If you feel like you live in a house with a revolving door (hellllooo, it’s me), maybe a family game night will be your favorite night too. Between the girls having school, school work, cheer, friends, a business + all of the other life things and the boys having school, school work, sports + friends… I feel like I’ve found myself being either a great taxi or alone… and that is so strange for me haha. It has come with bonuses like more frequent date nights, but dare I say it?? I miss when my kids needed me a whole lot more!! We’ve instilled tech-off family nights weekly, which occasionally Em gets a pass from for cheer…but other than that, we spend it together doing whatever we choose. Usually it’s a family game and a yummy snack at intermission. Here’s our favorite games to bring the family around the table together.
- Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza – Whew. What a mouthful. The object of the game is to get rid of all your cards and be the first to slap your hand on the central pile of cards when you see a match or when a special card appears. Now, to play the game, each player gets 12 cards dealt from the shuffled pack and players must not look at their cards. The players have to keep these five crazy words – Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza in mind. As soon as there is a match between a card and a spoken word, race against each other to slap your hand on the central pile of cards. The last one to do so must take them all. Sometimes being last is not that bad at all as he/she can slap everyone else’s hands harder. We all had fun slapping hard on the last-but-one player!
- Cover Your Assets – This is the one game my boys BEG to play and it’s so much fun as a family. Fair warning, if you’ve got kids that are competitive, this game can get lively! But it’s super easy to learn, fun for large numbers (just buy multiple decks), and can keep the troops entertained for hours! The idea is to get two matching cards to create an “asset” and to protect that asset by collecting more and piling them on top of each other. Only the top “asset” is in danger of being stolen by another player. This is hand’s down one of the best games ever made! ALSSOOOO – one of you fun followers have developed a game super similar to this, reviews say it’s just as fun. It’s called Get That Pirate’s Booty. Apparently there is more stealing, I can’t wait to get this for my boys to play.
- Settlers of Catan – Settlers of Catan is an enduring classic, and for good reason. It’s approachable for new players but deep enough for experienced (and very competitive players) to really sink their teeth into. On the surface, the game is simple enough. You build settlements across the island of Catan in pursuit of economic domination. There’s no violence or combat in this game; it’s all about managing resources and trying to outsmart your opponents. Here’s the expansion pack if you’ve got a big family like us.
- Throw Throw Burrito – My boys thought this was hilarious when I grabbed it a few weeks ago. I can’t believe I hadn’t bought it sooner, I definitely should have! If you’ve got a rowdy crowd, you might want to play outside haha. Sometimes it’s hard to remember you’re inside when you play this.
- What do you Meme – This is a fun one if you’re throwing an adult party, or even to play with older kids! It’s similar to cards against humanity, just meme style!!
- Travel Games – These travel games are perfect for the car.. another great brand is chuckle + roar from Target and they have a bunch of on-the-go games.
- Not Parent Approved – It IS parent approved, by me anyway haha! This is a fun one for the older kids. This is like a family friendly cards against humanity. It’s hilarious!
- Code Names – This one is super fun to play with teams. The two rival spymasters know the secret identities of 25 agents. Their teammates know the agents only by their Codenames.The teams compete to see who can make contact with all of their agents first. Spymasters give one-word clues that can point to multiple words on the board. Their teammates try to guess words of the right color while avoiding those that belong to the opposing team. And everyone wants to avoid the assassin. Pick that tile and your team gets killed. It can be fast-paced and is super fun!
- Left Center Right – This one is great to bring money and throw down a buck or two and play as a huge group, it’s also a really great way to help littler players learn their left and right while having fun. It’s a pretty simple game, Jett picked it up quickly! It’s the one we played on Halloween with our whole dang family, the pot was huge!! Everyone brought a dollar.
- Sushi Go – we’ve had this one since 2017! It’s a fun, fast paced card game with a bunch of different directions on them. You win by making the most sushi rolls!
- Suspend – Imagine a crooked, wonky game of Jenga and Pick-Up-Stix and you have Suspend. Except you’re stacking crooked bars on top of one another and hoping you aren’t the one that dumps the whole thing!
- Rummikub – Gin Rummy with tiles and the kids picked this one up pretty good and have mastered kicking my butt! haha.
- Tenzi – Tenzi is perfect for beginners and aficionados alike. It’s actually one of our family’s favorite games because everyone can play and you can add as many players as you’d like. We actually own 2 sets for just those occasions! Every player gets 10 dice. The object of the game is to roll the dice as fast as possible, the player who gets all dice on the same number and yells “Tenzi!” is the winner. And if you get bored with this old standby, this set comes with 77 different ways to play to mix it up!
- Zingo – Zingo is one of my kid’s favorite games, and is the winner of an Oppenheim Gold Award and Parents’ Choice Gold Award. It’s Bingo with reading! The pictures ensure that Jett or Dash can still independently play, while it encourages them to read aloud the object. This game requires no adult help, so my kids will literally spend hours playing this game together. It is a super sturdy game with thick, sturdy, double-sided cardboard bingo cards and the text and pictures on the yellow “chips” have no scratching or fading from frequent overuse. This game is now my go-to gift for any birthday party we are invited to and my boys ask to play it all the time!
- Sling Puck – We discovered this game in Island Park and probably played with it for a collective 20 hours while we were there… It’s super fun, SUPER competitive, and extremely fast-paced. It’s like foosball, air hockey, and a slingshot all in one. Trust me, this is a game your family needs!
- Qwirkle – From the makers of Square Up, Qwirkle is another of our favorite matching games that is easy for our younger kids to play but can be made challenging for the older kids to play as well!
- Salem 1692 – this one is a fun one! Accuse your friends of witchcraft using cards, strategy, deceit, and a bit of luck. It’s definitely best for older kids.
- Monopoly Deal – the board game takes forever, and my kids definitely lose interest and get all mad over it. This card game version is way better and we all love it!
- Mexican Train – One of my favorite and oldest games, this game involves placing dominoes on the table by matching ends with the same dot count. There’s obviously more to it than that but them’s the basics.
- Get that Pirates Booty – This is super similar to cover your assets with a mix of monopoly. I have one on the way!! 🙂 you can use 15THUESON to save on it!! There’s a how-to-play video in the listing.
