Spades, yes! I forgot that one.

Battleship (I hope that's the correct name) is wonderful for children 9 (or so) & up. Teaches strategy skills and is alot of fun - highly recommended!

Cribbage is a good game it involves memory and math, you will need a board but having the kids make a temporary one could be fun.

I just played Cranium Cadoo with my 6 year old today and we had a lot of fun. She is very into games now. At 6, she is just approaching an age where we can get into more complex games. Up until now, we have enjoyed playing Trouble with her. I plan on getting some of the old favorites like UNO, Phase 10 and Sorry for her this Christmas.

I know a very popular game now (I don't have it or have ever played it) is "Scene It". It comes in many varities like Sports, TV shows, Music, Harry Potter. From what I know of it, it includes a DVD and it shows clips of shows, sports, movies etc. and you are asked questions about it.

I just joined a ladies BUNCO group and Bunco is very easy dice game requiring just 3 dice. You can find the directions on the internet.

My childhood favorite was SORRY! It always ended up with my big sister getting mad and flinging the board and pieces all over the room. Now that's entertainment.

Monopoly. Stratego. Boggle (a word game). Scrabble.

Chinese checkers.

Card games: Pinochle and poker.

I personally enjoy Trivial Pursuit because I kick family butt.

We are a geek family, so when the kids got a little older we used to play a card game called Magic: The Gathering. But it usually ended with ME getting mad and flinging the cards all over the place :)

Good question! We love Tripoley and sometimes stay up way to late playing; adults and down to about 10 enjoy it. Also, Canasta for teens and adults, Boggle, Word Yahtze, Backgammon, Scattergories, Mancala, Go, Taboo and classics like Parcheesi, chess, Scrabble, Life, Uno, Clue. (I remember my mother playing Parcheesi endlessly with a grandchild on her lap.)
Monopoly, Risk, and Scrabble are not my favorites because there is so much down time and so little action, but I know I'm outnumbered on this.
I recently culled the games we never played and only kept the ones we kept returning to, all mentioned above.

I just remembered one of our favorite games,"Spit!" Anybody else play that? Children love it because they often beat their parents. In case you're not familiar with it, I will explain: gather your oldest, most beat up cards, full decks don't matter. Each player deals 4 stacks of, say, 10 cards face down in front to work from. At the call of "Go" everyone turns over a card from their hand and places it in the middle. Every player can add to any of these piles from their 4 stacks, going up or down, so the play might go 45676565454, etc. When no one has a move, each player plays another card from his/her hand again. Play continues until one person is out and yells, "Spit!" If more people want to play, just add another deck or two.

Spades and Hearts are fun card games. They're fast moving and tend to generate buzz and conversation rather than stress.

Yes, bridge can take a lifetime to master but it's not terribly difficult to learn the basics and it is a lot of fun to play...so long as partners don't yell at each other. :-)

As a kid my favorite games were "Life," "Scrabble" and "Clue." I hated "Monopoly."

As an adult (and a kid), I like Monopoly and Scrabble. I'm not very competitive, so I don't enjoy board games or card games, and my kids are the same. We like an occasional game but a steady diet - count us out. Don't be surprised if everyone isn't enthusiastic about playing games.

Have some age appropriate books and magazines around. Have some outdoor activities available - balls for all kinds of games, as well as a trips to the local parks, and whatever else is good for a walk or a hike. We usually set up the horseshoes, badminton for the little kids, volleyball, kickball, etc.

momj47-- You can count me in with your crowd, too. When I play, it's to have fun. My dad used to be real competitive, and ALL of us would cringe when he'd pull out any games, because guaranteed, we'd get yelled at if we made a stupid move (which was just about all the time). About the only time I get competitive is either on the pool table or on my bass boat!! :-)

I got the Rich Dad game a few years back. Dh and I played it once and he beat the pants off me. Guess my ego couldn't take it and that's why it is still on the shelf, LOL.

My 6 year old plays UNO all the time and my mom is teaching her checkers and chess. I also remember Pictionary as being alot of fun, I plan to buy it for an upcoming family reunion.

We don't have kids, so I can't add to the list of good games for kids. But we do play games with our adult friends. Our favorite card game is probably Eucher--lots of fun, pretty easy to learn, and fast-paced.

Board games we enjoy include Sequence, Cranium, Uno Stacko, and a few that most of you probably haven't heard of: Scotland Yard, Dread Pirate, and Ticket to Ride.

Oh, and another good one that's no longer available is Troke. My friend used to play it when he was a kid. We managed to find one on the Internet a few years ago for him to give to his father as a Christmas gift, and while we had it in our possession, my husband made a set for us out of wood.

Just got back from a Christmas party and one of the kids got a dominoes set. Well, we had no idea how to play it and one of the aunts explained the rules and strategy. What fun! I'm going to get a set for home. Also spoke to someone yesterday whose wife plays a dice game called Bunko weekly with 'the girls'. I never heard of it before.

Aha, I found the Bunco rules

Here is a link that might be useful: Bunco rules

I'm not terribly good at games where I have to strategize and think ahead (like chess or checkers) or even card games where I have to remember what was played. . .I like Set, which can be played (I think) solitaire or up to about four players. You don't have know how to read. It is primarily visual. You have to match or contrast shapes, colors, and patterns. I guess it might be called *educational* without pain.

Chicken Soup for the Soul is one of those family/sharing type games which might be good for family play.

For our family gatherings, Boggle is always a favorite, as is Backgammon and Chinese Checkers. Also, while not a game, jigsaw puzzles can be a great group activity for mixed ages. My kids are still too young, but when I was a child, I remember doing puzzles with my mom, aunt, grandparents, and cousins at our big family gatherings.

We always play Scrabble at family gatherings. The down time is good for our casual affairs -- we wash a few dishes, play with a baby, refill drinks, grab another piece of pie while we wait for our turn. Dominoes and Spades are popular too.

My niece brought a Family Feud DVD game to Labor Day. We all rolled our eyes at first, especially the teens. But, it was great fun! Everybody could play at once unlike Scrabble. Plus, the good natured teasing about silly answers was a hoot.

Our kids are still too young to have played (age 3), but I did buy them Chutes & Ladders and Memory for Christmas, to start getting them used to board games. I love board games, and as an adult have enjoyed playing Scrabble, Cranium, Trivial Pursiut (many editions), etc.

But as kids - we liked to play board games a lot, and I am the youngest with my oldest sibling 9 years older, so we had a good span of ages. We liked Monopoly (I am the shoe, always), Clue, Life (loved the cars & little stick people), The Mad Magazine Game, Trivial Pursuit. . . for card games, War, Go Fish, and Spit are good introductions for younger kids.

at-- hook them up with Candyland. :-)

OMG - Candyland! How did I forget Candyland!?!? The Chocolate Swamp! The Peppermint Stick Forest! I bought Chutes & Ladders and Memory b/c they were on the shelf at Target and I thought they were good basics. . .how did I not see a copy of Candyland?! One of these games might be going back. . .

Cribbage, Euchre, Hearts, crazy 8s, Uno, Set (check it out online---a real thinking game, usually the kids find the sets first!!) Quiddler is made by the Set people and it is a word game with cards....

Board games we like most--things by Ravensburger--The Amazing Labrynth is really fun...Lego Creator is a board game where you gather lego pieces to build a model, Careers-where you travel around trying to earn fame, money and happiness points to win the game...

We played a really funny card game as kids called Pig (I've also heard it called spoons) You only use as many cards as there are people (6 people--use the Aces, Ks, Qs, Js, 10s, 9s) Shuffle and deal. You are trying to get 4 of a kind, so take one card and pass to the right. (everyone at the same time) Keep passing and when you get 4 of a kind, don't say anything, but put your finger on your nose. Everyone else has to put their finger on their nose and the last one is the "pig". (If you are using spoon, you use one less and instead of putting your finger on your nose, you take a spoon, the last person "loses") this gets really silly and even the youngest kids can play!

Two other great group games are Scrutinize and Apples to Apples. In Scrutinize you have a certain amount of time to find and list items that start with a letter. In Apples to apples you draw a card and choose a card from your hand you thing goes with it. Examples are Elvis presley and shoes, etc, The words are really funny and you get some good laughs.

Jenga is awesome! I can't believe it hasn't been mentioned yet. We just taught our six year old to teach checkers, so that's what he's getting for xmas. I found a neat 12-in-1 game set at Bed Bath & Beyond for $20 that includes Checkers, Chess, Chinese Checkers, Parcheesi (one of my all time favorites), Tic-Tac-Toe, Playing Cards, Solitaire, Pass Out, Snakes and Ladders, Mancala (whatever that is), Backgammon, & Poker Dice. I think that Snakes and Ladders must be a different version of Chutes and Ladders. Of course, he already loves Uno, but we don't play with him enough b/c the younger kids get a hold of the cards and ruin them.

sladybug, I second apples to apples! It's a card game that is great for a mix of ages (read: not boring to adults). One person gets to be the "judge" of which words match best, and in our family, some kids like to be "wacky" judges that do whatever they please, making the game more challenging!

I also love pictionary and Cranium.

Wow! Thank you so much for these fabulous replies!

So here's where I stand: we love Uno, but like proudmama, we are always short in the deck so about every other year we acquire a new Uno deck. I even saw a really cute "Angelina Ballerina" Uno at Target today. Jenga looks awesome and my 15 year old son bought it for my 8 year old daughter for Christmas. My kids love Mancala. We've lost all of our checkers. We have about 10 chess sets but no one ever seems to want to play chess except for DH and DS #2. The game of Life is a huge hit for my 8 and 10 year old DDs. Mouse Trap never seems to set up correctly, plus it takes a long time to set up, plus we always seem to be missing a piece, so we don't play Mouse Trap very often (why do I want to type Mouse von Trapp?). Okay, here's something that I'm ashamed to type: but my 15 year old DS bought my 4 year old DS a Game Boy triple game including Memory, Chutes and Ladders, and Candyland. Oh well, at least the four year old will have fun with his brother's Game Boy. Hi Ho cherry-O is fun, but we usually end up losing cheeries every time we play, so that's another game that doesn't last long as well. We have Cranium Cadoo, that's a blast (I've never played it though), and a Backgammon game that never, ever gets played.

After reading these posts about Apples to Apples, I bought one this afternoon at Target. It was on sale for $19.99 and looks like a great game for a family with children of so many different ages, like ours.

I also want to learn the classic card games, like bridge or canasta. These sorts of card games seem to evoke a different era, when adults played cards, drank, and smoked together, with lots of laughter and they seemed to have a very good time. A time when that was one of the few ways people could entertain themselves. This was the case with my extended family, especially on vacations. My difficulty with this is that I'm so tired at the end of the day that I don't have the gumption to get into a card game. Bunco was really popular a couple of years ago, it seemed like half of the women I knew played Bunco together at least once during the week.

Risk is very, very popular with the boys in my family, plus a great long term game if you can leave it set up for a couple of days while the game is still being played. Candyland is my favorite children's board game. It's very sweet, yet still thrilling. And, it's easy to fix the game so that your child wins at least 75% of the time. Clue is a beloved game in our house. We have my husband's boyhood game, complete with metal tokens. In fact, my teenage daughter went to a Clue party this past year where each guest was a character and they played the game in full costume. We love Clue. And Monopoly. We haven't bought Trivial Pursuit or pictionary, but we will as the children grow up a little more over the next few years.

I bought my husband the Rich Dad Poor Dad "Cashflow" game and it arrived today. I think he wants it to teach our children the value of delayed gratification and of saving/investing. Too bad that they have me as a mother playing the opposite game 24/7.

Does anyone play friendly games of poker with small amounts of money (like coins)? What rules govern teaching older children/teens about gambling?

Thanks for all of your posts. I really appreciate them. I'm trying hard to resist the expensive poker chip sets so prevalent this year (if you haven't seen them, the chips are alledgedly made like authentic casino chips so that your games will seem more professional and thrilling). I keep telling myself that I will only be picking up 600 more things off of the floor on Christmas day and that by not buying these snazzy poker sets I'm actually saving myself a lot of housework.

In any case, please continue to post and thanks again for these great replies!

Cup, I used to love playing poker. Growing up we knew a family that played "serious" poker together, with real coins. Every holiday meant big game time. By the time I was 18 I knew at least 20 different poker games, and played well, but I had no interest in going to a casino. :) Just teach kids that the house always wins, then have them play roulette at home with their allowance to see what you mean. :) I don't play Texas Hold 'Em like the rest of the world, I prefer my old "Night Baseball" "Anaconda" and the games I grew up with, the variety of having the dealer choose the game makes it fun! I wouldn't worry about teaching gambling. I think its fun. Make sure you print out the winning hands in order, and get a book that describes different games (once you get the concept on how to choose and build a winning hand, the different games are just different ways to deal cards, very easy to learn.)

And for poker, just use pennies. If you do't already have a change jar with lots of pennies, then get a few rolls at the bank. And put a limit on the bets (5 cents at most, for example). And the pennies are not won, but go back into the change jar for future use!

And there are also the time-honored match sticks to use for betting.

I like the idea of pennies, Fairegold. Matchsticks? I've never heard of using those to bet with.

Heck yes, matchsticks. Old fashioned wooden matches. Cheap, and available everywhere.

I loved playing games as a kid. Risk, scrabble, monopoly, racko, cards, life, careers. Even as an adult, I love playing games. For a number of years I used to have a New Year's Day potluck - open house - game playing. There would be food out all day, and people would come for as long or short as they wanted, and people played games. We did a lot of Pictionary, and Therapy (and i forget what else).

Last year (as my daughter started playing games), I recalled how I always thought that games were the best gift. So I started buying games for all the neices and nephews. I was going to do that again this year - when my sister said her 13 and 15 yo kids no longer liked games - and my husband objected to my getting games for his teenage neices and said it's childish and he never really liked games. Gee - I thought it was universal that people had fun playing games, given the right game to suit them.

Anyway, long ramble, but some other recommendations -
my 6 yo daughter loves cranium cadoo and mancala (these are games that could appeal to older ages too). For older kids and adults,some games that got great reviews on Amazon were Rigamarole, Wit's End, Carcasonne.

My daugher has a classmate whose mother works (maybe co-owner) of a wonderful, small, independent toy store. These are some of her recommendations - quelf (new and great for groups - teens and up, I think), various cranium games, apples to apples, ticket to ride.

Cranium cadoo is GREAT! For the littler kids, ours LOVE Elefun, not exactly a board game but great fun even for big kids and grownups as long as some younger ones play, too-- it's this elephant which blows butterflies into the air and you catch them with little nets!

Pictionary/Win, Lose or Draw is my persoanl fave, because I was reigning champion for so long in school-- but now that I am a professional artist (for the last 10 years), no one thinks it is fair to play against me!

Scrabble and Sorry and Parcheesi are all faves as well.

Okay, NOT a board game, but a GREAT game for a large group of ANY age (we played a lot in college): Barnyard. You count off by fours or threes or fives, depending on how many people you have-- so you end up with even sized groups-- it is important for each group to have the same number. You assign an animal to each number. Everyone closes eyes and then makes the animal sound-- "cows" moo, "ducks" quack, etc. When you find someone else making the same noise, you grab hands. The first group to have all its animals holding hands wins. (Everyone knows how many are ina group.) It is HYSTERICAL. We played this at a bank Christmas party when I was a temp and everyone loved it, too. You can use blindfolds but I think the honor system w/ eyes closed is fine!

Also don't forget Connect four, and Mastermind.

Cranium has been our favorite board game for several years now. My youngest stepdaughter was 10 or 11 when we started playing and she's now 17 and we all fight to be on her team because she has never lost! Everyone can participate because it includes such a variety of skills, and all ages enjoy it.

When my kids were small, our whole family liked Racko, Upwords, and Clue. We liked Scrabble, but it was a little slow for the kids.

Well, we definately had a game oriented Christmas. Apples to Apples, Pente, "Angelina Ballerina" Big Performance, several GameBoy games, 7-Card Stud for Dummies, Jenga, Lord of the Rings checkers (where the pieces are either authentic looking "gold" or "silver" rings that can stack for crowning), Catch Phrase, Cashflow, and Sudoku puzzle books. Plus lots of other things, but I wanted to list our new games. Thnaks to all of you for sharing your ideas and recommendations!

And Barnyard does sound like a blast!

We played my daughter's new Apples to Apples game last night. In my first deal I had these cards: Whips, Leather and My Bedroom. If we hadn't been playing with the kids I could have come up with some pretty interesting (adult) answers!

Terriks; So how did that play out? I might need to look for that "Whips" card and put it away for a few years (or permanently). Unless there are cards for cream or potatoes.... stuff like that.

I don't think that I ended up using "whips" at all. I did use "leather" for "masculine".

When I was a kid, my favorite game was Life, because I always wanted to get the "twins". Fast forward 20 years and I was actualy blessed with twin daughters!!!!

I always loved Clue as well. My new fave has to be Cranium though! FUN!

New Years Day is our family game day. I can't wait. My mother loved playing games and it really brings the family together. We still do it and it reminds me so much of her.

My favorites were the word games. We had so much fun with Upwords. But you name it, we've probably played it. I'm very competitive and HATE to lose. LOL

My 13 yr old has been having poker night since the 4th grade. There's always 4-6 boys that play and they take turns "hosting." They have a blast and talk sports and burp. Sometimes they play with pennies, if they've made enough money umpiring the little kids' baseball games during the summer, but they each have their own set of chips. New Year's Eve is a sleep-over at my house. Something about their World Series of Poker Championships. It's a great group of kids.

We loved Pig and Spoons, although that sometimes got a big violent reaching for that last spoon. (you know how older brothers can be ;)

We also played a card game called Hand and Foot, though I can no longer remember much about it, except you used at least two decks of cards.

I'm curious about Apples to Apples and will probably pick that up this week to play.

Oh, and two other favorites were Scattergories and Balderdash...great for the creative ones. And funny!

Phase 10! It says 2-4 players but we have played with many more. It is a card game you can find at most stores with a gin rummy/uno flavor. You will love it!

Kirsten

Reading this post has been a real trip down memory lane! My older daughter is five, and is just getting into games. She got Chutes and Ladders and the Angelina Ballerina Uno for Christmas, and has been playing chess for a few months. How could I have forgotten High Ho Cherry-O? And we had months of penny poker in college. A huge pile of pennies was a big status symbol that year!

My favorite grown-up games are chess, Trivial Pursuit, spades, hearts and Scrabble (DHs favorite because he always wins). WeÂre waiting to see what our daughters favorites are. The younger one is mostly interested in stealing the pieces.

I have been surprised by the fact that Cashflow 101 (created by the Rich Dad, Poor Dad author) is a huge hit. I was worried that it would be a dud, an expensive dud at that. Part of the game is filling out income/asset sheets, which even my 10 year old is willing to do. A fascinating game about getting out of the "rat race" and achieving financial independence.

Here's a "free" game that is fun with a large group of people of mixed ages. It kind of makes you think of charades.

We call it Harry's Hat Game:

Divide into two teams. Everyone gets five slips of paper and writes the names of five different people - could be historical, celebrities, literary figures, authors, dancers, etc. The names are put into "Harry's" hat and three rounds are played trying to get your team members to guess the name you pulled.

In the first round, you can talk in complete sentences, describing the person or anything else that will help. After a correct guess, more names are pulled until the timer goes off (usually one minute). Someone must keep score, as this is very competitive! Then the first player on the other team takes their turn. Back and forth until the names in the hat are all gone.

Put the slips back into the hat. Second round picks up with whoever is up next. They can give only three word clues, but since by now all of the names have been read, it's not too hard.

Third round is acting out the name. Predictably, very funny.

This game has been a huge hit at our family reunions where you often have lots of players of varying ages. We played it on Christmas Eve when we had company. A hoot!

This post is bringing up many wonderful memories. When I was a kid, our family played Yahtzee just about every night when we were on summer vacation (it was one of the few things that brought us together.) My sister and I would quietly stay up well after bedtime to have "Spit"(the card game) tournaments (it was also a great procrastination tool to keep us from homework--which also worked in college.) Our family also played Hearts, Spades, Sorry, Big Boggle (I can no longer find this version of Boggle) and Risk (there were always a lot of hurt feelings with this game.) When I was 16 I went on a bike trip across Maine with two older sisters--we brought a word dice game called Perquacky and played it in the camping area rest rooms (where there was light) at night (I think we only played if there was some sort of vanity shelf or large sink area. I hope we didn't sit on the floor.) Many of us got together this summer for vacation and we had fun with Texas Hold 'Em. My parents and a couple of my sisters really enjoy(ed) bridge.

The games I've enjoyed playing with my kids are Scrabble, Cribbage (a favorite for my daughter and I when we are on vacation--we keep score with pencil and paper rather than a board), Sequence, Canasta, Chutes and Ladders, Life, Careers, Battle Ship, Rack-O and some lesser known games. Several of these come in small boxes and use special cards: Quiddler, Rat-a-tat-cat, Frog Juice, and for small kids Panda-momium and Hiss. We were/are particularly fond of Rat-a-tat cat and Frog Juice. Blink is also supposed to be very good. A game my teenage daughter and I got hooked on for a while is Fluxx--which is a card game with a special pack of cards. The rules of the game continually change depending on the card you play. It is great fun. We wore through a couple of decks.

Mary 228: Harry's Hat game sounds like it would be lots of fun.

Thanks for the chance to reminisce.

I love Battleship! Remember that scene in Toy Story where the Hamm (or is it the dog?) has all of his ships lumped together on the game board and all of them are sunk? That was hilarious. Anyway, Frog Juice sounds like a great game. And Fluxx, what's that? Zelmer, can you describe these games in more detail (if you have time)? Thank you and thanks so much for all of these replys.

My faves:

Kingdoms (2 to 4 players)
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/kingdoms.html

Fluxx--a card game that changes its rules.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluxx
http://www.wunderland.com/LooneyLabs/Fluxx/
http://www.looneylabs.com/OurStores/CardGames.html

Waterworks
also
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterworks_(card_game)

Bang! (needs at least 4 players)
read a review here

San Juan
http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/10/10456.phtml

This may be too late but non-electronic games we enjoy are:

SkipBo
Rumikub
Pente
GobbleIt! (Like tic tac toe but with layers)
Gin Rummy
Blockus
Chess (on occassion)
Jenga
Gnip Gnop
Parcheesi
Backgammon
ERS (Egyptian War or Egyptian Rat "Scramble") card game

Our family favorite is a card game called Five Crowns. You need the game, not just regular playing cards. There are five suits instead of 4 and it is a two deck game. It says ages 8 and up, but we have friends with kids as young as 5 who play.

We are actually on our second game because we about wore out the first set. (It's now our camping set!)

The company also makes a game called Set which is also fun.

~finally

Thanks again for all of these great replies. I wanted to add that I discovered, after Christmas, that Barnes and Nobel sold quite a few games, mostly old favorites, in wooden or tin game boxes with "original" looking game pieces, such as metal monopoly tokens or metal Clue weapons, that sort of thing. And several of the games were not much more expensive than say the ordinary cardboard box edition for sale at Target.

Set (from 4 to forever, a kindergartner can beat the newest PhD on the block)
Spoons (even dogs join in when it gets rowdy...)
Catch Phrase (fast, verbal, electronic gizmo)
Scrabble
Pente
Poker
Fluxx
Apples to Apples
jigsaw puzzles (not a game but promotes conversation)

We'll play anything here, I'm blanking out. We've taken Set all over the world, great for cafes w/ kids, easy to wrap present. I know my daughter will always treasure that original Set pack when she's older, it's well-worn.