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Favorite Flanders Family Games:

Raising a family of any size is a lot of work, but there’s more to life than jobs and chores, and our family believes in regularly enjoying healthy doses of fun and games. We try to choose activities that all of us can enjoy, like listening to Dad read aloud, riding bikes around the neighborhood, playing a round of four-square in the driveway, staging arm-wrestling competitions, eating picnic dinners in the tree fort, or working jig-saw puzzles at the kitchen table. Some of our favorite family games are ones our kids invented themselves. We've included rules for these, along with other favorites below:

The Family that Plays Together Stays Together... So Give These Ideas a Try Tonight:
Zombie Tree Tag: One person is "the zombie". He counts to fifteen and gives chase to everybody else. Anyone he tags becomes a "zombie" and joins him in tagging others. All trees serve as bases, but only for fifteen seconds at a time. Zombies must back 15 feet away from any player on a tree. Each player gets three trees per game (or one tree three times). When you are out of trees (and surrounded by zombies), you are out of luck. Last one tagged is the winner and serves as the first zombie for the next game.

Swing Tag: For this game, you need a fairly narrow swingset (with space for about three swings). Designate a base on either side of the swingset, out of the swings' reach (we use the brick wall of our house on one side and the fence on the other). Toss all but the center swing up out of the way. One person gets in the remaining swing (this works better if he hooks the swing under his arms and across the belly, rather than sitting in it, and he must stay in the swing through the entire game). Everybody else gets on the same base. When the person in the swing yells "go", players must run underneath the swingset and get to the other base without being tagged by the person in the swing. The first person to make it safely to the other base counts to 30. Anybody not on the new base by the time he finishes the count is out. Anybody who gets tagged while running across is also out. Last person left in wins, and gets to be in the swing for the next game. If the entire group of players makes it from one base to the other three times in a row without anybody being tagged, a new "it" is selected and the game begins again.

Octopus Tag: Everybody except one mobile "it" lines up on one side of the yard or field. When the "it" yells "go", players run to the opposite side of the yard. Anybody tagged on the way across becomes a stationary "it". Those tagged must remain rooted to the spot where they were tagged while trying to help the mobile "it" tag others on their next trip across the yard. End zones are safe, but the field between eventually becomes a maze of stationary "its", so it takes great skill to get across without being tagged. Last one tagged gets to be the mobile "it" for the next game.