Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Parent's Unofficial Guide to Playing Candyland... A Lot

Candyland or Disney Princess Candyland (we have both of course) is permanently set up in my living room. I'm not sure it's the little princess game pieces, the colorful game board, or the possibility of being a Candyland champion that keeps my daughter coming back for more.

She can play it by herself, with me, or with others for hours. Hours. My daughter LOVES this game. The game has been able to teach her many things such as:

  1. You can't always win and sometimes you get that crappy Sebastian card when you're almost at the Princess Ball but you still have to go all the way back to the beginning and not cry about it.
  2. Mommy will not cheat so you can win so you have to deal with the fact that sometimes Mommy is the champion of Candyland.
  3. Cheating is not tolerated in any way. You can try but it won't fly. You get what you get and you don't get upset!
  4. The game is all about luck so you're technically not "good" at it.
  5. Playing the game is for having fun whether you win or lose and though winning is more fun than losing, it's not nice to gloat or say "Ha Ha" in a taunting voice when you get to the Princess Ball first.
Candyland sure has its life lessons eh?

However playing Candyland over and over again can sure be taunting. Especially if you have no luck whatsoever and your little one beats you every single time with no cheating whatsoever for that matter! I've learned the hard way that if you want to enjoy playing with your child, the same thing, over and over again, you have to incorporate some twists.

The following ideas have all worked successfully for me.

Unofficial twists to add to your everyday Candyland game:
  1. Remove all the character cards and put them last in the deck of cards. This means the game only goes until you get to the end of the game based on just the color cards. This always makes for a quicker game for sure. Don't let the little one see you do it though!
  2. While shuffling the deck, place the same color card for every time your little one takes their turn. For example, one time my daughter only got Green the entire game. It was hysterical to me and she never even noticed. Adds that extra fun element for sure.
  3. Play the game backwards. Start at the Princess Ball (for the Disney game version) and work your way to the start but you can only win if you land directly on the first color of the game board. So if you have a while to play you can milk one game for all its worth.
  4. If there are only two of you, play with all four game pieces. This creates mass chaos for everyone for sure. You can only win once both of your game pieces make it to the end. Gives some hope if you always lose.
  5. My favorite color is yellow so every time one of us draws a yellow card, we kiss. And if there is a double yellow, we do two kisses. Gives you a little extra loving and adds a fun twist to the game.
  6. Agree on a word you can both say throughout the entire game. Every time it's a good turn we yell "Boo-yah!" and every time one of us gets set back we yell, "Aww Buggers!". Let's all those in the room know exactly how we're doing.
  7. Put bets on the game. If I win, you clean up the game or I get a piece of chocolate. And vice versa.
There ya go.

Six sure ways to make Candyland more fun no matter how many times you play it. Now enjoy this era because when they want to start playing Trivia Pursuit and become smarter than you, you'll totally miss these Candyland days...

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