saying: “Something kids build in the winter that’s in the shape of a human…” you could just shout: “Frosty the…” and everyone would (hopefully) immediately shout “Snowman!”

Variations: You can choose to allow or prohibit skipping words (say if you draw one that’s just way too hard to describe or a word you don’t know the definition of). If you’re playing with younger players, maybe allowing passing is a good idea. But if you’re hardcore, maybe it’s not.

Also, you could play with a shorter time limit (maybe 10 seconds or so) and let each player describe only one word per turn. If they guess it, great; the turn ends, the team gets a point, and it’s the next player’s turn. If they don’t, too bad; no points for them that round. Just experiment to find out the best time limit for your group.

One fun rule to make it more challenging is to try to get people to guess the word by saying as few words as possible, like one or two. You could get more points the fewer words you used, if you really wanted to keep score.

Oh, and once I was playing catchphrase with my family and it was getting a little easy, so my sister suggested that each person had to use a random pre-selected word in each clue. The word we chose was “banana.” So, for example, if the word was baseball bat, we’d say something like, “This is kind of shaped like a banana in that it’s long and skinny…” Or if the word were tiptoe, we’d say something like “If you’re in a room with a lot of banana peels all over the floor, you might walk like this.” It was a kind of fun way to keep the game interesting, creative, challenging, and a little silly.

The game password is also a four-person variation of the game.

Printables: For your catchprase-playing pleasure, here are some ready-to-go word lists for you! Just click a list to open it, print it out, and then cut along the lines to create pre-made paper word slips. Or, for an even bigger list of words, check out my online game word generator, perfect if you’re playing with a laptop, iPod, or iPad handy.

Catchphrase Word List – Easy Words

Catchphrase Word List – Easy Words 2

Catchphrase Word List – Medium Words

Catchphrase Word List – Hard Words

Catchphrase Word List – Animals

Catchphrase Word List – Food

Catchphrase Word List – Household Items

Catchphrase Words – People

Catchphrase Words – Travel

Hopefully these word lists help you out, but if you like playing catchphrase, I’d recommend buying the electronic version of the real game. It’s a lot easier to play and keep score, and it has a ton of words. It makes the game a lot more fun.

Best for: 2 players or however many more you want.

What you need: You’ll need paper and pencil, or something else to write with (chalkboard, wipe-off board, etc.).

How to play: The object of the game is for one player to think of a word or phrase, then for the other players to successfully guess the word before their guesses run out.

Let’s say Eli, Lucy, and Zander are playing. Eli will be the first to think of a word, so he silently thinks of one: apple. Then he sets up the game on a piece of paper by drawing a shape like this:

Then, next to it, he draws blanks to represent each letter in the word (or phrase) the other players are guessing:

Now Lucy and Zander can start guessing which word fills the blanks. They do so by guessing one letter at a time. Say Lucy guesses the letter E.

Eli thinks of his word. If the letter Lucy guesses appears in the word, Eli fills it in every time it appears:

Now Lucy and Zander know one letter of the word. Next, Zander might guess the letter T. But Eli knows the letter T isn’t in his word, apple, so Eli marks it as an incorrect guess by beginning to draw a hanging stick figure. He also writes the incorrect letter down below, so Lucy and Zander can keep track of their incorrect guesses:

Say Lucy guesses the letter P. Eli fills in all of the P’s in the word:

The game continues with Lucy and Zander guessing letters. If Eli completes the drawing of the stick figure, like this:

…that means that Lucy and Zander lose because they didn’t guess the word in time. But if Lucy and Zander correctly guess all the letters in the word or the whole word itself at any time, they win.

Then start another round! We usually played that the person who guessed the word (or last letter) correctly got to choose the next word or phrase.

Ah, this game got me through lots of long hours of high school economics class. Some of the hardest words to guess are short words with few vowels, like black. Rare words like myrrh and hymn are great, too.

Hangman is easily adaptable for themes: just have players think of words or phrases to fit a particular area. (History hangman, anyone?) It’s a great time-filler, too, and works well with classes when there’s some time to kill.

Printables: Not that it’s necessary to play the game, but if you’d like a pre-made hangman printout, just click here and enjoy!

What it is: A fun kid outdoor game (and one that involves pegging, if you like those kind) that actually has nothing to do with potatoes (even though they’re like one of my favorite foods).

Best for: A big group of about 20.

What you need: A big open area. A flat, grassy field is perfect. You’ll also need some sort of ball, which you will be using to peg each other. I’ve played with a kick ball, but you could also do a tennis ball (ouch) if you’re tough or a hacky sack or soccer ball.

How to play: First, assign each player a number, starting at 1 and ending at however many players there are. (Players will need to remember their number, but not anyone else’s.) One person, like Toby, starts out as it. He stands holding the ball and everyone else stands around him in a circle.

To start the game, Toby takes the ball and throws it straight up into the air as high as he can, at the same time shouting out a number that he knows belongs to one of the other players, like “Seven!” And as soon as Toby shouts out a number, all of the players including Toby run away from the ball as fast as they can – all except player number seven, who we’ll call Julia. As soon as Julia hears Toby call her number, she runs to catch the ball (or pick it up as fast as she can, if she doesn’t catch it). And as soon as Julia is holding the ball in her hands, she shouts “SPUD!” as loud as she can, and all players immediately freeze wherever they are.

Julia then gets the chance to peg another player to get him or her out. She must freeze where she’s standing, too, but she can look around and survey who’s closest to her. Say she decides to aim for Robbie because he’s closest. She gets to take three steps towards Robbie and then has one chance to peg him.

If Julia succeeds in pegging Robbie, he gets the letter S. Once a player gets an S-P-U and D, they’re out of the game. If Julia misses or Robbie catches the ball, she gets an S. While he’s being targeted, Robbie can’t movie his feet or he gets an S, and Julia can’t move hers, either, or she gets an S.

Once Julia or Robbie has a letter, Julia picks up the ball again and gets to start a new round by throwing the ball high in the air and shouting out another number.

The game continues until only one player remains, and he or she wins.

Variations: For a shorter version, you can play single elimination, meaning as soon as a player is tagged once, they’re straight out of the game.

Also, depending on the ball you’re using and the ages and strength of your players, you might want to do away with (or modify) the take-three-steps rule.

Caution: As with all throwing-and-pegging games, don’t hurt each other. Only allow pegging from the shoulders down, and make sure the size and hardness of the ball is adequately matched to the age of your players.

What it is: A big-group indoor memory and guessing game. Entertaining and great for teens or adults.

Best for: A big group of at least 10 people.

What you need: A slip of paper for each person to write on, pens to write with, and a hat or bowl to collect your slips of paper.

How to play: First, pass out the pens and paper and have everyone secretly write a name on their slip. It can be any name – usually a celebrity or famous character, but it could be a made-up name too. Mostly, it should be a name that other players wouldn’t immediately associate with you (this is an important part of the strategy of winning the game).

Players fold up their slips of paper and put them all in a bowl or hat. Then one player (who, to avoid giving him or her an unfair advantage, shouldn’t be particularly good at identifying the others’ handwriting) goes through and reads all the names out loud, probably a couple of times, just to make sure that everyone knows all of the names. Players should listen carefully when the names are read aloud, because that’s the last time they’ll hear them.

Then the game can start. At first, it’s every man for himself, and the object for each player is to form the biggest “corporation” by pulling other players onto their team. Players take turns guessing which name another player wrote. If the guess is correct, the guesser gets that player on his or her corporation. If the guess is incorrect, the guessed player gets a turn to guess somebody else’s name.

So let’s set up a sample game to illustrate. Alyssa, Jared, and Savannah are three players playing with their friends. The players just heard all of the written-down names read aloud, including the names Socrates, Grace Kelly, and Bob.

Alyssa is selected to start. She starts by guessing which name one of the other players wrote on their slip of paper. So she would say something like, “Jared, are you Grace Kelly?” If Jared didn’t write Grace Kelly on his paper, he would say, “nope,” and then it would be Jared’s turn to guess. He might say, “Savannah, are you Bob?” Say Savannah did write down the name Bob on her paper. She says yes, and then she joins Jared’s “corporation,” or becomes part of his team. For the rest of the game, Jared and Savannah will work together  – they can confer and help each other, but ultimately Jared is the boss of the corporation (and the winner of the game if his corporation wins).

So after Savannah joins Jared’s corporation, Jared (and now Savannah) would get another chance to guess. After conferring with Savannah, Jared might say, “Alyssa, are you Socrates?”

Also, if sometime later in the game, Alyssa guessed Jared’s name, that means that Alyssa gets Jared and Savannah on her corporation.

So you can see that memory is a very important skill. First, it’s important for players to remember the names that were read off at the beginning. (There’s usually always one name, something common or nondescript, that manages to slip everyone’s memory until the end. The player who wrote down that name is lucky and has a good shot of winning.) It’s also important for players to remember who guessed what. Also, the bigger a corporation gets, the better they usually get, because there are more people conferring and helping each other guess.

It’s fun to watch the dynamics of the game, and each round will be different: sometimes it might be one giant corporation against another, or other times it might be one pretty big corporation against a lot of mom-and-pop businesses (one- or two-group teams who have managed to avoiding getting guessed out by the larger corporations). In the end, there will be one giant corporation with one player at the head, and that player is the winner.

Strategies: Mind games can play an important role in strategy. For example, if Jared wrote down the name Socrates, he might want to guess, when it’s his turn, “Jeremiah, did you write down Socrates?” Jared would know the answer would be no, of course, but it might confuse the other players. (“His name must not be Socrates because he asked Jeremiah if that was his name…”)

A lot of mind-reading and interpretation will probably happen as players try to guess which name was written down by who. So one of the best things you can do to win is write down a name that no one will associate with you (but not so obviously opposite as to attract attention).

What it is: A casual, often unorganized talking and guessing game.

Best for: 2 players or however many more you want.

What you need: Nothing!

How to play: The basic game is simple: players take turns quoting movies while other players try to guess which movie is being quoted. Example: Cody might say, “That wimpy deer?!” Everyone else would guess, “The Sandlot!”

So the details of how you play are up to you. You can be strict and say that only the person who guessed the movie correctly gets to say the next movie line. You could even keep score. Or, you could just play casually and have players quote movies as they think of them. It’s a great time killer game.

Variations: A fun (and natural) variation for a larger group of players would be for someone to quote a movie, and then if another player guesses the movie, instead of just saying the title, they could name another quote from the same movie to help the remaining players guess. So, if Cody said “That wimpy deer!?” and Gabby figured out the movie, she might add “You’re killing me, Smalls!” (This can actually be a pretty fun game all on its own.)

You could also require players to, instead of naming the movie, name the quote that directly follows the first quote. (Like, “You can’t run from me!” followed by, “Oh, wait, you can. You keep surprising me!”)

If you have an iPod or computer and someone with an impressive music library, you could also play name that movie with soundtracks or movie scores. Just have one person play snippets of different songs and see who can name the movie the fastest. Our kids love this variation!

Oh, and bonus if anyone can name the three movies quoted in the post’s pictures!

What it is: One of those big-group, invade-your-personal-space teambuilding games (the kind my husband actually hates because they can be awkward). But perfect if you have a lot of teenagers and you want to build team spirit and unity…spunity, if you will.

Best for: A big group of at least 20 people.

What you need: Just people to play, and somewhere like a big field where you can all fit in a circle (best played outside).

How to play: This is really more of a teambuilding activity than a game with winners and losers. There are no teams; just gather all of your participants together and have them stand in a tight circle, shoulder to shoulder. Then in unison, have everyone turn to the right so everyone is facing the back of the person directly in front of them. If necessary, have everyone scoot in slightly so you’re all standing pretty close. Have everyone hold the shoulders of the person in front of them.

Then on the count of three, have everyone sit (on the lap of the person standing behind them). This needs to be done in unison or part of your circle will fall on the ground (which can be fun, too). Practice until you’ve successfully completed the human chair and everyone is sitting and stable on someone else’s lap.

*Very spunified human chairs will even be able to shuffle forward (kind of walk) all around the circle in unison, while sitting. Yep, something to aim for, for sure.

Best for: group of about 8ish.

What you need: Nothing other than people to play and a room with chairs for everyone to sit in.

How to play: Start by having all your players sit in a circle. Choose one player’s chair to be the head chair, then the chair to the right of the head chair to be the last-place chair.

Then each player gets to choose an animal, with a hand motion and sound effect to go with it. So, for example, if Phil were playing, he could choose an alligator as his animal, slap his hands together for the hand motion, and say “chomp!” for his sound effect. Each player needs his or her own animal. Other ideas are a lion roaring, a bird tweeting, anything. Don’t be afraid to get creative – I’ve played where someone chose a lemming, made the sign their hand fall over a cliff, and the sound effect saying “ahhh!”

Once everyone’s chosen their animal, sign, and sound effect, go around the circle a couple of times and give everyone a chance to repeat everyone else’s sign (you’ll need to remember these to play the game). When everyone feels like they’ve got each other’s signs down well enough, you can start the game.

The object, just like in the game signs, is to pass the “sign” around the circle. Players also try to work their way to the head chair by not messing up. The trick comes in keeping the rhythm and remembering who has what sign.

First set up the rhythm of the game by having all players clap along together: two pats on your lap, followed by one clap. (Think “we will rock you.”) Have everyone clap for a little bit to get the rhythm set. Start out slow so everyone can get used to the rhythm.

Once players have the rhythm down, the player in the head chair can start the game – we’ll say it’s Phil. Phil would start my making the sign and sound effect of his animal (the alligator) on a clap beat, then on the next clap beat making the sign and sound effect of another player’s animal (say Marianne’s fluttering butterfly). On the very next clap beat, Marianne would accept the sign by making her own butterfly sign, then she would pass the sign on to someone else by making someone else’s sign and sound effect.

If a player messes up, either by combining the wrong sign with the wrong sound effect, or accepting or passing a sign off-rhythm, or failing to accept the sign at all, the game stops and that player moves to the last seat in the circle, while other players move up a seat. The goal is to make it to the head chair and stay there, obviously proving that you’re the most hand-eye coordinated, animal sign-passer, sound-effect making, on-rhythm player there. How’s that for bragging rights?

Variations: If you want to make the game more challenging, you have a couple of options. First, you could just speed up the rhythm as you go, so everyone’s giving and receiving signs faster and faster. Second, either instead of (or in addition to) speeding the game up, you could make every sign “stick” to its original chair. So, say Marianne with the butterfly sign messed up and had to move to the end of the circle. She wouldn’t take her butterfly sign with her; instead, she would adopt the animal of whoever was in the last chair, while the player who moved up into Marianne’s chair would become the butterfly. This becomes challenging because you have to remember what your sign is, especially if there’s a lot of changing seats involved. It’s a lot of fun that way, too.

Best for: About 15 to 20 players.

What you need: You’ll need an odd number of players (probably at least nine) and as many chairs as your number of players plus one, divided by two (so, if you were playing with nine people, you would need five chairs).

How to play: Set up the game by arranging the chairs in a circle, with enough room behind each chair for someone to stand. Then divide up the players into pairs. A good way to play this game is on group dates with an even number of boys and girls, so each pair would consist of a boy and a girl. (But if you do have an even number of boys and girls, players will have to take turns sitting out because you need an odd number to play.) But you don’t have to play with an even number of boys and girls if you don’t want to.

Each pair then takes a chair, and one of the players sits down while the other player stands behind the chair, with their hands behind their back. So if Roxanne and Mike are a pair, they would sit/stand like this:

All the other players do the same. (If you’re playing with boys and girls, have all the girls sit while the boys stand, or vice versa.) One player will be left without a partner, say it’s Chad:

Poor Chad. The object of the game is for Chad to invite another player to fill the chair in front of him. The girls sitting in the chairs try to move to Chad’s chair (if he invites them), and the boys standing behind the girls try to keep the girls from moving.

Here’s how it works: Chad invites a girl to move to the empty chair in front of him by winking at her. Say he winks at Roxanne. When she sees Chad wink, Roxanne stands up as fast as she can and moves to sit in Chad’s chair. But Mike, standing behind Roxanne, tries to stop Roxanne from leaving by tapping her on the shoulder. If Roxanne can get out of Mike’s reach before he taps her, she’s free to sit in Chad’s chair. But if Mike taps her, she has to sit back down and Chad has to wink at someone else. And here’s the catch for Mike (and all the other boys standing behind girls): He must keep his hands behind his back at all times, and he must look down at Roxanne’s head (not up at Chad’s face).

Say Roxanne does escape to sit in front of Chad – then it’s Mike’s turn to wink at someone else, and the game keeps going on. The boys standing behind the chairs must keep their eyes down, and the girls carefully watch the winker, so they can move quickly when he winks.

After you’ve played a while, switch up the pairs and have the standers sit and the sitters stand behind the chairs (and rotate players in who might be sitting out).

Variations: If you want to shake up the standers and the sitters even more often (and you don’t care about mixing up boys and girls), have a pair switch every time someone occupies a chair. For example, remember when Chad winked Roxanne over? Once she got away from Mike, she and Chad would switch places, so Chad would be in the chair and Roxanne would stand behind it. You could also switch up players every time someone fails to get away (if Mike stopped Roxanne from moving to Chad’s chair, she and Mike would switch spots), or both.

This is also similar to another game my friends and I played often, but the other version is much rougher and involves a lot more physical contact.

What it is: A guessing game for two or more players.

Best for: 2 players or however many more you want.

What you need: Just your brains.

How to play: One player (let’s call her Tasha) first gets to think of a noun (a person, place, or thing). Once Tasha has a noun picked out, the other players then get to guess by asking questions that can be answered with a yes or a no. If you’re playing by the strict rules, players only get to ask 20 questions, and if they haven’t guessed by then, Tasha wins. If someone does guess what the object is, that person gets to think of the next thing to guess.

So here’s how a sample game might go: Tasha picks the noun “fire hydrant.” Say she’s playing with one person, her friend Leroy. The game might go like this:

Leroy: “Is it a person?”

Tasha: “No.”

Leroy: “Is it a thing?”

Tasha: “Yes.”

“Is it alive?”

“No.”

“Could I hold it in my hand?”

“No.”

“Is it made of metal?”

“Yes.” …

And the game would go on like that until Leroy uses up his 20 questions or until he guesses what the object is. It’s a great game for filling up long hours on car rides or for playing on walks. And you can go by the 20-question limit if you want, but I never really have. We just ask and guess until someone guesses right, then it’s their turn. And if you’re playing with little kids or just playing for fun, you could allow hints, too, especially if it’s taking a long time to guess something.

We also usually play with concrete nouns, things that you could see, touch, or feel. If you want to allow or disallow abstract nouns (like honor, love, capitalism…), you should probably specify beforehand, either way.

Some of the hardest-to-guess objects I’ve played with are confetti, trash bags, stop signs, and…oh, fire hydrant.

Variations: No, because and breakfast combo are some more difficult variations on this classic game. And poodle is a slightly sillier one

Oh, but what it is: A fast-paced, fast-moving card game, good for big or smaller groups of people, and always a crowd pleaser.

Best for: 4 to about 10 players.

What you need: You’ll need a deck of playing cards (two if you’re playing with a big group. It’s okay if they don’t match). You’ll also need spoons, either the metal or the plastic variety, enough so that every player minus one can have one.

How to play: Set the game up by sitting all players down in a circle on the floor. Put all the spoons carefully in the middle of the circle, with handles facing outwards, like this:

Shuffle the cards, then deal four cards to each player. Put the remaining cards face-down next to one player that you designate as the starter (we’ll call the starter Max for this game).

The final object of the game is to grab a spoon from the middle of the circle and not be the one player left without a spoon. You can grab a spoon when you either have four cards of the same kind (four aces, four kings, four twos, etc.) or when you see another player grab a spoon.

Play starts with Max, who draws a card from the deck, looks at it, and then either discards it or switches it for a card in his hand and discards that one. So remember: the goal is to collect four of a kind. If Max is holding an ace, a king, a two, and a six, and he draws another two, he’d probably want to keep it, so he could exchange the two for the six and discard the six.

Max discards the card face-down into a pile in front of the next player in the circle (say it’s Annie). Annie then picks up the card, looks at it, and either discards it or switches it for a card in her hand and discards another. She discards in front of the next player, and play moves like that all the way through the circle. Each player can only pick up the cards directly in front of them. The last player in the circle starts a discard pile near Max, which he will draw from when the original deck runs out.

So that’s basically how the game works, with each player trying to collect four of a kind. And all players are drawing and discarding at the same time, moving as fast as they can or want. Each card must go though every player’s hand, though, so if Annie is slow, she might have a pile build up in front of her (while the other players urge her on).

So the goal is to collect four cards of a kind. Remember Max with his two twos? Let’s say he finds the other two twos in the deck, so then he’s holding four cards of a kind. He can immediately grab a spoon from the middle of the circle. And as soon as the other players see Max grab a spoon (or, really, see Max starting to grab a spoon), they can grab a spoon, too, but one person, like Annie, will be left without a spoon. Then Annie would get a letter S. Next time she gets left without a spoon, she gets a letter P, then O-O-N, and then when you get all five letters, you’re out of the game.

When a player leaves, take one spoon away, too, so the number of spoons is still one less than the number of players. Play until one player remains: the winner.

Strategies: The “right” way to play this game is to carefully watch your cards, so you can collect four of a kind, but also always keep one eye on the spoons so you’re never left without one. If you wanted, you could also just watch the spoons and forget about your cards (but you still have to go through the motions of picking up each card and putting it in the discard pile).

When collecting cards, sometimes if you see two of one kind go through the deck, you might want to pick up the third one, so the people on down from you don’t collect four of a kind, or so if the other two cards make it through the rest of the circle unwanted, you can collect them.

If you’re the first to have four of a kind and grab a spoon, it’s fun to take it as quietly and as secretly as you can, and then hide the spoon and pretend to keep playing. If no one saw you, it might be a few minutes until someone looks at the spoons, counts them, and realizes there’s one missing. I’ve played sometimes when all but one or two spoons were taken, and the last two or three people in the game kept playing, searching for four of a kind, not even realizing that the spoons were gone. Those times are fun.

Variations:  If you want a faster game, do single elimination: a player is out as soon as they fail to grab a spoon one time (no more counting S-P-O-O-N). You also don’t have to put the spoons in a neat circle. Sometimes we pile them all messy, like this:

Then (especially if they’re metal spoons), it’s harder to take a spoon without making noise, which makes the grabbing-for-the-spoons moment at the end more rowdy and rough.

If you really like rowdy and rough games, try putting the spoons not in the middle of the circle, but somewhere else, like in the next room, behind a couch, up the staircase…. That sure leads to some rowdy games. Then it’s pretty impossible to sneak away from the game to grab a spoon, so everyone ends up running and jumping over each other to get a spoon at any cost. It’s a lot of fun, usually something kind of like this:

Oh, and one more thing: if one time you really really want to play this game, but you can’t find any spoons anywhere, so you think, “Hey, why don’t we just play with forks instead?” … um, don’t do it. Just don’t.

What it is: Originally a board game, but it’s become a common classic, and you don’t need to buy the game to play your own version. It’s a drawing word-guessing game for groups of any age.

Best for: Group of at least 4 players.

What you need: You’ll need something to draw on, like a big pad of paper and marker, a chalk board and chalk, or a wipe-off board and dry erase marker. Or even just a stack of blank paper. You’ll also need slips of paper with words written on them and a hat or bowl to put them in. (Or, you can use my online word generator!) Optional: a stopwatch/hourglass/clock, and a piece of paper to keep score.

How to play: The game is pretty simple: players take turns silently drawing different things while their team tries to guess what the drawing is. Teams compete against each other to have the most guessed words and win the game.

The way you set up the game can vary; pictionary allows for a lot of flexibility. For this post, let’s pretend you’re going to play with a big group divided into two teams.

Before the game starts, you’ll want to come up with some things to draw and write them on slips of paper (see the end of this post for some pre-made lists). The objects can be as hard or as easy as you want. If you’re playing with little kids, easily illustrated nouns like sun or bear would probably be good; if you’re playing with teens or adults, throw in some abstract nouns like honor, some adjectives or verbs like upset or dance, or maybe some idioms like have a cow.

Once you have your slips of paper ready, fold them up and put them in a bowl or hat. Then divide your players into two teams.

If you have one drawing surface, have teams take turns sending up a player to pick a word from the hat and draw it in a pre-designated amount of time. If the team guesses the word before the time runs out, they get a point. (Or, if you want to designate hard and easy words at the beginning, you could assign different point values to different words.) Then the other team takes a turn.

If you have two drawing surfaces, you could have each team send up a player and have them draw the same word at the same time (hiding their drawings from the other team). First team to guess the word wins the round.

At the end, tally up points and announce a winner!

Variations: Instead of having a player draw one word before the time runs out, you could let team members draw as many words as their team could guess before the time runs out, if you like that sort of fast-paced action.

You also don’t have to keep score or keep time if you want. You don’t even need two teams. You could just play with a big group of people and take turns drawing, with slips of paper or with players thinking of their own words to draw. Players take as long as they need to draw. The first player who guesses correctly gets to draw next.

Printables: Want some ready-to-go pictionary word lists? Click any of the links below, print out the lists, cut into strips, mix and match, and enjoy! Or, if you want word lists you don’t have to print out, check out my word generator.

• Pictionary Word List – Easy Words
• Pictionary Word List – Easy Words 2
• Pictionary Word List – Medium Words
• Pictionary Word List – Medium Words 2
• Pictionary Word List – Hard Words
• Pictionary Word List – Hard Words 2
• Pictionary Word List – Really Hard Words
• Pictionary Word List – Movie Titles
• Pictionary Word List – People and Characters
• Pictionary Word List – Idioms

And if you really like playing pictionary beyond the occasional class or family party, I’d highly recommend buying the real game. It has a lot more words, a board, and a better way to keep score; it’s an awesome way to play.

Variations: Looking for new ways to spice up your pictionary games? Try mixtionary, musical pictionary, paper telephone, or pictionades. Happy playing!

What it is: Just what it sounds like: playing catch with an invisible frisbee.

Best for: 2 players or however many more you want.

What you need: An invisible frisbee, ha! Okay, just kidding. This game is great because you don’t need anything to play, just somewhere to play. (Probably outdoor, but indoor could be fine – there’s not very much danger of an invisible frisbee knocking over your favorite lamp, is there? Well, I guess someone’s arm still could…maybe scratch the indoor idea…)

How you play: Well, it’s just like regular frisbee, but you’ve got to use your imagination a little when you throw and catch. Just pantomime throwing a frisbee to your friend Alex. He can exaggeratedly make a dramatic dive and catch it, and toss it towards your friend Lizzy, but maybe Stephanie jumps up and intercepts it and passes it back to you…just have fun! It’s not really a winner-or-loser (or even different teams) game, but more of a silly fun activity to pass the time (like when you’re on a long car trip and you take a pit stop and want to stretch your muscles but you left your frisbee at home). It can be a real blast, too (especially for people like me who don’t have a ton of athletic coordination to catch and throw real frisbees and like pretending for once that they can make an awesome dive or pass).

Variations: It doesn’t have to be invisible frisbee; it could be invisible anything! Hacky sack, basketball, football, soccer, you name it – just get creative and have fun.

Examples: Once I was with some friends, standing around, killing time, and our other more talented friends pulled out a hacky sack and started to play. We weren’t good enough to join the hacky sackers, though, so (maybe only a little out of spite) we started our own invisible hacky sack game. It was great! And probably way more fun than the real thing. Seriously.

Or, another time my siblings and I were in a big open field, I think after fireworks on the Fourth of July, and as we were walking back to our car, we were filled with so much energy and good spirits that we started tossing around an invisible frisbee, that became a football, that became a baseball. Ah, good times.

What it is: A rough-and-tumble, physically active game played in the pool with big groups. Best for teens and older.

Best for: About 10 players to however many you can comfortably fit in a pool.

What you need: A swimming pool, a watermelon, and at least, oh, I’d say ten people to play. (Don’t worry, it will all make sense soon.)

How to play: First, divide your players into two even teams and your pool into two equal sides. Each team gets a side. Then toss the watermelon into the pool (it will float).

The game is basically like football, but in the water, and with a watermelon in place of a football. (Doesn’t this sound hilariously fun already?) The object of the game is for your team to move the watermelon through the pool and place it on the outside edge of the opposing team’s side, all while keeping the opposing team from doing the same to you.

Rules include: no biting, kicking, scratching, drowning, otherwise hurting, or getting out of the pool. But basically, other than that, anything goes. You can push the watermelon, keep it above water or push it under, pass the watermelon to teammates, tackle opposing team members, grab onto the watermelon for dear life – anything to score. As you can imagine, it often turns into a pretty rough physical contact game, but also a pretty funny one (because, come on, how hard/entertaining is it to maneuver/watch other people maneuver a wet watermelon in a pool?).

Variations: I think I’ve heard of covering the watermelon in Crisco, to make it even harder to hold onto. You can also play basically the same game with, instead of a watermelon, a clear 2-liter soda bottle, with the label removed, filled with water. Then it’s a little more challenging and less silly, because it’s a lot harder to locate the non-floating bottle, but a lot easier to maneuver it around the pool.

What it is: An outdoor, physically active group game (dare I say sport?) for lots of people.

Best for: Big group of at least 10 players.

What you need: First, you’ll need two flags (one for each team). These can be a variety of things; we always used two rags or cloths. You could also use two bandanas, t-shirts, etc., or, if you’re playing at night, two glow sticks.

You’ll also need somewhere to play, which can also be a variety of places, depending on how many people are playing and what type of game you want. I’ve played in front and backyards, big parks, parking lots…just anywhere with lots of space to run around outside, and a way to divide the playing field in two.

Finally, you need people to play, probably at least ten, but up to many more, depending on how big your playing area is. And, depending on how many people are playing, you might want a way to distinguish teams. (If you’re playing with a small group, that probably won’t be a problem because everyone could remember who’s on their team, but if you’re playing with a huge group, different colored t-shirts or bandanas might be a good idea, for instance.)

How to play: First, divide your players into two teams. Then, divide your playing area into two equal sides. (If you’re playing in a park, you can choose trees or other landmarks as dividing lines; if you’re playing in a yard, you could drag a hose across for a divider line; you could lay out shoes or t-shirts in a field; you get the idea.) Within each side, somewhere kinda far away from the dividing line, you’ll also want to designate two areas to be jails (this could be around a tree, in a corner, etc.).

Each team gets a side and a flag, and each team then puts their flag somewhere on their side. You could have a designated flag place picked out beforehand, so both team members know where the flags are, but it’s more fun if teams get to hide their flags, so the opposing team doesn’t know where the flag is. (If you do choose to hide flags, you might want to set some rules, like the flag has to remain visible, or it can’t be placed above players’ shoulders, etc.)

Then you’re ready to start the game. Your team’s goal is to find and bring the opposing team’s flag back to your side, while keeping your flag protected from the other team (because they’re trying to do the same thing). Any players are free to move anywhere in the playing area (on their side or the opposing team’s side) whenever they want, but here’s the catch: when you’re on the opposing team’s side, anyone from their team can tag you and send you to jail.

So that’s basic game play: players run onto the opposing team’s side and try to find and bring back the flag without being tagged and sent to jail. If one of your teammates is caught in jail, you can free them by running onto the opposing team’s side, making it to the jail untagged, and bringing back your teammate.

So while the basic game is simple, play can get very strategic and fun.

Your team could plan a specific attack, for instance, that involves all key players making a mass rush for the flag. Or, you could focus on defense, gather as many players of the opposing team in your jail as possible, and then make a move for the flag. You can have scouts that run and search for the flag, then come back safely and help plan. You can have decoys, trick plays, and kamikaze attacks. The possibilities are endless! It’s a great game for strategy, adrenaline, and teamwork.

It’s also a game that needs some well-defined rules beforehand, because disputes may often arise. Here are some things you might want to agree on with all players before the game starts:

1. When a player rescues a teammate from jail, do the two players get a free walk back to their side? Or do they have to make a break for it and run the risk of getting tagged again?
2. If you make a jailbreak, how many players can you bring back with you? One? Two? All?
3. Is puppy guarding allowed? (Puppy guarding: noun. The act of defensively guarding the flag by standing right on top of or very close to it.) How far from the flag must defenders stand?
4. What constitutes a tag? One-hand touch? Two-hand touch? Full tackle? (I’ve never played that way, but wouldn’t that be awesome?)
5. How will players in jail be penalized for breaking free illegally?
6. If a player finds the opposing team’s flag, grabs it, makes a run back to their side, and gets tagged in the process, what happens to the flag? Does it have to fall where it lands? Do the defenders get to take it back to its hiding spot?
7. Are challenges allowed? (I never played with challenges growing up, but my husband informed me how they work. Two players from opposing teams stand to face each other, right over the boundary line, both safe on their side. Then they declare a challenge, reach over the boundary line to grasp hands, and try to pull each other to their side. The player who gets pulled to the other side goes to jail.)

Any other rules anyone can think of?

Variations: Like I said, there are many ways you can play capture the flag: outside at night with glow sticks as flags, with big teams or smaller teams, during the day… But one of my favorite and tried-and-true variations is flour bomb capture the flag, perfect if you want to get a little messy.

What it is: An indoor acting game for big groups, funniest when you’re with a fun group of people comfortable with each other, especially if a few hams are included. Also a kind of fun spin on charades.

Best for: 4 to 12 players.

What you need: Just some creative people to play. Aren’t games like that great?

How to play: Gather all your players in a room and have one player (we’ll say it’s John) leave the room and close his ears. While he’s gone, the rest of the players in the room choose an adverb, one that describes how you might do something. An easy way to think of an adverb for this game is to think of words that end in -ly (for example, dejectedly, chivalrously, or simultaneously). Let’s say the players choose “chivalrously.” Once everyone has agreed on an adverb, call John back into the room.

John’s task is to guess the adverb by having other players act it out. He can call up any number of players in the room, give them any scenario, and then tell them to act it out “in the manner of the adverb,” or in the style of whatever adverb they’ve chosen.

So remember that the adverb is “chivalrously,” but John doesn’t know that. John would walk into the room and say something like this: “Okay, Chloe and Andy, talk to each other on the phone in the manner of the adverb.” Chloe and Andy would then stand up and start acting while John starts guessing and (most likely) everyone else in the room giggles. Players can get creative as to how they act in the manner of the adverb. For example, Andy and Chloe could act out “chivalrously” by being extra courteous on their phone call, or Andy could pretend to pick up the phone and say something like, “Good lady Chloe, what dost thou require? Might there be some dragon that I may slay for thy fair hand?” The main goal should be to act in a way that John can guess the adverb.

John can call up new actors and create a new scenario at any time. If Chloe’s and Andy’s acting just isn’t helping him guess, he can call up new actors and give them a new scenario. It’s also up to John how detailed his scenarios are. He can give players specific roles, like “Chloe, you’re a flight attendant, and Andy, you’re a businessman traveling to Europe. Act out flying on the plane in the manner of the adverb.” Or John could just give the players a general setting, like “Chloe and Andy, act like you’re at a Halloween party in the manner of the adverb.” He can ask everyone to act in the manner of the adverb, or just one specific player. It’s fun to watch different combinations of players act, sometimes even all players at once.

As soon as John guesses the adverb, the round ends and another player leaves the room, then the game starts again. It’s often fun to choose obscure or less well known adverbs that will be harder to guess (for example, instead of something like happily, try enthusiastically or whole-heartedly). We’ve even made up some adverbs before, for fun (Indiana-Jones-ly was a big hit). It’s a fun game, especially if you like charades or acting, and it leads to a lot of laughs, too.

Variations: This game is basically is a more specified and complex version of charades, and it can also be a lot more fun.

Printables: Want some ideas of good adverbs to use for the game? Here’s one you can view or print out. You can also find a list of adverbs in the “Wordplay” section of my Word Generator online. Have fun!

Adverb printable

What it is: An intense, active, get-your-adrenaline-pumping game, one of my all-time favorites. It’s also about a bajillion times more fun than regular dodgeball. I played regularly with a group of friends in high school/early college.

Best for: Group of 6 to 9 players.

What you need: The materials for this game are very specific and might be a little hard to come by, but it’s worth it in the end. First, you need an enclosed space with no or very little furniture or features inside (and for sure nothing breakable), and one that can be made pitch black. Yes, probably rare. We always used the gym at our church building, which was perfect. With everything put away and the doors closed, it was safe, enclosed, and pitch black. It was a half-size gym, which was also perfect; depending on how many people were playing, a full-size gym was sometimes too big.

You also need one or two (depending on your number of players) glow-in-the-dark dodgeballs. I think we got these at a sports store, but it’s just your basic red rubber kickball…except green and glow-in-the-dark. I found one on Amazon (commission link) that’s not green, but apparently still glows in the dark.

Then, you need players: probably about five or six for one ball, or however many more you want if you have two balls. And tell the players to come in their athletic gear, because this game is intense.

How to play: First, prep the area by making sure there’s nothing in the room to trip over, blocking out any lights you need to, making sure the dodgeballs have soaked up enough light to glow, and telling players to stretch. (Haha, kidding about that last one – mostly…) Then designate one area of the room (we always used the stage) as the place for players to go when they’re out.

Then, when you’re ready to play, divide the players roughly into two groups and have them stand on opposite walls of the room. Place the dodgeballs on a line down the middle. Then turn off the lights. The game starts immediately.

There are no teams; it’s just every man for himself. And unlike regular dodgeball, there is no dividing line. But like regular dodgeball, the object of the game is to peg other players with the ball, getting them out, and at the same time avoid being pegged yourself. The trick is, in the pitch-black room, the only thing you can see are the dodgeballs. It should be dark enough that you can’t even see the other players.

So when the lights go out, players can make a choice: they can fade into the darkness and hide, or be daring and make a grab for one of the balls. Once you’re holding a ball, you try to peg the other players and get them out – which is challenging, admittedly, since you can’t see anything. You can use your hearing, or your luck. Or, if you’re playing with two balls, you can watch the other ball – as soon as it moves, you know someone’s next to it. But if you are playing with two balls, be careful: don’t hold onto yours too long or someone else might get you out! (However, you can use the ball you’re holding to block someone else’s peg; as long as the peg didn’t touch you, you’re still in.)

Players are free to move anywhere around the room, usually trying to stay hidden, but also trying to make a move to grab and throw a ball when they can. It’s largely a game of strategy. There are no teams, but sometimes players form alliances. Anyone is free to grab a dodgeball when one’s available.

If you get pegged, you yell “I’m out!” and make your way to the designated sit-here-once-you’re-out area to visit with your other friends who are out, or provide commentary for the game (pretty creative commentary, since it’s pitch black…). Oh, it’s a good idea to make a lot of noise once you’re out; you don’t want someone mistaking you for a player and pegging you again. And, like regular dodgeball, if someone tries to peg you but you catch the ball, the person who threw it is out. Also, only pegs from the neck down count (no aiming high allowed).

So that’s basically the game. Everyone sneaks around the gym, using his or her own tactics (make daring runs for the ball? Shout out confusing comments? Try to trick the other players into giving their locations away? Hide in the shadows until the end? Whatever you want.) As more people get out, it’s harder for the players still left to find people to peg. Some games can last a good long while. But the game keeps going until one person, the winner, remains.

To play again, turn on the lights, let the balls soak up some more glow, take a break, then start again. My friends and I loved this game: it’s a great adrenaline rush, with lots of stealth and sneakiness involved. And it was always fun to watch for awesome events, like a mid-air collision between two balls, or, the best, when someone would accidentally hit the light switch with the ball and the lights would come on (we’d all cheer at that point).

Disclaimer: This is a pretty hard-core game. In fact, my sister just may have broken her nose while playing…so please be careful. We always started each game with a prayer for safety. It can be dangerous (as you can imagine) with people running, throwing, and dodging in a pitch-black room. Avoid sprinting or fast movements (to avoid running into other players). And I would only recommend this game for teens or older.

Variations: If you want another version of normal dodgeball that’s a little different and fun, try every man for himself dodgeball. I think it’s a blast!

What it is: A way fun classic, one I mostly played in elementary school.

Best for: Big group of at least 8 players.

What you need: A big, open area indoors (like a gym). And lots of non-hard balls (like ones made of foam or rubber). And lots of people to play.

How to play: Divide your players into two teams, and divide your gym into two sides with a line (real or imaginary) down the middle. Place all the balls on the line and instruct the players on both sides to stand a designated distance away from the line.

The purpose of the game is to get players on the opposite team out by pegging them (from the neck down) with a ball. So when someone says “go” or a whistle blows, all the (brave) players rush to the line to grab a ball and start trying to get people on the opposite side out. If you’re pegged anywhere from the neck down, you’re out and have to go stand against the wall. But if you catch the ball or get pegged above the neck, the person who threw the ball at you is out. Balls end up bouncing around on the floor, and you can pick one up at any time, but be careful no one pegs you in the process! Also, players aren’t allowed to cross the line in the middle.

The game turns into a big crazy melee, with balls flying and players running, throwing, and, of course, dodging, until one team has completely vanquished the other by getting all players out. There’s one catch, though: if everyone else on your team is out and you’re the last player in, and someone throws a ball at you to peg you, but you catch it, your whole team is back in, hooray! Then the game keeps going.

Variations: I’ll admit that I was never a huge fan of dodgeball—I’m just too afraid of things heading at high speeds aimed at hitting me, I think. But for some reason, I love glow-in-the-dark dodgeball, though it could be said that it’s decidedly more risky and intense. For a much less risky and intense version, try playing with softer balls with kids on a playground. I also think every-man-for-himself dodgeball is more fun, so give it a try!

What it is: An indoor group game, best for teenagers. Fun, but not in the rough or invade-your-personal-space way.

Best for: Group of about 12, or bigger, depending on how many people you can fit in a room.

What you need: Enough people to play (probably at least twelve), slips of paper for everyone to write on, pens to write with, and enough seats in a room for everyone (e.g., chairs or couches or benches). Each seat should be clearly distinguishable, so the floor probably wouldn’t be the best, and it’s best if they’re arranged in a circle. Oh, and you need one couch that seats exactly four people (or a bench or set of chairs will do).

How to play: First, designate one four-seater couch (or bench or set of chairs) as the Couch. The point of the game is to have all four seats on the Couch occupied by your team members. Next, divide into two equal teams. The easiest way to play is boys versus girls, because everyone always needs to remember who’s on their team, and things might get a little confusing later. Boys versus girls is easy. If you can’t do boys versus girls, though, maybe you could divide family versus family, or teens versus adults—any division that the players will be able to remember easily.

So you have your teams? Good. Let’s say you’re playing boys versus girls. So next, have everyone sit in the circle in the order boy-girl-boy-girl. (This means that each team will have two players on the Couch.) Also, it’s important that one seat stays empty, so you need one more seat than there are people.

Next, hand out the slips of paper and pens and have everyone write their first name down (if you have two players with the same name, have them use their last initial, too). Then gather up the slips of paper, toss them in a hat, and hand them out to everyone again. Each player will get someone else’s name. Someone might get his or her own name, but that’s fine. It’s just important that everyone keep the name a secret.

Okay, so you’re with me so far? Good. Now you’re ready to play. Let’s say Keith, Liz, Ben, and Ann are playing. Keith is one of the lucky ones sitting on the couch. Liz and Ben are sitting in random seats in the circle. And Ann is sitting in the seat to the right of the empty seat: because of this, she gets to start.

Remember the objective: each team wants to get four of their players on the Couch. Here’s how it works: Ann calls out the name of anyone in the room, like “Ben.” Then whoever is holding the slip of paper with Ben’s name on it (say it’s Liz) would get up and move to sit in the empty chair next to Ann. Then Liz and Ann would trade papers, so now Ann is Ben, and Liz is whoever was on Ann’s paper (nobody but Ann and Liz know).

Then the person to the right of Liz’s old chair gets to call out a name. So that’s basic game play: the player to the right of the empty chair calls out a name, and the player holding the piece of paper with that name moves to the empty chair, and then the players switch names.

Now remember that Keith started on the Couch? Let’s pretend he’s holding a slip of paper with Donna’s name on it. Eventually, someone will say “Donna,” and Keith will have to get up and move. That means one of the Couch spaces is now open. Then Kelly (the person sitting to the right of where Keith was sitting) is lucky: she gets the chance to fill the open seat on the Couch with one of her team members, as long as she can remember one of the names one of her team members is currently holding.

So memory is an important part of this game. The girls in the room are trying to figure out the boys’ names on the couch so they can call them off, and vice versa. And the people who are sitting to the right of a Couch seat are trying to keep track of the names of their teammates so that, when a Couch seat opens up, they can fill the seat with their team members. But people shuffle around all the time, and you never know if you’ll be called to a Couch seat or off the Couch or what. So you try to keep track of everything, but with all the seat-switching and name-switching, you can imagine that it gets pretty complicated!

As far as rules go, team members aren’t allowed to help each other, especially when it’s the team member whose turn it is to call someone to an empty chair. (People may talk and whisper when it’s not their turn, but try to keep it to a minimum.) There’s lots of memory and thinking involved, but it’s great fun, and a big moment of triumph for the winning team when they win.

What it is: An active, outdoor game that’s intense enough for the very athletic and fun enough for everyone

Best for: Big group of at least 10 players.

What you need: A good frisbee and a large field outdoors, preferably with a way to mark end zones (like trees, fences, shoes, or some other sort of boundary).

How to play: First, set up the field by designating the playing area with two end zones for scoring (like in football). It’s best if there are clear boundaries on the end zones and playing area, to avoid disputes later. Next, divide the players into two even teams.

Then you’re ready to play. The game is fundamentally like football: each team starts at opposite ends of the field, and each team tries to get the frisbee into the other team’s end zone to score. So, pretend you’re on one team, standing on the field, facing the middle. Behind you is the end zone the opposition is trying to get to in order to score—the end zone you’re trying to protect. In front of you, across the field, the other team is standing in front of the end zone your team is trying to get to.

One of the teams (say, for now, the other one) starts off with the frisbee and throws it off to your team. Your team spreads out to catch the frisbee as the opposing team rushes towards you. You so happen to catch the frisbee—woo hoo! Now you have to advance it up the field by passing to your teammates. But while you have the frisbee, you are not allowed to move your feet more than three steps; you can only pass. So you quickly pass the frisbee to a team member and your team starts advancing up the field. You can pass to team members in front of you or behind you, it doesn’t matter.

But someone gets clumsy and misses a catch, and the frisbee lands on the ground. Then it’s the other team’s turn, and they get to pick up the frisbee where it fell and move it down the field the other way. Your team switches to defense, trying to block the opposition from catching or throwing the frisbee, even trying to knock it out of the air. For example, as an opposing team member passes the frisbee, in a leap of glory you knock the frisbee onto the ground. Then it’s your team’s turn again, good for you. Or, if your team member actually catches the frisbee while playing defense, its also switches to your team’s possession.

Play continues like this, moving up and down the field. It’s usually pretty fast-paced, with a lot of running involved. The first team to get a player to catch the frisbee with both feet on the other side of their end zone scores. Then the other team takes a walk of shame to the other side of the field, and the teams switch sides until the next point.

Variations: I’ve played ultimate football before, which is the same thing, but with a football. Also, I’m sure there are variations on rules (for example, the three-step rule that allows the person holding the frisbee to take three steps between catching it and throwing it again could be the two-step rule), or more specific rules I didn’t mention. Anyone have any rules to share?

What it is: A not-too-silly, not-too-extreme, sitting down, quiet, yet still intense group game.

Best for: Group of at least 10ish.

What you need: Each player needs a piece of paper to write on. You also need one die and one pen.

How to play: Everyone sits in a circle, either around a table or on the floor. One person starts out with the pen, and the person to their left starts out with the die.

Let’s say Paul has the pen, Tasha is to his left with the die, and Adam is sitting to Tasha’s left. When the game starts, Paul starts writing legible numbers, starting with 1 and going up to 100, as fast as he can on his paper, while Tasha starts rolling the die as fast as she can, trying to roll a six. As soon as she does roll a six, she gets to grab the pen from Paul and start writing numbers on her paper, while Adam grabs the die and tries to roll a six. As soon as he does, he grabs the pen, and the person to his left starts rolling. Play proceeds around the circle like this. The next time Paul gets the pen, he starts writing where he left off. The first person to write to 100 on their paper wins.

Variations: This game is a little like the candy bar game, sort of. But while the candy bar game is pretty silly, one hundred is better for older players, and it’s a good game to play if you have a big group and want a game to play, but still want to be able to talk and laugh, because the people who aren’t rolling or writing will be able to chat and laugh all they want without worrying about the game, until it’s their turn.

Update: I’ve also heard this game called roll-and-write, played with two dice where players try to roll doubles instead of a six, and where you can also make the game more interesting by encouraging tackling and trash talking.

What it is: A way fun physically active game played around a pool table.

Best for: Group of about 5 to 10 players.

What you need: A pool table with plenty of room around it to move in. And a group of people to play.

How to play: First, get rid of all the balls except for the eight ball and the cue ball. Those are the only ones you’ll need. You won’t need any cue sticks, either. Next, decide playing order by lining up around the table. Remember who you go after.

The object of the game is to always keep the eight ball moving. If it stops moving on your turn, you get a letter. If you get four letters (S, P, A, and Z), you’re out of the game.

Here’s how it works. Everyone lines up in order around the pool table. Let’s say Kim is playing, and it’s her turn. She steps up to one short end of the pool table and grabs the cue ball. Then another player stands on the opposite side of the table, grabs the eight ball, and rolls it across the pool table pretty hard, so it starts bouncing back and forth between the two ends. Kim’s job is to roll the cue ball and hit the eight ball with it. As soon as she hits the eight ball, her turn is over and she moves away from the table. Then the next player (say, Frank) is up. He grabs the cue ball and has to hit the eight ball, too. If the eight ball loses momentum and stops moving before he can hit it, he gets a letter.

Now, there are two important rules. First, the player who’s up must always stand between the pockets on either short end of the table:

No standing on the long ends; only on the short ends. Second, you can only hit the eight ball when it’s on the opposite side of the table as you. So in the above picture, pretend there’s an invisible line connecting the two middle pockets on the long ends. If the eight ball is on the left half of the table, you have to be on the right side, and vice versa.

That’s where the physically active part comes in—as the eight ball keeps rolling across the table, you end up running around it a lot to make sure you’re on the opposite side before you can hit the eight ball. You end up jogging more and more if the eight ball is on the other side, you roll the cue ball towards it, and you miss—then you’ve gotta run around the table, grab the cue ball, run back around, and hope the eight ball hasn’t stopped moving yet. There are no limits on how many times you can miss, as long as the eight ball keeps moving. Also, if you accidentally hit the eight ball when it’s on the same side of the table as you, you get a letter.

There’s one more way to get a letter in spaz: if the person whose turn precedes yours knocks the eight ball into a pocket. So say Kim’s up again, and she grabs the cue ball and rolls it towards the eight ball. The eight ball is hit and rolls right into the corner pocket—that means Frank, who goes after Kim, gets a letter. He also loses his turn and the person after him starts again.

So that’s spaz. Play proceeds around the circle. Keep track of your letters, and when you get all four, you’re out. The number of players gets smaller and smaller as players are eliminated, until a sole champion remains.

If you want to see a sample game, here’s one. Just letting you know, the video quality isn’t super great, it’s noisy, and it’s not super clear, but hopefully it’ll help give you an idea if you’re a little lost.

Spaz sample

Strategies: One of the best strategies is, when it’s your turn, to wait until the eight ball is moving pretty slowly, almost stopped, and then very lightly hit it with the cue ball. Then the player after you really has to hustle to avoid getting a letter. Of course, hitting the eight ball into a pocket is a great strategy, too. But often the game is so fast-paced that aim might not have much to do with it.

Cautions: This game is best suited for teens and older. Be careful of smashed fingers or flying pool balls…yes, very careful.

What it is: One of those invade-your-personal-space group games that leaves you laughing in the end.

Best for: About 9 players.

What you need: A pair of longer-than-ankle socks that you don’t particularly care about, because they’ll probably get a little stretched out. And a room with enough space for everyone to sit in a circle on the floor.

How to play: First, get ready by taking the pair of socks, wadding one sock into a ball, and stuffing it into the toe of the other sock. Then pick one person to be It (let’s say it’s Tom). Next, have everyone else form a circle by sitting on the floor with their legs bent in front of them, feet flat on the ground, knees up. The circle should be tight enough that everyone is shoulder-to-shoulder with the person next to them.

The person who’s It, Tom, kneels or squats in the middle of the circle. Everyone in the circle puts their hands under their legs so Tom can’t see them. To start the game, someone in the circle starts out with the sock. The point of the game is to pass the sock from person to person, under everyone’s legs, without Tom seeing (or at least grabbing) the sock. If he sees or suspects he sees it, he makes a grab for it. If Jill has the sock and is trying to pass it off to Melissa, but Tom sees and grabs it from Jill first, that means Jill is the new It.

Strategies: If Tom is It and in the middle of the circle and his back is turned to you, and you have the sock, you can get daring and pull it out and bop Tom with it (the sock is the perfect shape for that). Then you’ve got to move quick to pass the sock on before Tom grabs it. But it makes the game more fun (or mean, I guess).

What it is: An old classic, and one of my favorites—when played with people I knew well. Otherwise…well, let’s just call it a get-to-know-you game.

Best for: Big group of 10 to like 18 players.

What you need: A bunch of people.

How to play: Have everyone stand in a circle, shoulder to shoulder. Tell everyone to put their right hand in the middle and then grab someone else’s hand (preferably with no peeking). Repeat with everyone’s left hand. Now you should have a big mob of people—a knot, if you will—and everyone should be holding on to two other people’s hands. The task? Untangle the knot! It will involve teamwork, communication, stepping over arms, twisting around, and probably lots of flexibility. The only rule is that no one may break a hand hold. Once the knot is untangled, you should have a big circle, or maybe two separate smaller circles, or maybe two circles that interlock. Either way, the knot is untangled. Ta da!

Variations: Playing in the pool can be extra fun because the weightlessness makes it easier to duck around and through the knot. Just make sure that everyone can reach the bottom! I’ve also played with a “doctor”—one person who isn’t part of the knot but who walks around and directs everyone on how to untangle it.