I have a habit of biting off more than I can chew, and never more so than when it came to The First Annual Brinkerhoff Game Extravaganza. It was an undertaking of such epic proportions that, for the first time since I began this blog, I took a Sunday off from blogging to recuperate. But now I'm back, playing catch-up, and ready to relate my shenanigans.
It was an idea born of a particularly bad day of solo parenting, in which I stayed up late watching Jimmy Fallon video clips of games he plays on his show. They are brilliant. Box of Lies! Egg Roulette! I know I'll never be on late night TV, but I wanted to play too. And I wanted to see my friends smash eggs on their heads.
So, Dave and I picked a date months in advance, made a plan, and got to work. For weeks I worked on our yard, planting and weeding. We cleaned the patio, cleared out the garage, shopped for the barbeque, and prepared the many games. Truly, the most difficult task was narrowing down our invite list. We wanted to invite about 50 people, which was simply not possible. We had to exclude some larger families that we would have loved to invite. Normally I'm quite satisfied with the size of our house and yard, but on such occasions I want a mansion.
When the big day finally arrived, we had an obstacle course, a frisbee golf challenge, a croquet challenge, and a giant game of relay race tic-tac-toe. Each of those games were played at-will, whenever our guests wanted to give them a go. The "spectator" games were the main event. These were: Arm Wrestling, Box of Lies, Egg Roulette, and Put it on a Cracker.
Arm wrestling was a hit, and got the ball rolling with lots of energy and excitement. Box of Lies, which I had eagerly anticipated, was a total flop. As on Jimmy Fallon, I assembled some truly bizarre items, but my guests did not find them nearly as hilarious as I did. And being so stymied by the oddity of these items, almost no one lied. Put it on a Cracker was amusing for those who stayed long enough to play.
The big hit of the party was Egg Roulette. I hadn't planned on playing, but when the time came I figured that if I expected my guests to crack raw eggs on their heads, I had better participate. Of course I got two raw eggs, and my opponent got none. (The upside is that I now know that eggs are stronger than any hair gel, should I ever need to construct a gravity-defying hairdo.) Dave also got off scott-free. One friend cracked his first raw egg with such gusto that I basically got showered with a third raw egg standing behind him, as did the ceiling and much of the garage. I thought that couldn't be topped, until Daven and Savanna Lake played. They were the last round, and their dozen eggs were a mystery. We had combined a bunch of eggs from partially used cartons, and had no idea of the hard-boiled/raw ratio. For several turns there were no raw eggs, until Daven picked one out-of-turn that he knew was raw by shaking it, and hucked it at Savanna's head. She retaliated by smashing the rest of the carton on him, which was no less than five raw eggs. All of the work of the previous weeks was worth it for that moment.
True mommy muscles, arm wrestling with one arm and a kid in the other.
Daven's well-deserved aftermath.
The real challenge of the obstacle course was finishing before any of the kids disassembled it and beat you with pool noodles.
Wasabi, pickles, mustard, and ranch dressing...yummy.