Sunday Sweets: Game On
November 13, 2011 Thanksgiving is coming up (for us Americans, anyway), which means a lot of us are about to spend a lot of time with our families. When my family gets together we like to cook, eat, laugh, eat, and play a whole lot of board games. Then we eat again.
So, in the spirit of two of our favorite activities, let's get our game on!
Scrabble ALWAYS makes its way to our coffee table during the holidays:
;)
By Cake Central user ToniRod
And it stays on the table for days because we all take hour-long turns. I'm serious. One Christmas, I played a game of Scrabble with my aunt that lasted two and a half days. (And I totally won.)
Chess, anyone?
;)
Submitted by JH and made by The Chocolate House
I love how the tiers and floating pieces add dimension to a traditionally flat board game. Very cool!
My aunt and uncle just informed me that Settlers of Catan will be a big part of Thanksgiving this year. So I guess I should figure out what that is.
;)
Submitted by Emily P. and made by Ann Zeleny
Meanwhile, I'll just eat these adorable cookies.
Here's an old favorite:
;)
Submitted by Jenene D. and made by Fields of Cake
Chinese Checkers is kinda like that game at Cracker Barrel where you have to jump the pegs, right? Except it's much harder and doesn't come with dumplings?
Ah, here's a game I'm very familiar with... on the computer. Mah jong!
;)
Submitted by Miriam M. and made by Blackmarket Bakery
Unfortunately I have no idea how to play this in real life, though. Anybody want to teach me? Or make bracelets out of the tiles with me?
This colorful cutie has nothing to be sorry for!
;)
Submitted by Crystal R. and made by The House of Cakes
That's "sorry," as in, "I'm sorry for eating all of the leftover pecan pie."
Here's a perfectly piped way to show the meaningful moments in a couple's life together:
;)
Submitted by Jenn F. and made by Sweetest Perfections
So sweet! And I'd play this game a lot more if "GO TO JAIL" was always replaced with "GO TO JAMAICA."
Here's another couple who thought outside the box:
;)
Submitted by Jenene D. and made by MichelleSugarArt
Yep, guys. That's really cake.
Make room for a childhood favorite:
;)
Submitted by Evan N. and made by Dolce Designs
This cake makes me hungry, hungry!
And another kids' game everyone loves:
;)
It even has gum drop mountains!
Of course, if you can't decide which game to play, why not play them all?
;)
Submitted by Kari W.; baker unknown.
Just remember: be nice, let your little brother win, and never - NEVER - sell Boardwalk.
Ever.
Have a Sweet to nominate? Then send it to Sunday Sweets (at) Cake Wrecks (dot) com.
Hey Houston! We'll see you at 2pm. WOOHOO!!!
Reader Comments (71)
Settlers of Catan isn't really complicated and its fun. Also what other game can you say "I've got wood for sheep" and it be a perfectly acceptable statement.
Hey! Today is National Gaming Day at your public library! What a happy accident that you posted these today!
The monopoly anniversary cake is so sweet-what a cute idea :D
Jen,
You really need to learn Settlers of Catan... addictively easy and fun for everyone, especially those who win.
Those cakes are fabulous!
You are going to love Catan! We started playing it this year & everyone we've played with is instantly addicted.
I LOVE the first Monopoly cake. So much creativity and beautifully executed, too.
These are cute! The last Monopoly box is unreal. Seen on my Facebook Newsfeed yesterday: OP--"And now the waiting game begins." One of his friends comments on his status: "The waiting game sucks. Let's play Hungry Hungry Hippos." :D
Cooties!! Squeeeee!!
Those were all wonderful cakes, but the last one just brought me directly back to my childhood. Thanks for that.
Settlers of Catan is so much fun!! Have you ever played Ticket To Ride?? Another totally awesome game that my family adores!
I wanna see more details on the first Monopoly cake!
The second shows a photo print cake done absolutely right.
Oh my GOODNESS! I LOVE the Monopoly Of Life cake!! These are amazing! I can't believe my eyes! ALso... FIRST!! :D :D
You will LOVE Settlers of Catan! I think of it as a combination of RISK and Monopoly. Only different. My husband has every variation and expansion set available. Our kids even have the children's version of it!
So-- yeah... those cookies are cool.
These are all really well done and super fun cakes, but that Hungry Hungry Hippos cake wins it hands down for me. It is perfectly sculpted and so adorable!!!!!
The Chinese says "Happy Birthday" and they managed to write it correctly, which is amazing considering what problems Americans have spelling Happy Birthday on their cakes.
Know what I think would be an fabulous game cake (even though it's not a board game)?
An Alice in Wonderland flamingo-croquet game cake. Tricky, but trippy! I know somebody out there could pull it off. Amazing talent out there!
All amazing cakes! The one thing that's bugging me is that no one played over the star to start the game on the first Scrabble cake.
These are all wonderful. I too squeed when I saw the cootie! I'd forgotten how much I loved that game. Although I was an only child, so more often than not I'd just pull the pieces out of the box and put critters together for fun.
The real game of Mah Jong is nothing like the computer solitaire version. It's a lot more like a complicated cross between poker and spades. It's a lot of fun, but you can ONLY play it with exactly four people, so I haven't played in years. (And I've never actually played it right, because we didn't bother trying to bet.)
I'm sure you'll enjoy Catan very much. We love it too!
Wow, me and Jen must be the only people on the internet who've never played Settlers of Catan.
Love, love, love the Hungry Hungry Hippos cake! The hippos look like plastic! How did they do that?? (rhetorical question)
Another squee for Cooties here!
I love this post! All the game cakes are very well done.
These are Ph.D. level cakes for sure! (I'm taking a cake decoration course! But it will be a while before I'm anywhere near this level.)
Talk about talent. This is my fave SS by far. Unbelievable.
Word of advice when playing Catan, go for the longest road. Save your wood and brick cards and always try to have a settlement on 5 or 9. Awesome cakes!
Dawwww! Those Hungry Hippos are adorable!!! I'm also loving the fantastic Scrabble board and the 3D chess (anyone else thinking Star Trek 3D chess?).
My favorite was the chess cake. Took me straight to the 3D chess games of the Star Trek OS. I actually looked for Kirk and Spock for just a second. Does that get me extra geek cred?
The thing that impresses me most about the Catan cookies is that you could actually play the game on them, assuming you can resist the urge to eat them right away.
1. Settlers of Catan may change your life forever.
2. Pandemic. Equally addictive, but awesome.
Wow... you just lost major geek points for not knowing about Catan. //sadness
A "laugh for hours", totally fun game is Quelf! Hey John. this is the "winner" from Philadelphia-ish. Let me know when the carrot jockey necklaces are ready so I can get one for my daughter, K? Tks.
We play Mahjongg all the time. It's an awesome game. If you're ever in Mississippi, we'll be glad to teach you!
LOVE the Scrabble one! Probably my all-time favorite board game (I blame my grandma for getting me hooked). :)
The Game Night cake is great too - heck, they all are!
Another post telling you that Catan is a fantastic game! I love the first commenter's hilarious post: "Also what other game can you say "I've got wood for sheep" and it be a perfectly acceptable statement." Yes, we totally milk that one for all it's worth!
After Calvinball,
come inside and play with this
German game addict.
I'm another Catan addict - after the Christmas my husband received it as a gift, we spent many weekend breakfasts, lunches and dinners fitting in "just one more" game! It's very easy to learn and lots of fun . . . and yes, totally addictive. We finally broke our Catan habit by starting a Puerto Rico (yes, it's a game) habit . . . then we managed to break that with a Ticket to Ride (for the Ipad - so portable!) habit . . .
Hmmmm, I'm starting to think my husband and I may have addictive personalities . . . is that a problem?
On another note, the Hungry, Hungry Hippos cake brought back many happy childhood memories - not of actually playing the game (which my brother and I found pretty boring), but of making the hippos have loads of goofy conversations and interpersonal drama . . . Yes, I was THAT child who turned the salt and pepper shaker into people and entertained myself at restaurants by making up adventure stories for them! :)
Yay for MahJong! That hand is what the Japanese would call Thirteen Orphans, very rare indeed, and a high value hand.
'Settlers of Catan'? Hey, it's not too late to get into a horrible accident and be in a coma for Thanksgiving.
A few years ago, I was curious about how to play the traditional game of Majong and actually found it on Yahoo! games. They had game rooms where you could play other people. Someone said it is similar to Gin. I've never played Gin so I can't compare it.
I would learn to play chess just so I could eat those chocolate and white chocolate chess pieces! They look so nummy!!
Oh, you are in for an entirely new world of gaming fun now that you're going to be introduced to the Euro-style board games. SO much fun! At the holidays, we spend hours upon hours playing Settlers, Puerto Rico (my favorite), Caylus, Carcassonne, etc., drinking (good) beer, and waging a simultaneous beanboozled contest. (Those are the jelly belly candies that might be delicious...might taste awful. We all get the same color, eat it at the same time, and watch everyone's face to see who got peach and who got vomit flavor.) Best times ever!
Ahhh amazing! I LOVE the first scrabble cake. And hungry hungry hippos!!
LOVE the Scrabble cake!! Scrabble is extremely serious with my family, and my mom is super competitive. Generally we can't play just one game because you *need* best of 2 or 3. ;-) We do have time limits, though; otherwise, it would take days... :)
Oh, take me back to the Candyland, where the cotton candy grows (poof, poof!), and the little marshmallows hang from the trees, and the lollipops grow from the ground!
Ooooh Catan is awesome! My friends and I made a similar cookie cake for anoter friends birthday. We cheated and used edible photo icing though ;) these are all great!
I especially love the scrabble one too. Ahh!
Love all of these. My favorite part is the fake nails and nail polish that is in the corner of the Second monopoly cake...makes it personal and there must be a story behind it.
The Hungry Hungry Hippos is so amazing that at first I thought you were showing a picture of the real thing, to be followed by a cake. OMG. AMAZING.
The second Monopoly must be making use of edible images, right? Either that or that's the best paint job ever, including the money.
The Game Night Cake was made by Glenda of Goodwitch Goodies in Kansas City, MO. She also did the "Oh the places you'll go" cake on the Seussical Sunday Sweets, Jan 6, 2011.
Catan is AMAZING. And I'm scared to show my best friend these cookies because I know what she'll want for her next birthday. I'm thinking, if you used some fondant to sculpt the thief and the merchant, and colored white chocolate to make the towns, cities, roads, and knights....you could totally make Edible Catan. Then we could play it before we ate it...
If you love Scrabble, try Quiddler. This is one of our favorite games. It's like Scrabble but with cards and it doesn't take as long. (More games, more fun!) It's suitable for anyone who can read-- even young players have a chance, because in each round players can get bonus points for having the longest word and for having the most words. So young players can earn extra points with lots of little words. Oh, did I mention that the cards are beautiful? They're printed with letters taken from various Celtic illuminated manuscripts.
This is probably my favourite Sunday Sweets post to date. My husband and I are huge Scrabble fans and now I now what to do for his next birthday cake :)
A great word game is Smarty. See www.mindbogglers.org or track it down on YouTube.