This year, my whole family was able to get together after Christmas, with sisters flying in from Mexico and Pittsburgh. We partied hard, filling every day with food, games, playing with the babies, bouncing from house to house to cabin, to the movies. In fact, I told Chris, it feels like we did everything over the holidays--except relax. Haha!
One thing I thought would be fun to share is the favorite games we played! Our whole family loves a good game night and we played so many over the holidays. Here were some of my favorites:
1. Scum. When I showed my family playing this card game up at our cabin over Christmas, a few of you chimed in that you know it as a$$ho#*. By either name, my whole family loves this game and we often play it with our friends, too. All you need is two decks of cards for a group. Here's a breakdown of the rules.
2. The Game of Things. We played this with some friends at a New Year's party and then went out and bought it and played with my family because it's so fun! It's a game you can play it as couples or individuals where you read the hilarious topics and write down your answers, then try and guess who said what.
3. Telephone Pictionary. Maybe our favorite game of all time, that we play year after year with all sorts of groups--even Greta joined this time! Everyone gets as many little pieces of paper as there are people playing. It's helpful to number them. Everybody starts out by writing whatever phrase they want. Then everyone passes their whole stack to the left and that person looks at the phrase, puts the paper in back and draws the phrase. The next person will write what they see drawn. Next person will draw what that person wrote and by the time it gets back to the original person--the drawing is generally so different than what the original phrase started as, you have to show everyone. We take turns showing the progression and laughing hysterically.
4. Time's Up! If you're familiar with the game "Celebrity" then you know what Time's Up is all about. The first round you try to get your partner to say what's on your card (could be a person, movie, song, book, place, etc.!) by saying pretty much anything besides what's on the card, the second round you can only say one word and the third round you can only act it out. It's one of our favorite party games and we still haven't gotten through all the cards it came with!
5. Karaoke. Ever since I got a karaoke machine for Christmas back when I was a tween, we've had a karaoke night around Christmas time. Nowadays, the setup is a little different. We use our TV (it's one of those smart ones that can access apps including YouTube) as the Karaoke machine--YouTube has never let us down as far as lyrics and songs go--and these mics that can hold your smartphone and sync with your bluetooth if you don't have a smart TV you want to use.
More fun things this week:
• This week, my friend Brittany, from @brittanymakes and The Vintage Rug Shop, shared some interesting thoughts on her Instagram Stories. More and more people are saying they aren't able to see the people they want to in their instagram feeds. And so instead of scrolling, they are watching Instagram Stories--which is forcing people to curate their stories more...making them look a certain way--which is the opposite of what Stories SHOULD be. I don't know the answer or what to do on our end. I'd love to keep our stories more candid and our feed more polished, but it's been on my mind, too. What do you want to see from us on Instagram?
• I've been reading Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown and I'm devouring it. It's not about essentialism in the home sense, but in the time sense. It's great for entrepreneurs or anyone that's tired or stretched thin from trying to do it all.
• We're refreshing our bedroom a little bit this year and love this one below by @courtneynye. It's so simple, calm, effortless, but sophisticated. I'm using it as our inspiration.
• This was my favorite Christmas gift from Chris.
Hope you all have a great weekend! We are headed to Seattle this morning--It'll be Polly's first flight! I was invited to tour the HGTV Dream Home in Gig Harbor, Washington and will be sharing lots of highlights and a live tour on my Instagram! Can't wait!
Leave a Reply
WE'RE CHRIS + JULIA
Portfolio
Projects
Personally, I think the reason people like insta stories is because they are candid and NOT curated. I love Tara Thueson, yours and Emily Henderson because they are not curated and bs. It's real life and not a perfect scene.
I love candid instastories. In addition to yours, I love Orlando Soria, Honey and Fitz, and Emily Henderson. Hate very curated/produced stories. And while I love younghouselove, I hate their stories as they are often super redundant, covering stuff they showed already, and/or they are just swipe ups to buy stuff. Ugh. Hate it!
I try to watch stories but they’re almost always pink or green striped! It’s weird and so annoying - I can hear but can’t see. Any suggestions on how to solve this would be appreciated - not tech savvy ????
I've never heard of this happening? Could it be a phone issue? Have you tried googling the problem?
Looking into it - I'll let you know what happens : )
We call the card game "Janitor" around here... I hadn't heard of Scum but Janitor was our replacement in highschool for the A-hole name! :)
Hahaha, nice.
LOVE that bedroom. I was looking through your room sources (we are hoping to have our kitchen remodeled this year in our 1925 house) and was wondering if you could comment on the difference between the Pottery Barn handles in your office and the Rejuvenation ones in the kitchen.
Pottery Barn's aged brass is definitely a lot warmer. In the Kitchen, we have unlaquered brass which will patina over time.
If you haven’t tried it, YSL mascara is great!
I haven't!
Oh I love these posts so much!
You should buy Telestrations - it's exactly like the "telephone pictonary" you described but comes with books and dry erase markers. Wastes less paper and there's an adult only version ;) (as well was their original completely kid friendly version)
I agree with you and think stories should be more candid. It's what I watch the stories for! I want more of them but in a different way! So keep doing what you're doing! I may not be the majority here but I'll also search for my favourite followers if I noticed I haven't seen their posts in a few days and I find the more you interact with your favourites the more likely they're going to show up on your feed anyhow!
That mascara looks deine. I may buy it.
PS: I miss you three in podcast land. I can't wait for your first 2018 episode!
I've been reading Essentialism too and it's giving me lots to think about and making me look at what I choose to do with my time in a new way. The idea that less is more isn't new but sometimes we glorify "busyness" and yet it doesn't result in really accomplishing more. As a stay at home mom I appreciate the reminder to choose between "good, better, and best" and that setting time aside to think and plan is hugely beneficial.
There is actually a game for #3 The Telephone Pictionary game you mentioned. It's called Telestrations and we played it with my husband's entire family on Christmas Eve! It turns out absolutely hilarious---and the best part is, it's not really a competitive game so people can really just have fun!
I like that there is a difference between stories and feed. I say don't change what you are doing. I enjoy the stores sometimes more than the still life pictures. What I think should change is getting rid of the algorithms!
Here here
LOVE telephone pictionary. We used to make our own notepads like you, and thought we had the greatest game invention and should manufacture and sell it... and then I discovered that it already is. It's called Telestrations. Exactly what we had been playing! I think it only goes up to 8 people, but if you buy more than one (we have the original and the After Dark), you have more pads, it just doesn't get back to the original person.
AW, thanks for bringing the Instagram + Stories topic up here! It's something I can't get off my mind, and think it's great to spread awareness of the issues with IG. Sadly, I worry only us bloggers care this much! haha
Great post!
Do you mind sharing where you got your sweater turtleneck ruffle top?
It's from Banana Republic, right here.
For anyone looking for an actual "board game" version of Telephone Pictionary, Telestrations is exactly what you described! I'm sure there are actual rules that go along with it to keep score, but we always just go around the group and show the hilarious progression of drawings/guesses. So much fun!
We love family games! And telephone pictionary - so, so hilarious! There is an actually game (with whiteboard booklets and dry-erase markers) and my brother-in-law got it for Christmas. It was perfect for the whole family and so funny. We were crying-laughing!
https://www.amazon.ca/Telestrations-Telephone-Game-Sketched-Out/dp/B001SN8GF4
We also had a rousing game of Pass the Pigs - a fairly ridiculous dice game, but the dice are in the shape of little pigs.
https://www.amazon.ca/gp/aw/d/B00005JG3Y/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1515171291&sr=1-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_QL65&keywords=pass+pigs&dpPl=1&dpID=51RRPf3WPEL&ref=plSrch
And we also like to play Chase the Ace. It's fast moving and since you only get one card for each round it's super easy for littler ones to play as well.
My aunt & uncle built their house in Gig Harbor 30+ years ago, and when I saw the HGTV Dream house I almost thought it was theirs! So similar, yet so different. It's a wonderful little town, and my hideaway when I need a break from it all. I look forward to seeing your tour of it.
Gig harbor is so nice! It’s supoosed to be rainy all weekend because...Seattle ???????? but you will love it! Enjoy and get down to the market if you can!
Have you heard of Drawception.com? It's your telephone dictionary game, but online. A good way to waste time, and just admire some super talented artists.
Definitely would like to see the insta stories stay informal, while keeping the feed more polished! I still scroll through the feed every time I'm on instagram, and watch the stories of my personal friends and a few of my favorite pages who provide the most entertaining stories (I always watch yours). I think the stories take too long to go through everyone's, plus I'm usually on instagram while at work so I prefer the feed because it's mostly silent! As a result of the new algorithms, I've noticed people are posting a screen shot of their feed on their stories with the most current photo covered as a way to tease it to force us to their feed. Please don't do that! I find that very annoying.
i don’t think insta stories would be as great if they were curated. The casualness about them is why i watch them more than scrolling the feed!! Just my two cents
Have a great weekend
Alas, I couldn't find the link to lead me to the rules for "scum" or alternatively titled %$#holes. Sounds like a fun time!
I love big families that love to play games! We’re big boss game people, so we always have a good selection on hand. One of my personal favorite party games is Concept - it’s kind of like Pictionary, but instead of drawing pictures, you are moving pieces around in the game board to slots representing various concepts. It requires a little more creativity than the typical Pictionary-type games and it’s great for all ages!
For Instagram - I agree, I've definitely noticed myself watching Stories before scrolling through the pictures. I will say that I LOVE your stories . It's such a good mix of pictures from the blog + adorable pictures of your girls/home life + your candid thoughts on things that are necessarily blog related. I also LOVE when you shop sales - it's so fun to see your picks and all of the good deals (both home decor and clothes)! Your taste is just impeccable!