How to play Trouble!

Trouble! is one of those games that gets passed down from generation to generation. It's fairly easy and compact. The rules are simple, too. Trouble! can keep your family entertained for hours at a time and provide endless laughs and fun.

Step 1. Get started with the game Trouble! by placing your colored pegs in the corresponding colored holes at the edge of the board. Your opponents should do the same. Only use the pegs that you will need for the game. The rest of them can be put aside.

Step 2. Pop the dice in the middle of the board. The person who gets the highest number goes first and the game proceeds clockwise. Your peg can never be moved from the start position unless you pop a 6. You can then move forward. When a 6 is popped you can choose to either move a peg from the home base or one of your pegs that have already been moved from it.

Step 3. Move your peg forward the number of times that corresponds with the number popped by the dice. If you pop a 6 you get another turn. Each time a 6 is popped, you can continue your turn until you don't get a 6. The object of the game is to get your pegs back in your home base before your opponents do.

Step 4. Return your opponent's peg back to their home base by landing on their colored pegs if the number you popped puts you there. For instance, if you pop a 3 and you land on your opponent's peg, he or she must return the peg to their home base where they started. Be careful that you don't get into Trouble! and get sent back home.

Step 5. Approach your home base and you will see numbers marked 1 to 4 on the board. This is where you want your pegs to ultimately land. You can only move your pegs into these slots when you pop the exact number you need to move all the way into the holes. For instance, if you have a peg that you want to move into the 4 slot, and you pop a 3 then you can't move into that slot. You have to pop a 4 to move that particular peg. If you do have other pegs on the board, you can choose to move one of them.

Step 6. Pop a 4 with the dice and you could move your peg into the spot marked 4. Then you have to pop the exact number to move your next peg into the 3 slot and so on. Land in slots 1, 2, 3 or 4 and you are safe from being in Trouble! and can't be sent back to the home position by your opponent's pegs.

Step 7. Win the game when all of your pegs are in the in slots marked 1, 2, 3 or 4. If your opponents wish, they can continue the game to see who comes in next and so on.

How to Play Sorry

Sorry is a classic board game first popularized in the United States in 1934. It is descended from the many Pachisi variants (like Parcheesi), and involves moving four colored tokens from the start to the finish box at the end of the board. Gameplay uses cards to determine the way in which the pieces move, and it's possible to end up knocking opponent pieces back to the start (hence the name "Sorry!").

Step 1. Choose the color you wish to use and place your four pawns in the start box that corresponds with your color.

Step 2. Select a card from the deck and move one of your pawns according to the instructions. You must select a pawn that can move the exact number of spaces. For example, if a pawn is two spaces away from home, but you draw a card that instructs you to move three or more then you much choose one of your other pawns.

Step 3. Take advantage of slides whenever they present themselves. You must land precisely on the start of the slide in order to use it.

Step 4. Take advantage of cards that instruct you to move back by choosing a pawn that is close to the beginning. Often you can play a backward card and end up, instead of far from the home, a single move away.

Step 5. Be aware of the opportunity to send opponent's pawns back to their start. If you draw a card that would place one of your pawns on the same space as an opponent, you get to move your piece there and move your opponent's pawn to his start.

Step 6. Try to get your pawns into the "Safety Zone" (the last 5 squares closest to your home) as quickly as possible. Since they are immune to pushes (being sent back to start), you'll be able to leave them there until you draw a card that gets them home.

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Pizza Quesadillas

Here's a variation on traditional pizza! Add this to your menu for your game night.

Pizza Quesadillas

Ingredients:
1/2 cup pizza sauce
6 7-inch flour tortillas
2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese with jalapeno peppers or Monterey Jack cheese (8 ounces)
1/3 cup finely chopped pepperoni
3 tablespoons sliced pitted ripe olives

Directions
1. Spread some of the pizza sauce on half of each tortilla. Sprinkle Monterey Jack cheese atop pizza sauce on each tortilla. Top with pepperoni and olives. Fold tortillas in half; press down edges gently.

2. In a large skillet or griddle cook tortillas, 2 or 3 at a time, over medium heat about 4 minutes or until cheese melts, turning once.

3. Cut each tortilla into three triangles. Makes 9 appetizer servings.

Nutrition Facts
Servings Per Recipe 9 appetizer servingsCalories 194, Total Fat (g) 12, Saturated Fat (g) 6, Cholesterol (mg) 27, Sodium (mg) 427, Carbohydrate (g) 13, Protein (g) 9, Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet

Plan a Family Game Night - wikiHow

Plan a Family Game Night - wikiHow

Pictionary

Ready? Set? Draw! This is a great word-guessing game with pictures you draw as the clues for your team partners. You don't need to be an artist to draw in this game, where the originality of the players creates a lot of fun. You will need at least three people to play the board game version.

Difficulty: Easy
Fun for all ages!

Things You'll Need:

Timer Or Stopwatches
Card Tables
Chairs
Prizes
Beverages
Party Snacks
Pencils
Paper
Pencils
Paper
Pencils
Chairs

Step 1 Divide the players into teams.

Step 2 Name a permanent "picturist" if you have only three players. He will draw all the clues for the other two players.

Step 3 Have each team select a picturist to do the drawing for
the first word if you have four or more players. This duty rotates to all players in turn. The remaining team members try to guess the word being drawn.

Step 4 Have each team place a playing piece in the start square on the board. Roll the die to see who gets the highest roll to go first.

Step 5 Let the beginning team's picturist select the first card. She has only 5 seconds to study the word she will sketch.

Step 6 Start the timer, and give the picturist 60 seconds to sketch clues for her teammates.

Step 7 Allow the picturist's teammates to try guessing the word for the full 60 seconds as long as the picturist draws no words, letters or numbers and uses no body gestures.

Step 8 Have a successful team that has identified the word within the time limit roll the die. The team moves ahead on the board by the number of spaces indicated on the die.

Step 9 Let the same team then select the next card and continue with a new picturist. Only when the time expires before a word is identified does play rotate to the left to another team.

Step 10 Continue play until a team wins by landing on the finish square and identifying the word selected.

Tips and Warnings

Each card lists different words in five categories. The correct word to be sketched is determined by the location on the board of the team's playing piece.If the playing piece is on a space marked "All Play" or if the word to be sketched is marked as an "All Play" word (with a triangle mark beside it on the card), then all teams sketch and guess at the same time to see who gets it first.The die is not rolled at the beginning of a turn. It is rolled at the end, only when a word is successfully guessed. A turn begins with the selection of a card.A playing piece must stay on the same square as long as its team does not identify the given word.The picturist duties rotate to a new player on your team every time the team must sketch.There are different versions of Pictionary, including Pictionary Junior for ages 7 to 11 and Pictionary on CD-ROM, which can be played solo or over the Internet. See Related Sites and Things You'll Need.In special "All Play" situations a picturist from each team gets to look at the word and sketch it for his teammates. All teams do this simultaneously, and the first team to identify it wins the word. Winning the "All Play" situations is very important since you are competing against everyone at the same time. And since the normal rotation of play may be changed, you might miss a turn if the team to your left wins the word.

Scrabble Board Game - How to Win!!

Here's a game we are all familiar with! Scrabble!! My husband and I played on our last game night, Phoebe was my able bodied assistant! It was a great way for my 4 year old to sound out words and letters. I found this great article "How to Win at Scrabble-Board Game.

This word game presents a number of unique challenges to its players. Memorizing the entire Official Scrabble Player's Dictionary would be great, but it's also unrealistic. Start with these basics first.

Ages 8 years and up
Difficulty: Average
Time Required: n/a

Here's How:
1.Consider balance as you look at the letters on your rack. It might be smart to form a word eliminating double letters in your rack even if it's not the highest-scoring move you have available.

2.See what's on the board before making a move. If few E's have been played, you might chose to create 'were' instead of 'ware,' reducing the chance you’ll draw a double tile.

3.Plan ahead to be able to create long words, possibly even using all the tiles on your rack in one turn (and thus earning bonus points).

4.Don't concentrate so much on one word that you blind yourself to other options.
5.Don't fear the Q! This tile (as well as the somewhat less-frightening X, Z and J) offers some high-scoring potential.

6.Even if you don't have a U to go along with it, there are 16 legal words you can spell with the Q (such as qanat, an underground system of tunnels in the Middle East, and qindar, a monetary unit of Albania).

7.If you get stuck with a lot of vowels, think about iodine -- and the dozens of other vowel-rich words available. (Cookie, anyone?)

8.If you have a lot of consonants, there are legal words without vowels -- myrrh, rhythm and tsktsk, for example.

9.Avoid giving other players easy access to bonus point squares.

Tips:

1.Practice. You can buy Scrabble books, and there are a lot of useful practice tools available on the Internet.

2.If you study, concentrate on unusual words. Two-letter words are useful in a lot of situations. Q words, X words, J words, Z words and words with lots of vowels also are good to know, as are longer words.

What You Need:
•Scrabble Board Game
•Opponent(s)

Cat-in-the-Hat's hat cookies!!

Check out this creative snack idea shared by Amy Wyatt. Find out how to can make a treat that looks like the Cat-in-the-Hat's hat!
Materials Needed:


•Round Crackers
•Marshmallows
•White Chocolate
•Red Icing
•Wax Paper
Instructions:
Place the white chocolate in a microwave safe bowl and melt it. Stir until smooth.

Start off by dipping a round cracker in the white chocolate, tapping off any extra. Place it on a piece of wax paper. Before the chocolate cools and hardens, place a marshmallow on the center of the cracker so it looks like a white top hat. Once the chocolate cools and hardens, the marshmallow should stick.

Now all you need to do is pipe red icing into rings around the hat. Also spread some over the top of the hat. If icing stripes seem to run, place them in the refrigerator to set icing more quickly

Pictureka

Pictureka! is a new kind of game, both in mechanic as in artwork. The mechanic is invigorating with its large square gaming tiles. The game board is composed of 3 by 3 game tiles, so the game board on which is played is a huge square of 63 cm x 63 cm. This is large enough for several players to be able to play the game at the same time. The game board is “alive”, it is not a static board as the tiles are flipped over, turned and moved. So it is not possible to memory map the board. The mechanic of an ever changing board makes it not only fun; also the challenge is kept into the game all the time.

A game turn
Players will have to throw a color dice at the beginning of their turn. According to the color thrown (3 possibilities) they must draw a mission card of the same color. There are 3 kinds of missions.

How to win the game?
Be the first one to have successfully accomplished 10 missions. Each successful mission gives 1 point, so be the first one to get 10 points.
The artwork is something not to be found in ‘standard’ games. The personal drawing style of the artist Eugene makes this a kind of playing artwork.

Ages 6 years and older.