Deal us a hand of winter games

The winter is off to a snowy, frigid start, with the most amazing snowfall ever (nearly three feet) followed by several weeks of below-freezing temperatures. We’re not used to this New England-style weather here in the foothills of the Shenandoah Mountains. But my wife & kids & I have taken advantage of the harsh outdoors by playing lots of games in the warmth of our home.

We’ve filled the days with endless combinations of Munchkin, using the epic rules to extend the game to level 20. Add in Killer Bunnies, Apples to Apples, and various other board & card games, and some family time on the Wii, and I’d say we’ve made the most of the winter break.

And somewhere out there, a greater cause benefits from our fun. As a family we participated in this year’s Million Minute Family Challenge. Unfortunately, I’m afraid I just wasn’t good about logging our time; our performance is underrepresented by a good 8 – 10 hours. But that wouldn’t have been enough to lift our state from third place in the rankings. 

New Year’s Eve included a few games as well, including the party game Werewolves of Miller's Hollow. It’s a fun murder mystery game wherein players play the roles of innocent villagers – except for the two amongst them who are werewolves. Each night the werewolves slay a villager, then during the day, the villagers have a witch hunt to find one of the fiends, whom they then put to death. Unfortunately, our group was not very good at this and inevitably lynched innocent villagers by mistake. We played twice and the werewolves were victorious both times.

Up next: ambitious goals.