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We love games so much in our family. Out of the 6 of us, 3 are extreme Introverts, 1 is an extreme Extrovert, and the other 2 of us are somewhere in-between. For us, games are a way to spend time together with a common goal (of all playing the same game). Conversations come naturally about playing the game and it is really good quality time together that both the Introverts and Extroverts really enjoy. {Introverts love the game playing, Extroverts love the time surrounded by people.}

Playing games brings people together and teach children in the ways other things can’t. We also try to have dinner together every night that it is possible, and that certainly helps keep family unity, but games do other things:

• Games help children learn how to lose and not lose their cool.
• Games help children learn how to win gracefully.
• Games teach children timing and how to follow a sequence of directions/rules.
• Games teach children logistics and train them to see the big picture.
• Games help children start making plans and strategies, and be able to think through several steps ahead.
• Games give children an opportunity to feel successful.
• Games give children an opportunity to learn how to pick themselves back up and try again if they are NOT successful.
• Games give non-athletic children a chance to learn team dynamics.
• Games give families the excuse to spend quality and quantity time together.

My family goes in waves. Sometimes we are playing a game after dinner every night of the week (like the time I was addicted to Bananagrams and made everyone play with me all the time). And sometimes we play only 1-2 games a week. I thought I’d share some of our favorites in our game cabinet right now (in no particular order, because every person in my family would rank these differently):

1. Ticket to Ride ***
2. Spot it!
3. Sleeping Queens
4. Qwixx ***
5. Scrabble
6. Blokus
7. Q-bitz ***
8. Settlers of Catan & Catan Junior
9. Bananagrams
10. SET  ***
11. Skip-Bo
12. Guess who?
13. Phase 10
14. Uno
15. Yhatzee
16. Qwirkle
17. Monopoly & Monopoly Jr 
18. Sequence & Sequence for kids
19. Clue ***
20. Farkle
21. Rook ***
22. Canasta ***
23. Blink
24. Chess
25. Connect 4
26. Dominos
27. Tri-Ominos
28. Go Fish
29. Life
30. Chutes & Ladders
31. Battleship
32. Apples to Apples – we use the Disney version
33. Hedbanz
34. The Game of Things
35. Exploding Kittens
36. Guillotine
37. Rummikub ***
38. Help Your Neighbor  ***

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** – There are plenty of games in the cabinet that I didn’t share, because we rarely choose those or they are more puzzles than games.

*** – One of MY favorites. My kids and husband would have totally different answers!!! We play a mixture of what makes everyone happy.

Of course, we love Help Your Neighbor so much, I wrote a whole post about it with a free printable to play!

I hope this list helps you find some new ones to enjoy. If you’re like us, sometimes a fun new game gets us all excited about games again and then we start playing every night.

Don’t forget, games make excellent gifts for any birthday or holiday, like Christmas stockings or Easter baskets!