Games to Play on Mothers Day
Bring the family together with some down-home, wholesome competition this Mother’s Day. Outdoor sports, board games, bowling, family-friendly video games and jigsaw puzzles are all potential ways to enjoy Mother’s Day together.
|
Google Ad |
Croquet is Great for Fun and Laughs
An old favorite that can be played almost anywhere, croquet is a game that many people think they won’t like until they play it. Sets are typically inexpensive and any grassy area will do as a pitch. This is also a game casual enough that inter-match cocktails are not prohibited by any means. Choose similar outdoor lawn games like horseshoes or Bocce Ball.
Family-friendly Video Games Inspire Laughter
Many leading edge video games are free of violence and often integrate fun physical activities such as dancing, singing, playing music and driving, sailing or skiing.
Rent the disks, download the files or go out to an arcade with the family on Mother’s Day. Despite some of the negative press surrounding the explicit content of their counterparts, family-friendly video games can make for highly participative fun on Mother’s Day.
Get Mom silly with Guitar Hero. This infectious video game involves players with a
specially modified, easy-to-use “guitar.” The user then plays along to arena rock hits of the past three decades. Mom can rock out to her favorite song as if she was on stage. With an easy mode that’s just right for beginners, she’ll soon be hitting all the notes—even the solos.
Share in Crossword or Sudoku Games
Share a crossword with Mom as you puzzle through the clues together. Or consider ushering in a new challenge level on Mother’s Day. If she’s not a fan already, introduce Mom to Sudoku, a Japanese puzzle involving logic and number symbols, Sudoku is available in many newspapers, online, and in books of collected puzzles.
Scavenger Hunt
If you’ve picked out a great gift for Mom or secured reservations at her favorite restaurant, it might be fun to prolong the suspense and excitement by designing a scavenger hunt with several clues to help Mom track down her prize.
Be clever with your clues. If one of her gifts is hidden away in the oven, your clue could read, “I make the best roast in town,” or “Is it hot in here, or is it just me?”
The hunt could take place indoors or out. If you know that Mom will like just this sort of contest, you could get ambitious and make it a town-wide search, with the final stage being a store where you have pre-paid for a gift, or a restaurant where you are already waiting.
Tip: for city-wide searches to her favorite restaurant, be sure that someone who knows the answers accompanies Mom, so that she doesn’t stray too far off course.
Outdoor Sports & Games
Is Mom a bit competitive when it comes to team sports? Organize Mom's favorite outdoor game--baseball, softball, basketball, tennis and even touch-football--in her honor. Consider her level of competitiveness in the planning and playing. Find a careful balance between hearty competition and relaxed enjoyment.
Tip: For team sports, make Mom one of the captains. Alternatively, make sure the captain of her team gives her priority placement in the line-up or her favorite position on the field or court.
Bowling
Is Mom a lane junkie? Give her a shot at rolling that perfect 300 this Mother’s Day. Great for families and parties, bowling alleys are in many small towns and big cities around the world, making for highly accessible, affordable and wholesome Mother’s Day fun.
Board Games
Is Mom a board game maverick? What may seem like tired old games at first glance, can still inspire great family fun.
- Monopoly can be played with an unending list of customized rules that add new twists and turns to this legacy game. There are also advanced Monopoly rules that may give you an edge over Mom.
- In addition to Monopoly, timeless favorite include the spelling-for-points game Scrabble, and Trivial Pursuit, the classic trivia game.
- If there was ever a game to make an artist out of a, well, non-artist, it would be Pictionary.
At the same time, you might consider expanding your board game horizons by picking out a new, potential favorite for Mom.
- A break from the traditional Chess and Checkers, the Japanese board game, Go, is surprisingly easy to learn—although it could take years to master. While the objective is to annex territory (white stones vs. black stones), one highly aesthetic side-product of Go is a playing board that gradually blossoms in wild and expressive geometric patterns that some aficionados ascribe to the physical expressions of each player’s personality.
- In the past the game Balderdash used to be played with a dictionary and a pad of paper. Now repackaged into a colorful board game, Balderdash can send the whole family into uproarious laughter as obscure word definitions are bluffed and the most audacious players advance at a fast clip toward the board game’s finish line.
If board games are a regular pastime for your family, Mom probably already has her favorite. If she doesn’t have a good set to play on, consider giving her one for Mother’s Day. If there is a game store nearby, go and ask for the luxury or premium edition of her favorite game. Scrabble, for example, has rotating boards and velvet bags in their fancier boxes, and special Monopoly boards come with extra or gold colored pieces.
Shop for a really special version of a game. The nicest board games are often vintage editions, which can sometimes be bought more cheaply than new luxury boards. Once you have the details on the year and type, check out sites like eBay.com or amazon.com to track down the best value.
