Another “wordie” game, Keesdrow is “Word Seek” backwards. Players are truly seeking words, and you’ll find them backwards, forwards, left, right, up, down and diagonally. The board changes with each game, so players can play again and again and always be challenged to find more words.

Both games are definitely for families with older kids, who can already read and have a good understanding of words as they can be backwards, forwards, diagonal, vertical and horizontal. We’ve also played without the kids, creating a great challenge for friendly-game-night. Educationally, they incorporate spelling and reading but, moreso, they’re great thinking and focusing games, with a bit of stragety. Wordies, be sure to put these two in your carts to add them to your collection.

 Both games were provided as samples from their parent companies for this review.

First Night: Think Fun S’Match. We received this as a birthday gift (from Zareen, thanks Zareen!) for my 4-year-old and its been a great family game for all of us. Its Memory with a twist. Instead of just turning over 2 cards and hoping they match, you push a spinner and it tells you if you are matching category, number or color. My babysitter was hooked after playing one Thursday, so that night I knew we had to check it out.

Second Night: Hasbro CirKis: This one was a sample and I was concerned that the kids wouldn’t enjoy it. Simply because it is for ages 8 and up. The 6-year-old found it, was intrigued by the box, and we opened it about a two weeks ago. I kid you not, we have played it nearly every day in the past 2 weeks. It is a challenging game of spacial relations with lots of rules. But if you have a little one with good spatial relations skills, like my 4-yo, this is a great game. You’ll definitely have to help out with score keeping and we did alter the rules a tad to make it less frustrating for the kids. This one is really fun for the whole family.

Third Night: Uno Card Game. This summer’s camp season was leaden with too many rainy days for my liking. It meant a lot of time indoors and not enough in the pool or on the tennis court. But the kids wouldn’t have known it. Each day they went to the game room and were introduced to new games. Apparently, the 6-year-old’s bunk loved Uno. C came home the 2nd day and asked if we could buy it. Fortunately, I had it in the gift closet and pulled it out. Since then, its become a game we play every sick day, every rainy day and, almost, every breastfeed when the kids are looking for something to do. Its one of the classics that every house needs. (And, as of this writing, its less than $3 at Amazon.)

Fourth Night: Wii Sports Resort Apparently, this is a big seller for Nintendo. And I can totally see why. It has a lot of the classic sports games, like bowling and a twist on golf making it Frisbee Golf, but it also introduces about 10 new interactive games. I’m loving wake boarding and archery and the 6-year-old could play basketball and Frisbee for hours. The 4-year-old even gets into the game with Air Sports. It comes with a new Wii MotionPlus sensor, and you’re likely to need at least one more if you use 2 remotes.

Fifth Night: Gobblet Jr. When we received this game 2 years ago it instantly was on the top of faves my list and its never faltered. Its a two-player game of strategy that we pull out very often. You’re trying to tic tac toe, can loose the spot you already played. Very user friendly and a great game for kids 4 and up.

Sixth Night: Sorry. Okay, I’m officially Sorry that I’m recommending this game to you. Because you don’t realize how long this game can last until you play it again. In fact, the first time we pulled out Sorry this fall we were shocked that we sat for over 30 minutes playing. But that’s the thing. All 4 of us sat and played. No one was distracted. No one threw down a card in frustration or lifted the board in a fit. Everyone played and played happily. Its another classic that belongs in every home.

Seventh Night: My First Making Words Snap. We only just took this out of the wrapper yesterday. Inside was a deck of 52 cards with phonics sounds on them. Your job: to make a match that spells a word. So that “ch” and “at” will match but “ch” and “sh” don’t. You can also play a Memory-style game with the cards. The 6 year-old was busy enough testing himself with the words he was making not to notice that the 4-year-old didn’t know his sounds and was just learning them with me. Its a great beginning reading game. And its under $5. Plan to hang some stockings? This is one that belongs inside.

Eighth Night: Think Fun’s Zingo! Its a bingo game with a zing. Instead of calling out numbers, the Zingo dispenser dispenses tiles with pictures on them (and the words). Players race to grab a word if its on his Zingo card. We started playing this one at age 3 (with help) and now the kids can play on their own. This one is a playdate favorite.

For what its worth, today I asked the 6-year-old what his favorite family games are right now. Without pause he responded Cir*kis and Sorry. His favorite current Wii game is Wii Sport Resort. The 4-year-old’s favorites were My First Making Words Snap and Cir*kis.

Cir*kis was received as a sample for review. Zingo, Gobblet, Jr. and ‘Smatch were all gifts. Uno and Sorry were won in a charity raffle. The 6-year-old purchased Wii Sports Resort with his own birthday money, though I pitched in and purchases the 2nd MotionPlus. And My First Making Words Snap was once sold at Precious Personalities (I opened my final deck yesterday taking it out of stock.)

Why I Like It:  The game is simple, but offers lots of variations.  You can play against each other or work as a team.  You can play the easy side or the hard, with one Zingo sheet per player or multiple.  Since the tiles have both words and images, the game is great for pre-readers and early readers (even my 1.5 year old is picking up on matching the bird tile to the bird picture), and if you’re looking to build skills in other languages, Zingo is also available in Spanish, Hebrew and French.  I also like that it’s a game we can play together (up to 8 people), but my toddler can also have fun with it alone too.

Why My Toddler Likes It: One of my son’s favorite parts is moving the tile slider and trying to guess which two tiles are going to come up next. This isn’t really supposed to be an exciting part of the game, but it’s one of the things that keeps him most engaged.  He also loves that “race” element – if two people both have the same picture on their Zingo sheet, the first person to call it out, gets to take the tile.

ThinkFun produces lots of enjoyable educational games, many of which are single-player games that can be a godsend as quiet time activities or times when you need your little one to play solo.  Though Zingo has been the most age-appropriate for my little one, we’ve also checked out a number of other ThinkFun games: Hoppers Jr. (a frog-based, single-player strategy game, ages 5-7), Clever Castle (pattern matching game with princesses and dragons, ages 5-7) and Rush Hour (a super portable, single-player problem-solving game, ages 8 and up).  And I love the Think Fun keeps us moms in mind – many of their games have storage bags to keep all the pieces organized and make clean up a breeze.

Want to win your own copy of one of these ThinkFun games?  Leave a comment that answers – What was your favorite childhood board game? – and an email to contact you if you win. Contest ends July 7th and four winners will be chosen at random.  Good luck!  And long live family game night!

Want to host a fun game night? Pull out the game You’ve Been Sentenced and you’re nearly guaranteed a night of fun. Read my review for more information.

We brought it along with us to an annual family reunion and it was quite a hit amongst the teens to grandparents crowd–in-other-words, the adults loved this game.  A creative challenge, each round players are dealt 10 cards, each card with 5 words. The challenge, to use your words to make a grammatically correct and justifiable sentence.

Here’s how it goes. Players move their deck of words (which are everything from conjugated verbs to adjectives, nouns, proper nouns… you know… typical middle school English class… but fun!) around and around until they create a sentence. Once all sentences are made, they are presented to the competitors. This is where it gets spicy. Competitors can challenge a sentence and its up to the sentence creator to prove the sentence makes sense.

Already fun sober (yes, that’s right… you all know I’m pregnant), I hear You’ve Been Sentenced is a lot of fun with a glass of wine (or a few). But its also ideal for middle and high school students. Imagine having your teacher pull out this game rather than teach grammar out of a book… how much more fun would English class have been!? I’ve read several reviews by educators on what an educational success the game is, and I can easily imagine using it often in my former 4th grade classroom.

Created for ages 8 and up, it’ll be a hit at parties so definitley add it to you hostess gift list, as well as your holiday gifting list. Grab an extra one for you for Family and Friends Game Night and one for a favorite teacher! And if Dad’s a gamer, I’d be running to the store to grab a last minute Father’s Day Gift.

Just dying to try it? We have 4 to give away at Mommies with Style. So make sure you’re subscribed to our newsletter (use this link, or the one at the top of the page) and subscribe right now!! We’ll contact the winners next week. (Winners will have 24 hours to respond to our e-mail before an alternate is chosen.)