Family Game Night

My son is 8 and has been playing board games with us since about 6 or so. (We could only take so much candyland!!!)

We like: Ticket to Ride (can be sort of longish but we enjoy it), Uno, Monopoly Deal (card game. We're getting the U-Build for Christmas, will see how that is once we get to play it - we also have the board game and have started to play that but it does take a long time!)

Sorry!, Parcheesi, Life,

card games: Monopoly Deal, Ono 99 (old game we both played as kids and my son also loves. Find it on eBay. It's fun, fast and good math practice as well!) Uno, Rat-a-tat-cat, Station(? it's in a blue box), Skipbo, are all games we enjoy as well.

Chinese checkers? 5 can play at once. Or only 2. Or anywhere in between. It's one I remember playing with my family.

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If you want one that is fast and easy for two players try Mancala. There is a skill involved in going around the "board" dropping the stones into the spaces - I just haven't mastered it yet. My 5 year old likes playing it - he got it for his birthday from a friend and I have to admit, my sister and I got it out and ended up staying up till 1 in the morning trying to figure out where the best place to start is. We tweeked the rules alittle to suit ourselves. You can get it at Target or the like.

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Yahtzee! My parents taught us how to play the game when we were young (around 7 or 8). It's great b/c it doesn't matter how many people play and as long as they can do basic addition (with help) the whole family can play!

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There is a new game out by Cranium called Scribblish and it's a lot of fun. It is kind of like pictionary meets telephone. Our kids are 7,9 and 11 and they loved it!

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I have a 9y and a 4y. They love 'Trouble', 'Uno', and 'Scrabble Slam!'

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how about uno attack, or uno spin, the toddler can play with a parent, would be a GREAT game to help the toddler learn numbers and color's, you can tell the toddler, since that card is blue and a 2, find a 2 or a blue and lay it here or ok, we have to draw 2 or 4 now, so get 2 cards....my kids LOVE that game and with a good number of people, can be really fun for adults too my adult friends play "drunkin" uno, it's a blast, but have to have at least 5 and perferably not with the kids lol. also, there are different versions of candy land, my daughter had a dora candy land, was good for teaching number's and identifying different things.

since my kids are older, we can get mean with uno, our "street rules" if you are given a draw 2 and have a draw two, you can lay it down and if the next person doesn't have a draw 2 they have to draw 4 or same with a draw 4 and can go up til someone doesnt' have that draw (whatever) number...makes it fun!

don't have to stick to a game night, do game day, say on a saturday before all the other activities begin, during lunch time or something like that, or on a week night when there are no other activities...set 1 day aside a week for family game night....let the little one's pick a game that everyone has to play with them, then the middle kids, then the adults (3 games) go up and if it's too hard for the younger one's then play on teams, there's always SOMETHING in a family game that's good for all ages even if it's moving the pawn for a parent or rolling the dice, etc

i suggest the train game. i'm not sure if that's the actual name of it. but its a blast, and you can get competitive. it also helps children learn geography. other suggestions are scrabble and the traditional ones. i used to love playing trivial pursuit. i was good at it for being young... lol skipbo is also a good family game, but i thik only 4 can play that... and its long...

Mario party for the Wii is so much fun.

What about games like trouble, sorry, taboo, jenga, the scene it games are fun too.

We LOVE games and I will probably not mention half of our favorites...

bananagrams - excellent fast game... we played it after we ordered our food in restaurants a few times!

scattergories - board game

trumpet- board game that uses cards... best with 4-5 players

skipbo - card game we played in the little bit of time before the bus came in the mornings

curses - board game makes you do silly things... laugh a lot with this one!

for wii - plants vs. zombies -- we got this a month ago and love love it!!

smart mouth - is fun!!

SET - a great fun card matching game... makes you think!

blokus - just learned this one yesterday and we will be buying it soon (if we don't get it for Christmas)

uno - fun card game for all ages... we had an old uno deck and let our toddler put all the same colors on different piles while we played and then when that got boring, we had the toddlers/kids put them on piles like that but upsidedown and they had to remember which piles were which colors.

operation - our 8 year old just suggested that one for ya!

abalone - great marble pushing game... you can buy extra marble sets so more than 2 can play at a time.. we have enough marbles so 6 can play!

backseat drawing - twist on pictionary... you have to tell the other person on your team what to draw... but with words just explaining what to draw - not saying draw a donut but saying draw a large circle then draw a small circle inside that one..

don't say it - has cards of words you have to get other team to say but a list of words you are not allowed to say to do that!

sequence - you are dealt cards and you play one at a time on a board when it is your turn and try to get 4 or 5 in a row

Apples to Apples - great game AGAIN we have the regular edition and a bible edition... they also have a junior edition

Mindtrap - great thinking game... tells you a short story and you have to answer HOW

Whoonu - cranium game that helps you learn more about each other and just fun to play!

Quarto (only a 2 player game)
Mastermind (only a 2 player game)

we know many many card games - if you want to know some of them, I can tell you those, too

Oh my the time is flying... if you want more ideas, send me a message :)

We love scrabble, monopoly and UNO for our game evenings. These are enjoyed by my husband and I, and our 8 and 5 year old.

We play games on Monday nights mostly.

Our favorites are LIFE, SAY ANYTHING, and UNO. We tried the Scene It games but they were just really out of our league. We don't devote that much time, energy or attention to any of the Scene It subject matter games from the Disney to the Star Trek even though we are big fans of each. This game was really over the top too much detail and trivia.

Oh I almost forgot Trivial Pursuit and Scrabble. We have more than one Scrabble board so we have more than enough letters for the 6 of us to play.

Try this company. http://www.play2havefun.simplyfun.com/
It is like a tupperware party but for games. You don't have to have a party. The games are great. I don' t know if there is a sales rep in Columbus area to help you. But you can still buy the games online.

Sorry if I am repeating.....

My kids loved Monopoly at those ages, also Uno. they are teens now and still enjoy Uno sometimes.

Also consider Life, Yahtzee (don't know if I spelled that right) and card games like "I Doubt It" and rummy (both 500 and Gin). My Dad taught me a card game called Casino, works better with 2, 4 0r 3 (in that order of preference) but you could try with 5.

you could also play Quintuple Solitaire--like Double Solitaire but with 5 people, 5 decks of cards (make sure decks are all different,you have to sort them out at the end). could get a little wild and woolly, but might be fun.

We also like Mille Bornes; works bettter with 2 or 4 players; but you could try it with 5.

The last couple years my kids have really liked Risk. (kiddos are now 19 and 16, so a little bit ahead of yours). Try it and see if they like it.

I love Scrabble, but no one else in the house does :-(

Have fun!

K. Z.

I work for a board game publisher, R&R Games, http://rnrgames.com so 1st I have to recommend their games. There are board,card & party games for all ages

I have a 7 yr old & we regularly have adult & kid game nights. Other companies games we enjoy - Rummikub, pass the bomb,blokus, Quiddler, most Rio Grande Games, Apples to Apples... and many more

We've done family game night since my youngest was like 4, monopoly, life, all the traditional stuff.

Our all time favorite game right now is flapperdoodle. it's crazy and silly and with a little help your youngest could play as well. it's a great game for a good laugh.

Apples to Apples...lots of laughs. Can play for 10 minutes or 2 hours. Our entire family loves it! On sale right now at Meijer for $10--usually about $25.

If you like card games there is Phase 10. It is along the line of rummy or Texas Rummy. My 7 year old plays it with my husband and I every once and a while. The one thing that I do do for her is to let her use a card holder mostly when we play Uno.
Go fish (you can use a regular deck of cards to play with), Old Maid, War, Slap jack, Hearts, are all the card games that I can think of. Dominos. Those are the only ones that I can think to tell you only because of the number of players. Not sure if you could do one adult play chess or checkers with one while the rest play a board game.
then you are giving one child one on one time.

We like Jr. Monopoly -not as long as the original but still fun
Life
operation
uno
sorry
aggrevation
kurplunk
hangman
just got a wii so don't have any ideas there yet but looking at yours to see if anyone has any good ones to get

Lots of good suggestions here! The only one I can think to add is "Scene It" which comes in a variety of themes. We split the teams so mom is on one and dad is on the other and we all have fun with that one!

My kids LOVE games!! We play Mousetrap, Disney Monopology, Clue Jr, Scrabble, Yahtzee, Life, Sorry, Trouble, Operation, etc...any games they LOVE. Certain games they can play alone but others require adult supervision...like Mousetrap. So we try to save that for a family game night. Our kids are 7, 5, and 3...if that helps at all!

Uno and Sorry Express are our favorites. Games are pretty short, so we usually play two or three games. Sorry Express is only for 4 players though, but games are short so you could rotate players. We also like Connect 4, Battle Ship, Trouble, Chinese checkers

Cranium makes great family games.

Other ideas....
Uno (any of the versions)
Life
Sorry

Discovery Toys has several unique games that are huge family game night favorites! #1 on my list is Labyrinth...a board game with a shifting maze making capturing the treasure a bit tricky. I also love Wiz Kidz which is two sets of cards. One with letter and the other with categories. Draw one of each and laughter soon follows. It's so popular a sequel to it was just released called Speed Wiz. Money Money is a fun hands on way to learn about counting and exchanging coins you earn for doing household chores. There are lots more at www.toyladyjanet.com!