You can take the boy out of the gym...

.... but you cannot take the gymnast out of the boy.

Haiku fun

A few weeks ago, my son excitedly related to me his idea for a new game. I encouraged him to write down his ideas and create the rules so we could play it. For your family's game night pleasure, I proudly present to you:

"Quicku"

(If any Parker Bros. reps are trolling the internet for new game ideas, we do expect to see some royalty checks when you roll this one out.)

The basic rules are as follows. The game consists of 10 rounds. In each round, a subject card is drawn. (We made our own subject cards, including the following subjects: gum, noodles, soccer, pizza, a rainforest, birthdays, a purse, vegetables, gymnastics, etc.) Each player then has 90 seconds to write a haiku about that subject. Players start with 100 points. You lose 10 points if you fail to complete your haiku, or if your haiku does not follow the proper format. (The scoring needs a little tweaking, and I think some sort of creativity bonus needs to be added in, but for that each round would require an objective judge. I expect you folks from Parker Bros. to iron out all those details.) At the end of the game, whoever has the most points wins.

We actually played the game to test it out. We had fun! Here are a few of our haikus.

Chewing gum is fun
Blowing bubbles is crazy
Gum sticks to your shoes

Pizza is tasty
I like good pepperoni
There are healthy herbs

Made out of leather
Women wear purses a lot
Men do not wear them

Cheese and mushrooms, yum
Dripping, cheesy pizza slice
Wow, I'm getting fat

We love Wii

Ladies and gentleman, the Wii has arrived. And just whose Wii is it? The children's Wii? No, no, no. It is ours. Said Wii was purchased with anniversary cash (thanks Mom & Dad!). It is ours! OURS! We may occasionally allow the cute little people in the house to play it.

Truthfully, though, I imagined the Wii would be ours primarily in name, the kids' in action. But as it turns out, we really like the Wii. As a gift it ranks way up there with the trampoline we got my husband for his birthday one year. After the kids go to bed, we fire that thing up! I can just picture them, tucked snug into their little beds at 8:30, listening to their parents playing the Wii, filled with all kinds of jealously. Poor kids - it's not even dark out at 8:30 in the summer.

My favorite game so far - table tennis. It is, in fact, one of the very first things I did this morning. Sleep til 9:30 (not the norm, but I had a crazy week and my husband had mercy on me), eat a little cereal, play a little ping pong. My daughter was watching me. In the course of play, as I put the hurt on one of my challengers, I did take a moment to explain to her that we only talk smack to our simulated opponents; if we were playing a real game against real people, we would be most respectful, exercising our good sportsmanship. (Yes, top-notch parenting while wildly swinging a remote around my living room. It's impressive.)

The husband's favorite game - golf. Of course. Why does golf bore me so? The upside of Wii golf, though: my husband isn't gone all weekend getting sunburned and I get to chat with him while he tries to make a putt for birdie (is that a thing?) He loves that. I mean, doesn't every man think to himself, Man, golf would be so much more awesome if only I could bring my wife along with me and we could chat about her day and the kids and what we need from the store and which bills are due.... Oh ... they don't? Oh.

If only we had a second Wii remote, we could really heat things up and I could practice good sportsmanship. And I haven't forgotten the original dream: the Wii Dance Dance Revolution. But I only plan to play that one when my kids have their friends over.