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amyable
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| Posted: March 30 2007 at 9:32am | IP Logged
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...other things with a zillion pieces?
Yesterday we hit bottom with the amount of STUFF strewn around. Yes, it is mostly the fault of the 4 and 1 year olds, but I am apparently the only one who can clean it up.  So, I'd rather throw it away. 
Seriously though, I have a few questions about how others do it, before I just toss it all out. 
How many board games does your family have? Where are they kept? Any special tricks for organization? Are there those of you out there with happy, well adjusted children who DON'T have a ton of games like this? My dh used to have a whole closetful in his house growing up, and I think I am trying to imitate it here, but I'm not getting the same results! I have these images of my children going off together to play a board game, but that NEVER happens. They want one of us, and rarely we can do it. Nice when it happens, but it doesn't happen often enough to justify having 30 some odd games! 
Same questions for puzzles...
If I can tame (or throw out without guilt) the board game/puzzle monster, I will feel much better about keeping the scads of books and new manipulatives I seem to be collecting for my "down and out" time while I'm pg/babymooning.  With *all* of it around, things are ugly...
Thanks for putting up with all my questions lately.
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Amy
mom of 5, ages 6-16, and happy wife of 
The Highly Sensitive Homeschooler
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Cay Gibson
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| Posted: March 30 2007 at 9:58am | IP Logged
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amyable wrote:
| How many board games does your family have? |
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Roughly 25 board games. This includes about 3 different MOnopology versions and 2 Risk versions. But this is after the recent purging just done this week. Photos and write up here.
We have a game closet off the kitchen.
amyable wrote:
| Any special tricks for organization? |
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Just do it. Set everything in a spot that has to be cleared before nightfall and just do it.
amyable wrote:
| Are there those of you out there with happy, well adjusted children who DON'T have a ton of games like this? |
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I grew up with a game closet full of toys. I remember my brother and I had to make sure every litle piece was put back into the box exactly the way it had come. Everything had to be kept organized. I didn't realize my mother raised me with a touch of Montessori. Had I started that way with my children perhaps our game closet wouldn't have been such a living nightmare once I got hold of it this past Monday.
amyable wrote:
| If I can tame (or throw out without guilt) the board game/puzzle monster, I will feel much better... |
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Oh, I feel soooooo much better since doing ours. It's a chore well worth the effort.
I'll be cheering you on. 
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Cay Gibson
"There are 49 states, then there is Louisiana." ~ Chef Emeril
wife to Mark '86
mom to 5
Cajun Cottage Under the Oaks
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Maryan
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| Posted: March 30 2007 at 10:27am | IP Logged
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Oh Amy -- I hear you about clutter  but my weakness is not board games.
We grew up with less than 10 board games: Chutes and Ladders, Candy Land, Monopoly, Clue, Think Tank, Trivial Pursuit, Sorry, Scrabble, Checkers and Yahtzee -- but we had playing cards and used them a lot. We kept them on top of the hall closet, so Mom had to take them down. I think she did this, so she knew when little pieces were out and to watch for the sake of the baby.
My younger siblings got 3 more: Taboo, Pictionary, and Tribond.
Puzzles -- we had a lot of them. Ten seemed like a lot to me growing up!
Now for my own family -- I have even less because my boys are little, but I plan to keep it simple too. So far we just have Taboo, Letter Factory, Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, and a little kids Cranium game. But we have a LOT of puzzles.
Personally, if we lose pieces and they can't be replaced by the company -- I throw it out.
Otherwise, I keep my games on the top shelf in the hall closet to be taken down by me -- but the puzzles are down low on their shelves for whenever they want them. And they have to put them away after using them -- most of the time I can reinforce this.
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Maryan
Mom to 6 boys & 1 girl: JP('01), B ('03), M('05), L('06), Ph ('08), M ('10), James born 5/1/12
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stefoodie
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| Posted: March 30 2007 at 10:31am | IP Logged
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Every year or so I purge and keep under 10. We have chess, Monopoly, Battleship and a couple other games (gifts from people). I got the plastic containers recommended here (sorry, can't remember who, and now can't remember what they're called. They come in different sizes and colors. It's really helped my kids organize the games better -- until the 5-yo comes along and mixes stuff up, then an older kid or mom has to rearrange everything again. Sigh.
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stef
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amyable
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| Posted: March 30 2007 at 10:35am | IP Logged
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Cay Gibson wrote:
amyable wrote:
| How many board games does your family have? |
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Roughly 25 board games. This includes about 3 different MOnopology versions and 2 Risk versions. But this is after the recent purging just done this week. Photos and write up here. |
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Cay, that "after" picture is inspiring! Too bad we don't have an extra closet! (we probably have 3 fewer closets than we actually need, lol!) Right now we have everything divided between a buffet we have in our family room and stacked crates (turned sideways to slow down --but apparently not stop -- the path of toddler destruction). Your closet looks great!
Thank you for the cheering up and cheering on! 
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Amy
mom of 5, ages 6-16, and happy wife of
The Highly Sensitive Homeschooler
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amyable
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| Posted: March 30 2007 at 10:40am | IP Logged
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Maryan and Stef - I have wondered how the "less is more" works with games. It sounds like it is OK! Maybe better that my kids have but a few classic, fun games, that they play all the time and grow fond memories of, than that they get overwhelemed by choices and never learn one game well...
...thinking, thinking... 
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Amy
mom of 5, ages 6-16, and happy wife of
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lapazfarm
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| Posted: March 30 2007 at 10:56am | IP Logged
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We used to have a few, but I got rid of them all in our last move. The pieces were always missing, they never got played with (unless I was there to play, and I don't like board games)and just took up space I needed for Montessori materials.
We don't miss them at all and I think my kids are well-adjusted and happy.File folder games take their place for the littles and a few well-chosen computer games make up for it for the olders.
I do keep a chess set just in case.
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Theresa
us-schooling in beautiful Fairbanks, Alaska.
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marihalojen
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We have a few select games onboard and we go through spurts of playing them. After Christmas we were in a huge game playing mood, during the move and all we stopped. This may inspire me to pull them out soon!
We have taken all the pieces and placed them in nice ziplock bags and thrown the boxes out. What a waste of space! Cardboard is a great place for bugs to hide on a boat in the tropics or sub-tropics so I try to eliminate all cardboard from everything, cereal boxes, games, everything!
We then have one nice tin box (some sort of metal, I'm waiting for it to rust!) that they all fit in. Well, all except our portable zippy Scrabble and Yahtzee games and a huge Apple game with like 800 cards that someone gave us. I haven't even opened that one yet, it says it takes 4 players too!
Oddly enough Marianna and I rarely play games together. She is a super competitive kid and dividing that competitivness up with three of us playing is much better than just the two of us, maybe because there are then two losers usually? Hmmm...maybe I need to go check out that previous thread about non-competitive games a little more closely!
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Erin
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| Posted: March 31 2007 at 8:22am | IP Logged
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Amy
I'll be no help we have way more than 10. We have the closet full version. Although my dc do play board games and card games alot. Mostly the strategy type and maths, logic ones. I want to play the word and knowledge games, I hardly get to choose
However they do probably only play with 30% of what we own. I tend to pick up games for a song at garage sales and we rarely loose pieces. Most likely because I spend hours chasing them done. The pieces that is It is so hard to decide what to eliminate though as some of them are so educational They're the ones they only play if I get them out.
Since we have moved to our small house they can only fit about five games and some cards here and I spend lots less time chasing pieces. Maybe I'll just leave the games in storage longer. Then again they have just learnt to play some new games and are begging for those versions for their birthdays.
I told you I would be no help Amy.
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Celeste
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| Posted: March 31 2007 at 8:55am | IP Logged
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I have not tried this myself, but I lived with a family that did. It was quite a bit of work to set up, but once it was done it was very convenient. (I witnessed the whole process.) (Someday I may do it myself.)
The system is described in Deniece Schofield's Confessions of an Organized Homemaker (or "Housewife" in older editions), available in most libraries. Basically she figured out how much space the pieces of each game would need, then bought one of those cabinets with the little drawers of different sizes for metal parts and such. Game pieces go in their own labeled drawers. (Caveat: If cabinet is left within the reach of small children this could be an instant disaster--pieces of 25 games on the floor in a second!) Directions to the games go in a binder in alphabetical order (photocopy rules that are on the lids). Game boards are labeled and stood up between the chest and the wall. All game boxes can then be thrown away!
Keeping track of stray pieces is easier--just toss it in its drawer rather than rummage through a stack of boxes.
Celeste (who is NOT organized, but has read lots of books)
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CatholicMommy
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| Posted: March 31 2007 at 9:33am | IP Logged
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puzzles without frames: In our house we have large ziploc bags with all the pieces and just the picture from the lid. The boxes just got smashed anyway, so this works nicer.
board games: we don't have many simply because my son has not reached that point of interest yet and the other children who roam my house are more interested in the other things we have. I want (but have not yet accomplished) to put the pieces in their own little bags within the box - or some other way of organizing - because every time we do play, we have to spend so much reorganizing cards, money, pieces - and that seems to take longer than playing the game itself. I like the idea of the small drawers, with the boards stored separately and discarding the rest (with 4 versions of Monopoly, there is plenty of unneccessary duplicate material to discard).
Card games, though, we have - and use. I try to keep them sorted into index card boxes, grouped by type/style. (Mary and Saints in one; mille borne in another; regular playing cards; French/European art playing cards in another)
Right now, all is stored in the lower half of our entertainment center (the upper half is my sewing stuff - no tv here), but I foresee a day when this will need to be expanded. I do hope to keep it to a minimal expansion though. :)
~Jessica
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teachingmom
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I was so tired of this type of thing too. A friend gave us a wooden hutch that they no longer needed. It has solid doors on the bottom and glass ones on top. We put it in our basement rec room with all of our board games in it. Younger kids games are down low and older ones go on top. I also added a child proof plastic thingy to the knobs on the bottom, so my youngest dd needed to ask for help to get games. She is 4 now and doesn't really need the child proofing, but I love having it when other kids visit.
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ALmom
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| Posted: April 10 2007 at 9:49pm | IP Logged
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We have zillions of games and puzzles - mostly games from dh childhood collection and puzzles for eye-hand and spatial awareness skill development. His boxes were still like new (our children wore them out more) and our solution - we got a lock for the game closet. I rotate out a few games appropriate for younger children. The older children come to me for the game closet key. This lets me know which child pulled it out so I know which child to direct to clean it up if it hasn't been done. The system works very well. (This is also where markers, dry erase markers, etc are kept.)
Puzzles with lots of pieces are stored high up. Puzzles with fewer pieces are within the 4 yo reach.
Now, confession time - I am a maniac about missing pieces and my children have learned that mom stops everything when something is missing and become a real maniac. The standard joke around here is - remember the High Ho CHerry Oh cherry? This helps me keep from losing my cool when we cannot find something. (One cherry was missing from the game my dd bought for $1 at a garage sale when she was little - all the pieces were there when we bought it. I stopped everything and everyone went on a search mission till we found the one cherry. I think it took the better part of the day. No one got any school work done. My sis came over (the one who sweeps pieces into the trash when they are left on the floor and wondered why it took me so long to straighten out one closet at her house (I was putting puzzles together to make sure the pieces were there or looking for the missing pieces) as we were just ending our search - at which point my dd reminded me that the game was only a dollar and was hers and she wasn't worried about it - and we all cracked up laughing at the ludicrousness of spending so much time looking for something like this. I must admit I am very, very stubborn and we did find the piece and I still check to make sure all cherries are present and accounted for before the game is returned to the closet). My totally out of balance craziness about missing pieces is a great motivation for all the children to keep up with pieces. They simply don't want to lose a school day to looking for a needle in a hay stack - and I really do go nuts, pulling off sofa cushions, moving furniture, taking every game out and hunting, etc..
I'm not much help, am I?
Janet
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helene
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| Posted: April 10 2007 at 10:29pm | IP Logged
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We have about 8 to 10 board games which are kept on a high shelf above the washer/dryer behind a set of louvered doors. They are out of reach of little ones. Only one at a time can come out. When they are done with this activity they must pick it up and I put it away on the shelf before another activity can come down. A large box of puzzles is up there, too, with the same rules. I am very glad that these are behind doors because even when it is very very neat it has a cluttery appearance. I will only keep family favorites. Those games that never get played find their way to the trash. The only "stuff" that flows freely around here is paper and pencils and crayons. I have a homeschool cabinet (also with doors) for all these art supplies. All my children draw several times daily and I think it is worth the constant "pick-up" it causes. We only keep and display the best...and even those get culled after a while.....I'm suddenly feeling so cruel! But I had to declare war on "pieces" for my own sanity!
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Topic: Organizing board games/puzzles ...
