organized chaos

I know this confession might deem me a bad mother in your eyes, but confess I must.

The mere thought of playing board games with my gremlins is about as exciting to me as watching golf on tv. Or sitting in a waiting room with only Bait and Tackle magazines to read. I tried very early on to be the fun mom who broke out the board games every so often, so as to enrich my family with the kind of bonding that those commercials for “make it a family night” always portrayed.

Everyone always looks so happy and well adjusted in those.

But at the time, I had toddler gremlins. The most challenging kind. Breaking out the board games whipped them into a frenzy of excitement, but always crashed into mayhem once someone lost, or knocked the board across the room by rolling the dice too hard, or one of them yelling at the other for not knowing how to read the card by age 4.

And then there was always the issue of my boredom. Candyland? Oh yeah! Let’s frolick up and down the path aimlessly in a world of fake candy we’ll never get to eat. The gremlins usually would swipe the pieces when I wasn’t looking and use them for their psuedo-dramas in their bedrooms.

Now that at least two of them are old enough to control their spastic natures somewhat, I still have a hard time forcing myself to break out a big helping of family bonding time. Let me illustrate with some well timed photography.

Socrates initiated the game of Monopoly Jr. I figured, he asked nicely and I was just sitting on the internet anyway. Well, not actually sitting on the internet. You know what I mean. Everything started out swimmingly. It’s a cute game, I guess. Except luck of the dice awarded me with the good fortune of landing on all the rides and buying them for my property. See all those red houses. Mine. That means Socrates and Zoe had to pay me often. That didn’t go so well.

See this?

Socrates was no doubt thinking of an argument to swindle me out of my money. But right after this Jackelope came up and wanted to play. Poor Jackelope. He may be six, but he couldn’t even pull a chair up to the table without knocking half my money on the floor. Then when I let him roll the dice, he knocked half the ticket booths off the board.

All the while Socrates let his inner gremlin out and started snarking all over Jackelope because he didn’t want him to play. So it turned into a three way yelling match.

Socrates yells at Jackelope. I yell at Socrates to stop treating his brother like dirt. Jackelope yells into the air at his rights being wronged.

So then Jackelope finally gave up and went away. On his own. I did feel bad, but the game was a little more pleasant after that.

Until Zoe started to lose money.

This may look like a good humor kind of tantrum, but I assure you, it’s only for the camera. And as the game wore on, and she lost more money, the fangs of injustice came out. As they always do with her.

Then we had a car accident in the nice amusement park of Monopoly Jr.

Too many chance cards will do that, I think.

Then I looked up across the table and noticed Jackelope had found something else to entertain himself.

He really is a loner.
And stop staring at my dirty mirror. My gremlins may not be toddlers, but occasionally they still lick the mirrors and windows.

In the end, I won. And I didn’t really care, like some people. It’s not like it’s real money. I wish.

Then Zoe wanted to play Cadoo. Which I highly recommend. But you really have to know how to read. Here she demonstrates a combo play by molding the clay really fast.

Any guesses, yet?

Wait for it!

Not to worry. I didn’t guess right either. It’s a snowman. The Fast Mold Challenge isn’t really my forte. In the end, I won this game too. Purely luck! I am not a cheater!

But Zoe really never gets a break at these things and for the rest of the afternoon we were all subjected to listening to her whine, “I never get to win!!!”

The usual.

It will probably be another six months before I’m ready to listen to that again.

and feel free to leave your game recommendations in the comments. I need all the help I can get.