By Lamplight

Not to labour the point, but I mentioned we're finding our way here more and more?

Lessons in chess and a battle of minds. I appreciate these calm games after years of daily house-wrecking.

Travel Fun

A while back I envisaged the idea of making a compendium of travel games to keep the babes amused and engaged when we were traveling and visiting various people. The idea was to take our favourite games whilst unemcumbered by the weight and size of the orginals. I drew largely on Rashida's tutorial for the checkerboard and pouch whilst making a few significant changes.





Firstly, I made a sack in which to carry our games in. A simple enough drawstring bag with no whistles and bells.

The second difference was that as well as checkerboard pieces made out of fabric covered buttons I also made them into chess pieces by drawing on simple enough chess ideograms.











It seemed such a waste to let the reverse side go empty, so I decided to turn the back into a doubled-up board for snakes and ladders and Blokus.

The larger squares, comprising of four smaller squares, make one snakes and ladders square, whilst the smaller ones are used for the Blokus board.











The Blokus pieces themselves were constructed from felt sewn onto canvas after drawing around the original Blokus pieces that we already have. Yes it took absolutely forever.



And it turns out it might be a bit pointless. After all, travel games are only needed if you go traveling, and given the state of our finances and price of petrol the only places we'll be going to are the ones we can walk to!

But, if ever we do have a chance to fly the nest, we're ready.



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Game on

First it was Blokus, then chess, then checkers, then Pop to the Shops, and now we are back to chess again. I must admit to finding sitting gaming more of a chore than a pleasure (I don't like thinking on my coffee break...), but with some knitting, tea and a good old natter with these boys of mine, I think I can manage to finish off a game or two...

What games are your little people into?


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Apples for Crumble...

Days are beginning to merge into one as Ramadan rolls on; we live for iftar with as much mindful living as we can.

We fill our weekend with games, reading, playing and, for 'tis the season for it, apple crumble with whipped cream!

Our apples are still reddening up on the tree, and soon, insha'allah, they too will be made into pies and crumbles. And as much as I look forward to the coming season, I do so want to hold onto this one as much as possible!

What was your weekend like?


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The Joy of Checks

Yes? Good pun? No? Okaaaay.

Well, we've entered a new phase in this little family - where even the smallest of mini-men can get their heads around chess moves in a rudimentary fashion.

The smallest knows how to set the board up, he marvels at the beauty of each piece, weighing the glass in his hand, before picking it up betwixt forefinger and thumb and holding it aloft to the light, inspecting it like a master jeweler inspecting a gem, turning it, marveling at it, enjoying the perfection of it's craftmanship.







And in playing he has certain pieces he loves above all others, and doesn't understand why the King is the most important piece when it is the Queen who is the coolest and who is more useful - I resist the urge to explain the archetype and let his subconscious digest this information...





This right now is our beautiful game. A game of the mind, a game with beauty and skill, a game of strategy, ruthlessness and war.

And if the Eldest could stop winding the midget up by stealing the pieces and sitting on them? Then we might enjoy a game. Though after shattering the Rook and narrowly missing a trip to A+E (try explaing THAT to the emergency staff - erm, why, yes there is a spear-like glass ornament embedded in my child's derriere, I've no idea how it got there other than he acts like an ass, yes we homeschool, yes we are Muslim, no this is not a ritual sacrifice - is there a problem??) I think perhaps the cheating method of sitting on your opponent's pieces might have run it's course.

For now, we play. One step at a time.

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