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Word of the Week #38 – Play

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Hello and welcome to the home of Word of the Week, a nice and simple weekly linky, with everyone welcome to pop by and share. The idea of the linky is to reflect back on your past week and share it with us. It’s great if you can sum it up in a word or phrase, hence giving us your Word of the Week. My word this week is play and you can read more about that below.

I’m not totally strict on using just a word or phrase but please try to stick to the theme of summing up your week.

There are not too many rules with this linky, just remember to read at least another couple of posts in the link up after adding your link. I will read and comment on all posts and tweet them out for you. I also have a Pinterest board devoted to Word of the Week and I will add posts to Mix Please add the badge below to your post so that others may find us and join in. If you comment or tweet then please use the hashtag #WotW

Word of the Week is open from 6am on Friday Morning to 12 noon on Monday. Plenty of time to join in!

If you are unfamiliar with the Word of the Week linky then please feel free to ask any questions. New linkers are always welcome, we love to hear what you have been up to in the past week.

MY WORD OF THE WEEK

Play

Photograph of a violin against a wooden background and the word Play.

Play is my word of the week this week for a couple of reasons. I have just discovered that The Little Man is learning to play the violin at school. I don’t know if its somethings he will continue with but I hope he does. My eldest daughter played violin for many years and I bought her a purple one for her 16th birthday. Boo is learning to play the guitar with her Dad. I do love that there is music in the family.

The Lovely Bones

My highlight of the week was going to see the play, The Lovely Bones, with my eldest daughter on Wednesday. I knew I’d read the book before and it had had a big impact on me. But although I knew it had been a long time since I read it I hadnt realised until later that it was actually 16 years ago. I’d read it when my eldest daughter was 14, the same age as the main character Suzie Salmon. I think that’s why it had impacted me so much at the time.

I really enjoyed the play, it’s a sad but thought provoking story and I loved the way it was re-imagined for the stage. You can read my review here.

Now it’s your turn to tell about your week.

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The Pretender – A Fantastic New Fun Game for the Family

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We love playing games and I love it when I get a new one to review. The Pretender is a new game from Gamely, we reviewed  another Gamely game back in April, you can see what we thought of Randomise.

The Pretender comes in a box, just a little bigger than a box of playing cards. It is indeed a card game, but it’s so much more. Here’s a brief description.

The Pretender is a hilarious social deduction game of mini-charades, bluffing and suspicion that will make you laugh and get you thinking creatively. Each round, every player has the same identity except for the Pretender.  The aim of the game for the other players is to discover who the Pretender is, while the Pretender must fake their way through the game, escaping detection and trying to work out what on earth everyone else is miming!

In The Box

Quite simply you get a number of cards and a small instruction sheet. Each card has two categories and you get six of each. Each category has 10 entries to choose from. However, one of the cards does not have any entries, it just says Pretender 10 times instead.

The cards are all you need to play the game, well, along with your imagination.

 

How To Play

The rules are pretty simple and the game can be played by most ages. However, it depends on the players how cleverly you play the game.

The game is for four to six players and if you have less than six you will need to take away the excess cards, but make sure the pretender card is still there. Then the cards are shuffled and randomly passed to each player. One of the two categories is chosen before play and then whoever is chosen to go first will pick an entry from that category.

The pretender will not know what has been chosen, apart from the category, so they will be playing blind.

Each player in turn then mimes the chosen entry and the Pretender has to try and guess what it is for their turn. Or just wing it. When everyone has had their turn they players then choose who they believe the Pretender to be by pointing to them.

If they guess right the Pretender has one last chance to turn it around by correctly guessing what the entry was.

Example

The category chosen is sea creatures, and the entry chosen octopus. Each player has to mime octopus and the Pretender has to guess that they are miming octopus and mime it themselves. Of course this becomes very difficult if the Pretender is going first. Their only hope then is to pick any sea creature to mime and get away with it.

The players are faced with the dilemma, do they mime it really good so that they don’t get chosen as the Pretender, but risk the Pretender guessing it easily. Or, do they mime it obscurely so that the Pretender doesn’t get it, but risk being pointed out as the Pretender.

Winning

The winner of the game is either the Pretender, who doesn’t get spotted, or knows the correct entry. Or the other players for guessing the Pretender correctly and the Pretender not knowing what the entry is.

Conclusion

It’s a simple game that is not so simple. The rules are easily picked up but the skill lies in how well you play it.

The recommended age is 12 years but we played with an 8 year old. He found it quite difficult at first, especially when he got the Pretender card, he gave the game away immediately by exclaiming ‘my card says nothing but pretender.’ He did actually get the hang of it though after a couple of rounds.

We love that this is a compact game which can be taken anywhere and it easy to pick up and start playing. You can also choose how long you play for. It takes around 15 minutes for one turn, and you can have as many, or as few, turns as you like. We find that it’s only fair that we all get a turn at choosing the item from the category.

How to Get Your Hands on a Pack

You can buy The Pretender on Amazon.

This is an affiliate link.

The pretender is from Gamely Games and you can find out about this and their other games by checking out their Twitter,  Instagram  and Facebook 

Other fun games from Gamely include Randomise and Soundiculous

Disclosure: We were sent this game for the purpose of this review, all thoughts and opinions are our own. This post contains an affiliate link to Amazon. This will not affect the cost to you if you choose to buy anything.

 

Why Does Half Term Go By So Quickly?

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It’s now Saturday affernoon and on Monday the kids will be going back to school after half term.
I love having them home, we can chill out, we don’t have to rush in the morning, we can do lots of things together.

So why do I feel like we’ve just wasted a week?

Last weekend we went out both Saturday and Sunday. We browsed the shops on Saturday and bought some new craft supplies. Then on Sunday we spent the whole day at Cosford Royal Airforce museum.

But, we haven’t been out since. Monday the weather was kind but the weekend had taken it’s toll and I was in too much pain to go out. The Little Man and his big brother played in the garden for over an hour which was nice. The girls stayed in all day but they didn’t mind.

The rest of the week has passed so quickly and I was feeling upset that we hadn’t achieved much. Maybe that’s not a bad thing. I mean the kids are stuck to a routine all week at school, they are out every day and busy all the time. Maybe, it’s okay just to chill out and not do much for a week?

Then I got to thinking of the things we had done in the week. We baked a lovely cake for Daddy for his birthday. In fact Boo did most of the work on this cake all by herself!

chocolate orange cake

We also baked chocolate cookies, you can never have enough cookies in the house!

chocolate cookies

The kids had their arts and crafts stuff out and instead of telling them what to do I left them to just use their imaginations and create what they wanted. Boo made a book, and Star and the Little Man made some lovely art work.

I also bought the kids some new notebooks when we went out last Saturday and they have been filling them up with words and pictures all week.

We have had some lovely books to review this week and the kids have enjoyed doing lots of reading. Boo has also been learning Spanish with a book and audio. I reckon she’ll pick it up really quick like this.

learning spanish with audio and book

We had some books from Lonely Planet Kids which were full of stickers and activities and the kids have spent ages filling them in, they are  so much fun.

sticker book fun from lonely planet kids

We’ve watched movies, played board games, and the kids have played with their toys.

Star has been trying to make slime at every opportunity after watching YouTube videos, she’s not had good success yet but I’ve just ordered some stuff online for her so watch this space.

Today we are back to one of my childhood fun activities and making some pom poms!

making pom poms

So, is it bad that we only had a couple of days out and have spent the week indoors?

Maybe, if it’s nicer weather tomorrow we can go out and blow away a few cobwebs. I don’t like staying in all the time but if the kids are happy and occupied then I suppose it’s okay.

Debs Random WritingsThe Ordinary Moments


Pink Pear Bear

Exploring Outer Space with a Sassy Kids Box

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My Little Man has  enjoyed the fun of  a Sassy Kids Box in the past and there is something about receiving that little red parcel in the post that gets him real excited. We had a parcel arrive on Saturday and he couldn’t wait to switch of Mine Craft and get started. Of course his sisters like to get in on the act two.

The box this time was Space themed and the first task was to make a UFO from the things provided. We just needed to add some scrap paper and glue. You can see how he got on in the video below. Boo was reading the instructions out to him.

First step was to roll up some scrap paper and stick it on one plate. Then he had to stick the other plate on top. He then decorated the plates with the glitter glue provided. He was also provided with a little space alien that came with a parchute. This was placed inside the cupcake paper and then put upside down on top of the paper plates. The final touch was to stick on the little gems.

Also in the box was a bag of mini marshmallows and some cocktail sticks. I added some more marshmallows and sticks so that his sister’s could join in and make some constellations following the pictures in the leaflet.

There were also quite a few marshmallows consumed during this task.

The finished result was rather good though, don’t you think?

Sassy Kids Boxes are available on subscription to be delivered every two weeks. They are small enough to fit through your letterbox but are packed with activities. Each box contains:

  • Everything For Your Main Activity
  • Super Bonus Activity
  • Extra Fun Challenge
  • Family Game
  • Good Deed Challenge Card
  • Fun Facts
  • Did You Know?
  • Free Competitions To Win Fab Prizes

Each box is £3.99 plus 99p for P&P, but you can get your first box for just £1.99 and 99p P&P

We love our Sassy Bloom Boxes and you can tell the fun my little man had (and his sisters) in this little video we made.

Disclosure: We were sent a Sassy Kids Box for free for the purpose of this review, all thoughts and opinions are my own.

Hetty Feather – The Play

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I cried, I laughed, I trembled, I clapped, I watched in awe, I used my imagination to it’s fullest and then I cried again. If there is one piece of advice I could give to anyone watching the Stage Play Hetty Feather, it’s take a box of hankies. It will awaken every emotion.

Hetty Feather

Hetty Feather is a book by Jaqueline Wilson. Hetty is baby who is taken to the Foundling Hospital because her mother cannot look after her. She is then fostered out to a family in the country side and has a nice life until it’s time for her to return to the Foundling Hospital to be prepared for her future as a servant girl. She hates the hospital and vows to run away and find her real mother, who she believes to be a bare horseback rider she saw in a circus while living with her foster family. She finds her opportunity to escape when they have a very rare day out and she finds the Circus. Does she find her real mother? Is she really the circus lady? I won’t spoil the rest of the story for you but there are some scary moments ahead while Hetty searches for her mother. 

The Stage Play

Sticking quite close to the book the play begins with Hetty as a baby being brought to the Foundling Hospital by her mother. There are no scene changes as such but the whole stage is set up a little like a circus ring. The floating ribbons and ropes are manouvered around to create different scenes such as the hospital, the trees in the countryside and the circus. 
Apart from Hetty all the actors have several parts to play and they do it so good you barely notice that it’s the same actor playing her brother, a circus performer or even another girl in her hospital dorm.
There is a lot of action climbing the ladders and swinging from the ropes and ribbons. It’s very circus like and totally entertaining. We were all mesmerised from beginning to end.
The music complimented the play rather than taking it over. It was a vital element, but overall it didn’t really feel like a musical.
The play is aimed at children seven years or older. I took my almost seven year old and eight year old daughters along with my niece (22 yrs) We all really enjoyed the play although the youngest, Boo, was a little scared at times and Star (8) spent a lot of the show in floods of tears, the final tears were happy ones she said. I wouldn’t really recommend the show to younger children although there was a younger child in front of us who appeared to enjoy the show despite asking his mother lots of questions. 

The Foundling Hospital

The Foundling Hospital was not actually a hospital but the first ever purposely built children’s home for babies born into poverty or social exclusion. It was established by Thomas Coram in London in 1739. The babies were sent away to wet nurses until they were five years old and then were brought back to the instution to recieve a basic education until they were old enough to leave for employment.
Play Information:
Adapted for the stage by Emma Reeves and directed by Sally Cookson
Pheobe Thomas (Holby City) stars as Hetty Feather
The Play will be shown at Birmingham Town Hall from April 22nd to April 29th then will be touring Cheltenham, Edinburgh, Cambridge, Sheffield and Dubai.
Disclaimer: I was given four tickets to see the show for the purpose of this show. Photographs were provided for me to use on my blog. All thoughts and opions are entirely my own. 

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