Where Did the (Kirby) Time Go?

During the dying days of December and the brand-spanking new days of January, people's thoughts often turn to time. They consider the past and plan for the future. Here's my son's version, with his favourite video game character, Kirby. I think the upper left corner deals with the ancient past and the lower right consists of Kirby in the future. I'm not sure about the other quadrants.

Happy 2012! (Kirby Help)

Happy New Year! It's hard to believe that I only started this particular blog last year (in February, if you want to get technical, so it's not a year old yet). I hope I'll be able to encourage my Minecraft buddy D to post some of her stories this year on here to expand the reach and appeal of this blog. In the meantime, here's a helpful tutorial drawn by my son to show you how to draw Kirby.

The Daily (Monkey) Grind

Today's entry is thanks to my boy. One of his latest fascinations is Nickelodeon's MMO "MonkeyQuest". He received a membership for his Christmas. He had been playing it for free prior to this. As with many MMOs, there are several tasks participants can do daily. My son decided to make a list of the things he could do, complete with Kirby illustrations. I'm not sure what Kirby has to do with monkeys, but there they are.

Skylanders as Sweetie Pies

Today's art sample is also from my daughter. Both of the kids received a lot of Skylander figures for Christmas. The main villain appears to the world as a giant floating head but is actually a weaselly egomaniac. My girl "chibi-ized" the Skylanders for the purpose of this drawing. 

Some final fan work from 2011 - Angry Birds

I was doing some cleaning over the holidays and that included tackling the big pile of paper my kids doodle and write on to sort it. Some get recycled, some get put in their portfolios, and a select few get scanned and posted here before going in the portfolio. The next month or so will be daily scan shares. (I love Blogger's advanced posting feature - this means I can pre-write posts during my vacation that will appear all January!)

This piece of art is courtesy of my daughter. My son played Angry Birds on a visiting friend's iPad and he then spend a great deal of time watching Angry Birds videos on YouTube. These are the characters they've encountered.

How do you choose?

Our family friend who games with us regularly is trying to arrange a time so he can come visit and we can all play. The big question is: what do we play? He loves Risk Legacy. Here are some photos from our last adventure.

 

 

We got to crack open a secret section now that we used all minor cities!

The board at the end. D won this time!

Having considered that, both families also received some great games for Christmas. D (our family friend) got Last Night On Earth, a cool zombie game that I wanted to buy my husband but couldn't find in the stores. So, do we do the tried and true, or tackle something new and different? Hubby will be chatting with buddy while they play Star Wars: The Old Republic online together (a fantastic MMO) so they'll probably decide then.

P.S. Hubby bought me the card game Spot It today while we were gallivanting about. Between that, Minecraft and reading my James Paul Gee book on video games, I'll have plenty to keep me occupied!

Have a Playful Holiday!

Merry Christmas everyone! Games of all shapes and sizes seemed to be the gift of choice this year. Some of the games our family members received as presents this year were:

• King of Tokyo
• Pandemic
• Incan Gold
• Forbidden Island
• Arkham Horror
• Skylanders
• Donkey Kong Country Returns

The kids spent a lot of Christmas Day playing Skylanders together. It's a clever game both from the marketing perspective and the game play options. Between the two of them, they already have 13 figures and are itching to spend their Toys R Us gift cards to obtain more.

The game play didn't end when we went to my parents' house for Christmas dinner. Everyone there either watched or played my brother's interactive party game on the X-box, "Start the Party". It was silly and fun and a great way to get people from different generations to have fun together. May your holiday be just as playful and fun!