Friday, May 18, 2007

Fun and Games

Doug and I lead one of our church’s small groups on Wednesday nights. We’re a fun, casual group, often digressing and laughing uncontrollably throughout the evening. But we do try to stay on track with our lesson and learn something together. It’s great to share in God’s Word and prayer and just enjoy each other’s company. After the lesson, we usually play some games until someone gets responsible and reminds us that most of us have to get up for work the next morning. :)

My favorite games are word games (imagine that!) like Taboo, Scattergories, Scrabble, a new one I learned recently called VisualEyes, and my all-time favorite, Beyond Balderdash. In my opinion, it’s a must-play for every writer. The whole point is to create the best made-up meaning or description for one of five categories - words, initials, dates, people, and movie titles – and hope that your opponents will vote your fiction as the real answer, while you try to distinguish fact from fiction yourself.

What better way to get a writer’s creative juices flowing? If you’ve never experienced Beyond Balderdash, go buy or borrow it and get a group of fun friends together to play. Next time I’m at ACFW (hopefully in 2008), I think we need to have a Barbour Beyond Balderdash Bash. And if anyone steals that idea and does it this year, you better not have too much fun without me! :)

What are your favorite word games?

9 comments:

Mary Connealy said...

I think the one we love the most is Taboo. There's this ticking clock, counting down the time and you have to get people to say the word without using the 'taboo' words. It's just hilareous and that clock, ticking louder and faster and finally BUZZZZ, it's just fast paced and fun.
We like Outburst, too and Cranium, they're all kind of the same. Apples to Apples. We usually have one or two good nights of game playing at Christmas and then rarely play again all year. That's a shame.

Mary Connealy said...

I'm putting this in a separate post because it's so GREAT!!!!!
I got my Heartsongs yesterday and my book WAS IN IT!!!!!!!!!!!
And Krisy Dyke's book and Irene Brand and....I'm blanking on the fourth one. Someone help me.
I should just quit posting because I was so delighted to be in the mix with these three other ladies and now I'm leaving one out. I'll check at home and add her if no one fills in the blank.
I was just so thrilled to get them and be included. A thrill to come home to.

WordVixen said...

Some writer friends of mine introduced me to Liebrary. It's a lot like Balderdash, but with first lines in novels instead of definitions. Great fun! Good for jumpstarting your creative juices too.

Anonymous said...

When I was in college, we played "Celebrate" and "Flies Do." I think one of my pals invented them but I'm not sure. They're the kind you can do in a car or in a waiting room or wherever--they're totally spoken. Part of the fun of "Flies Do" is that it's twofold. Like an old parlor game, there's a secret to it, and once you figure out the secret, you can play it on a different level.

To get you started: Flies do, but bees don't.

The way you determine if you're right is to give one back, like if you said, "Cars do, but bicycles don't," you'd get a WRONG! buzzer.

If you said, "Puzzles do, but games don't," you get a nod.

Now I'll be thinking of examples all day long!

JanetS

Anonymous said...

Have you ever played Quiddler? It's a card game kinda like Scrabble -- I used it to help my son with his spelling, but it was fun too.

Mary Connealy said...

The fourth Heartsong this month was from Andrea Boeschaar and I knew that but I just couldn't drag it out of my head on the spot.
Mary

C.J. Darlington said...

Wordvixen beat me to it! I heard about Liebrary from Tricia Goyer. Read the post where she describes it here.

D. Gudger said...

Balderdash(s). Nothing makes me laugh harder than that great game. Trouble is, I can't find anyone to play with me!!!

RoyalShoop said...

Apples to Apples! It's a great party game that a group of 4 to 20 can play. It's based around word associations. You can play it seriously or be a bit ridiculous, depending on the group you're with. To get an idea of how it works, you can check it out at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apples_to_Apples