19 Comments
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Maggie Hoffman's avatar

not a game, but just because our kid LOVED it at that age so I gotta recommend: have you shown her Number Blocks? I think some episodes are on netflix and maybe some youtube, but it's a british math show that really helps bring addition and multiplication to life in a smart, visual way (and also gave our kid a really cute accent for a minute...)

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Hillary Dixler Canavan's avatar

Yes! We've watched some on Netflix and my daughter enjoyed it. Currently all our screentime is going to segmented rewatches of Mulan and Mulan II. Maybe when she burns herself out on that we'll get back to Number Blocks lolol.

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Meghan Splawn's avatar

We've been really loving the momofuku garlic crunch which is all the crunch without the spice! Blockus is another fun math-ish game that we love playing as a family, though it gets super competitive!

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Ryan Rose Weaver (she/hers)'s avatar

My kiddo likes Blokus too! Though sometimes he just wants to make art with the pieces, which is fine.

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Hillary Dixler Canavan's avatar

These both sound extremely up my alley! Looks like Blockus is good for former Tetris lovers? Do you think a preschooler can do it?

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Meghan Splawn's avatar

Yes, it is very tetris-like except you're trying to block other players too. We started playing when our youngest was 4!

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Catherine Smart's avatar

You nailed it with the chutes vs. candy land ranking 😂. Also excited for some sausage rabe pasta!

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Hillary Dixler Canavan's avatar

I remember loving Candy Land as a kid but now? It’s … so boring. So so so so boring!!

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Ryan Rose Weaver (she/hers)'s avatar

It's also much easier to cheat at Candyland than it is at Chutes & Ladders, which becomes relevant around age five or so (dealing with that now!). The literature on this is pretty (dryly) funny. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0022096513002683

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Katie's avatar

Love the idea of working on "taking turns and holding disappointment"—two things my 4-year-old could definitely use some help with. I've just discovered your Substack, and I love it! We do adult dinners every single day in our house, ha! I'm sure when my 1-year-old and 4-year-old are older, we'll all eat together, but for now it's such a peaceful, lovely way to end what are often chaotic days!

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Hillary Dixler Canavan's avatar

Ah I’m so glad you found my newsletter! More peace at the table is always a good thing!!

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Sally Ekus's avatar

Love congee and wrote about crying over it here.

Also, I’m all about ADULT DINNER. Please, more from you about this.

https://open.substack.com/pub/notsosecretagent/p/crying-into-congee?r=6lue7&utm_medium=ios

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Hillary Dixler Canavan's avatar

I promise more is coming in March!! Bookmarking this one!

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Ariel's avatar

My husband and I are really, deeply into Settlers of Catan. We now like the play the Cities and Knights extended version. We play in the app and are really competitive. I also love Ticket to Ride and basically any card game. Games are the best!!!!

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Hillary Dixler Canavan's avatar

Have you tried Splendor? You can play that one with two people and have fun.

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Alexis deBoschnek's avatar

Honored to be included!!

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Hillary Dixler Canavan's avatar

Happy to have you in the roundup! Love sharing a great recipe!!

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Emmy Singer (she/her)'s avatar

We gave our daughter Chutes & Ladders for Hanukkah this year and it's been a TOTAL hit as well. That gave way to Monopoly last month and we had a family game going for like 10 days. Busytown Eye Found It is also really fun and the board is 6ft long!

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Hillary Dixler Canavan's avatar

Oooh I didn't know about this busytown game! My daughter LOVES those books and the Busytown Mysteries show. I feel like this huge board would be a hit with her! Our living room is very small but I think she'd find it really exciting to see a board game take up so much of it, thanks for the rec!!

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