It's Game Night!

Did you know? Every Saturday night, we host Game Night at our house. Why, you might ask? Well, when Charming headed off to live in the dorms at one of the universities in our town, we wanted to being a new tradition, a way to keep our adult children in our lives without being overbearing or intruding in their new "grown-up" lives. At the same time, we wanted to respond to the changes in our world as well as the firming up of our own values and teach all our children that you can have a terrific time without spending money. Thus, the birth of Game Night. Game Night is every Saturday at 7:30 p.m. (thus, we are not providing dinner). All the neighbors are invited, as are Charming and any of his friends who want to come. Depending upon the size of the crowd, the younger kids might join us for the games we play, or they might head on downstairs to play their beloved video games. The girls might head to Buttercup's room to watch a "chicklet flick" or play with their American Girl dolls or the hamster or whatever. Sometimes the boys and girls mingle and sometimes, well, they don't (cooties, you know).

As for food and beverages, we provide some baked good that I felt like making (guess who's getting thick chewy oatmeal cookies tonight?), as well as big bowls of popcorn. We have water, tea, and coffee...no sodas or punch or anything. I don't go buy anything for Game Night, ever. We just serve what we have. Sometimes our friends bring more stuff and sometimes they don't...either way is fine with . The whole idea is that this is casual, low-key, easy, and inexpensive.

We tend to play Five Crowns, but we've tried Quiddler, Catch Phrase, and Pictionary with much success. There is no pressure for people to come each week, we've just tried to let them know the door is always open. Honestly, whether the crowd is big or little, we just have fun. We started this in September and here we are in February and still going strong. For being such a new "tradition" our family already counts on it every week and are already wondering how we'll be handling it when camping starts up again. (Duh, see you at the campsite!) I hope we're still doing it 10 years from now.

So, if you happen to be in the neighborhood, Game Night starts at 7:30! Come on by!