On one hand, I feel sorry for her. She doesn't have a room to hang out in. She either sits on the couch and watches TV, plays on a laptop, or reads, or she does the exact same thing in our bedroom. She's not really a 'toy' kind of kid, either...she doesn't play with dolls, cars, action figures, etc. She likes to read, draw and play games. A kid that likes to read? Yay!! She also likes to experiment with things; she once asked me if she could hatch a refrigerated egg to see what would happen, whether or not she could raise a tadpole, and she performs air quality tests in the house using a piece of packing tape facing outwards in every room to see how much crap from the air gets stuck to it.
My other hand doesn't feel so sorry for her and I will explain why. Papa Bear and I are from a time (as many were before us) that we entertained ourselves. We had no technology to help feed our every waking moment with flashing colors, ready-made characters, stale story lines and i-anythings. When my kids complain that they are bored, I tell them to find something to do! Then they just roll their eyes at me...and they go find something to do!
After about 30 minutes of her telling me she was bored, she came bounding into the living room full of excitement. She asked me if I would play a game with her. I detest most board games, so when we play games, it usually involves cards. I kick butt at Go Fish and Old Maid. So I agreed to play a game, assuming it would be a card game.
It was a board game. A very cool, new board game.
It was the best board game I have ever played.
It's called 'Treasure Hunt'. Little Lawyer created it.
Treasure Hunt has all the necessary elements of the classic board game: dice, tokens/coins, cards, playing pieces and a stunning platform to play the game on.
She asked which color I wanted to be. Being the good sportsman I am, I let her choose first since she did all the hard work creating this masterpiece. She chose Blue, and that left me with Green.
She told me rules. It was a 2 player game (so she only made 2 playing pieces). We each had to roll one die to see who got the highest number and go first. She rolled a 1 and I rolled a 2. VICTORY!!
I rolled my first turn, noticing the little traps she had set up for me within the board. There were 'Back X Spaces', 'Forward X Spaces', Get A Coin', and 'Read A Card'. I was destined to land on them all.
We rolled the dice. We went back spaces, we went forward. We got coins. We read cards (which told you to pick up coins, go forward or back, or pick up another card). We laughed. It was fantastic.
And of course, she was beating the pants off me. She got to the finish way ahead of me. She even offered to let me skip ahead six spaces at one point in the game, citing she was the creator and could introduce a new rule. I declined, but thanked her anyway.
Then Little Lawyer did something amazing.
When she was just about on top of the finish line (about 3 spaces away), she rolled a 6. I shouted, "You won!"
Ah, no....
She calmly informed me that she did not in fact win (yet).
Apparently, in this wonderful game, you must roll the exact number needed to land on the 'Finish' square in order to claim ultimate victory. She had 3 spaces to go and rolled a 6, which meant she had to move forward 3 spaces to the last square and go backwards the remaining 3 spaces she needed to move to make her full 6.
I was in awe of this logic.
I have seen and heard of games that made you wait on the last space you landed on until you rolled the number that you require to reach the finish. But I have never heard of a game that made you go forward and then backwards to move all of the spaces that one rolls, thereby delaying the person in the lead from winning! Genius!
There very well may be a game out there somewhere with that rule (or something similar), but I have never heard of it, and I am fairly certain Little Lawyer hasn't either.
I may win this one yet!!! Muhahaha!
Yeah...right.
After three more rolls of the dice, she nailed it. Did the victory dance. Taunted me. Teased me.
Hey, she's 9. She's allowed.
I could get used to being beaten at games by her. If she keeps making 'em, I'll keep playing 'em!
What a good imagination! I think I remember the old orignal game of "Life" had you go forward and back but I believe they changed it in later versions when my son got one.
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