Our family loves to play games when we’re all together. Last year, we were in Vermont for Christmas, and the girls got a laser tag set as a gift, and between laser tag during the day and charades and Who’s In the Room at night, it was full blown game fest, which was the perfect solution to some not so perfect weather (no one wants rain at Christmas!). Sometimes the dads would groan about the game before they started, but once we had divided everyone up in teams and the game was rolling, everyone would get competitive and into it. It was also hilarious-in charades, for example, there’s very little overlap between what the 40 year old men in the room and the seven year old girls in the room were writing down as titles of books to act out-and watching an adult man act out Baby Shark might have been one of the highlights of the trip. It was the perfect way to entertain multiple generations without screens and to get everyone laughing, engaging with each other and building memories-basically what my holiday dreams are made of!

We’re sharing some of our family favorites below-they’re perfect for entertaining the kids while the adults are cooking up a Thanksgiving feast or as a multi-generational bonding activity for after the feast.

Charades:

1) Our family loves classic charades, where each team writes clues on pieces of paper and then gives them to the other team to act out, but sometimes it can be easier to draw clues that already done.

2) Family charades make it easy when you have little ones who need some help coming up with clues or adults who want to take it easy.

3) If you’re all adults, maybe you want to make the game a little wilder and scandalize your mom, haha!

4) If your family loves charades and wants to take it up a notch, this game has multiple rounds and levels of difficulty.

The Girls Favorite Card Games:

1) In this game, you pick the person Most Likely To… in all kinds of categories like “eat all the Halloween candy the first night “or “ghost somebody after a first date.” The girls play it with friends and we’ve played it as a family-it’s all in good fun and nothing that would offend anyone (which was one of my concerns when wefirst tried it. It’s probably for older kids or adults, although Cece thinks it hilarious and she’s only seven.

2) My brother gave the girls Exploding Kittens two years ago and they’ve been playing it ever since! I have to confess that I can’t understand it, but we’ve taken it on trips and the girls have taught other kids to play it in just a few minutes and they’ve played it with their aunts and uncles.

3) Cards Against Maturity is definitely all the potty humor, but the girls get the biggest kick out if it.

4) We play Uno all the time-it’s great game to take on the boat or on a trip and even I can remember the rules, haha!

Games to Get Them Moving

1) The girls got Laser Tag as a Christmas gift last year, and I wasn’t sure if they would play it-we’re more of Barbie’s and American Girls vibe usually, but they have loooved it and use it all the time. It’s especially good if you have larger group of kids (or just energetic adults!) and you want to give them a way to burn off some energy outside.

2) I just ordered this as a gift and it looks very fun and portable-thinking it will be perfect for an indoor activity to take to a rental house on our next trip.

3) This is another game that’s supposed to be safe indoors and looks so fun! I love any game that involves racquets.

4) Twister is such a classic family game and this one is twice as large-whether you want to be able to fit all the littles, encourage social distancing or to give your clumsy cousin more space.