Good Thing I'm a Good Guesser

One of our favorite games to play is Pictionary Jr. It is a fun game with relatively easy items for young kids to draw and guess. Each card includes a clue to give the guesser an idea as to what the drawing will be. Clues may be something like "Things You Eat" or "Things In A Kitchen". And the clues are a good thing. Because, when you play with a five year old, the drawings may not be the most comprehensible. The clue of "Things in a Classroom" helped me guess that this:



was a book.

And the clue of "Things in a City" helped me guess that this:



was a sidewalk, and not the more obvious choice that would get the makers of Pictionary Jr. in big trouble.

Oftentimes, the game deteriorates into laughter and chaos. Since Luke can't read, someone that is not a guesser has to tell him the clue and explain what it is if he doesn't know. When Jack is the one telling him, John and I sit at the table with fingers in our ears making lalala noises. Our boys have yet to master the art of the whisper. And Jack usually forgets what color he's landed on when trying to figure out which item on a card he is to be drawing. He asks, "What color is it again," to which, by the end of the game, we answer "Just pick any color. We don't care."

Jack gets distracted, watching Luke draw and listening to my guesses, which is why I guessed book with the drawing above before he guessed book with this drawing:



And for the clue "Starts with N" Jack kept yelling "Navigator". How would you even draw that?

Luke tends to go into too much detail. For axe, he'll draw a man, and then a tree, and then an axe. I say to him, "Why don't you start with the axe, and then draw more details to help me? Start drawing the thing I'm supposed to guess first." I thought he got it. So, his next turn, he drew this:



First he drew a balloon. Then he drew a person. Then he started on the cake. The clue was "Things You Eat." The answer was birthday cake. We did not win.