First Saturdays - a dice-rolling good time!

We are fortunate to be able to spend New Year's Eve with friends. We eat, we drink, we play games, and we hang out with our friends. And this year ended with a bout of "American Pie" on some version of Guitar Rock Hero Band at 3:00 a.m. But we had fun, even so.

My wife and I had so much fun that we've decided to re-enact New Year's Eve on a monthly basis with an afternoon spent playing games with friends. We're dubbing the occasion "First Saturdays" and we started it this weekend. Not everyone we invited was able to make it, but that's okay. We'll do it again in a few weeks.

The afternoon's fun was composed of a pretty good mix of games:

• Inn Fighting (where players are participants in a terrific tavern brawl)
• Ninja Burger (delivering fast-food takeout to the most unlikely of locations without being seen)
• The Big Idea (playing venture capitalists bringing new inventions to market and trying to make the most money)
• Snorta (a memory game where everyone makes animal sounds - lots of silly fun and NOT a drinking game)
• Apples to Apples (picking the best representation of a descriptive word)
• Sorry (the standard kids board game)

There were so many games to choose from and a good mix of people. If we'd had one or two more people, we could have broken into two groups. As it was, we had a great time and the four children in attendance joined in most of the games. Personally, I'm just glad to be able to pull out some of the games we don't play very often, and also have the opportunity to play new ones. At last count, we own more than 70 board and card games, and that's not counting all of the standard fare of kids games like Life and Mousetrap.

I can't wait for next month! I also can't believe I roleplayed and board-gamed in the same week. It's starting off to be a great year!

Now reading: Gail Carriger's Soulless