As the weather warms, more and more people are looking for reasons to gather their friends outside. One popular way of doing this is doing cookouts. Food is a great draw for a cookout, but you can add some games to this article. Anyone who has been to a cookie in the summer knows that the crowd is bound to socialize around the grill and cook. This is not always the safest scenario, so the action is to help pull the crowd out of the grid. Games are great for achieving this goal. You can set up a cookie for your different games so that different people can choose the game they like best. The question is what games do you set up? Here are some suggestions I have, we’ll start with some classics and finish with a couple of less common games.
Horseshoes– Horseshoes are always a popular game at cookouts. The game has been popular for centuries. You put two stakes on the ground, and each player then throws two horseshoes in turn. You can play individually or with partners, so you can’t walk from one to the other after each shot. It is a twenty-one game, with no need to win exactly twenty-one totals. Of course if you want to make it more difficult, you could add it as a house rule.
Great Weapons– The slashing arrows have changed quite a bit from the version many of us play. as a child at the end of an iron nail. The government has decided that kids running around with sharp metals stuck in their heads aren’t exactly safe. Now most versions of lawn darts include weighted plastic darts that are filled with sand. The goal is to get them placed in a circle as the space of your choice. As with Horseshoes, this can be played with two or four players. It depends on how many people you have who want to play and how much walking they want to do.
Washeroos– This is a game that many people have not heard of. A fuller explanation of the game can be found here, but this article will do a brief summary. The game involves choosing a space to separate two wooden areas. In each playing area there are three circles in a line one after the other. The first is worth one point, the second is worth three, the third is worth five. Each player casts three 2-3 inch washers per round depending on the size you can find at your local hardware store. Points are totaled after each round of cancellations if any player gets flushed on the same hole. The game is played for a total of twenty-one points, in that it is required that you reach the total of exactly twenty-one.
Ladderball– This game is also called. bolo toss, golf hill and snake toss. More information can be found in this article. Again, for the purpose of this article, the first summary will suffice. Each player or team has three balls. These are pieces of string with golf balls attached to each end. The goal is to throw them and have them land on the three colored levels of the scale to score sixty points. The bolo must remain on the ladder at the end of the round to score points. There are many house rules and variations that will affect scoring methods as well as special rules that could affect the length or skill level of the game. This is another game that follows the horseshoe rules by allowing points to be broken by landing a bolo in the same stroke as your opponent. In order to win with 21 washeroos in total you need to win.
Major Group Games
The games above are designed for two to four players per game, if you have a large cache, you probably want to have many games installed, and maybe a few of the same type if they are popular among your friends. Of course, if you want to involve a larger number of people in the same game, you can try some traditional games. Also a pillow, a cat and a pregnant woman. All of these games require strict athletic ability and allow large groups of people to play together. They are best played after dinner, but they can also be played while the cook prepares the food on the grill.
Cookouts are all about Fun
Many people focus on eating when they think about cooking, in the end though, kitchens are all about entertaining and socializing with your friends and relatives. Adding games to your cookie mix encourages more interaction among guests.
