My family has always been big card players. When we get together we always pull out cards. We’ll have tables of people playing cards and whoever wins will rotate to the next table. When I was about 8 my grandmother taught me to play Gin Rummy. We played Uno with strategy and kept score! It’s serious business.
The story goes that when my dad was a newborn my grandmother couldn’t play cards because she’d have to nurse him at the table. (She was serious about her card playing, folks!) So, she came up with a great solution–she grabbed a box of tinfoil and placed her cards inside. She was able to see her cards secretly and still play with one hand!
She passed on this great idea to us and as kids we’d put our cards in a tinfoil box. And that’s how I taught Lydia to play cards. When she was little bitty (look how cute she was! *sniff*), I bought her My First UNO cards and Veggie Tales Go Fish. She loved it!
This is one of those simple ideas that works for cards but could be used for other stuff–flash cards? Memory verse cards? Family pictures? Reward/Behavior cards? Chore cards? It would be fun to cover it with paper, or paint it and decorate it! How cute would that be?!
linked to works for me wednesday and whatever goes wednesday
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9 Comments so far
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What a fun family tradition to pass on.
By Betsy (Eco-novice) on 09.15.10 12:04 am | Permalink
Elias gets so frustrated holding cards, and I get frustrated when he lays them out in front of him when they’re supposed to be hidden! (you know, b/c I’m such a tolerant loving mom…
) This is fabulous – thanks for sharing! And HOW CUTE and LITTLE is Lydia in those pics?!?
By Leigh on 09.15.10 6:58 am | Permalink
Ha! I didn’t even think of it as a tradition! But you’re right!
By ohamanda on 09.15.10 7:48 am | Permalink
I know, I can hardly look at those pics w/o crying! *sniff*
By ohamanda on 09.15.10 7:48 am | Permalink
Not two minutes ago my three daughters were playing go-fish (With the awesome marvel Squad cards from DollarTree of course
) and the younger two (6 and 4) kept dropping their cards. I LOVE this idea! Will definitely be using it !!!
By Janelle on 09.15.10 6:10 pm | Permalink
Yay! It really is a big help! I love it!
By ohamanda on 09.16.10 7:55 am | Permalink
That looks so useful! But have you ever had trouble with the sharp cutting edge of the box? (I can barely use foil myself without getting scraped on it.)
By 'Becca on 09.16.10 10:22 am | Permalink
I either just cover it with the tinfoil (or the saran wrap, you can even see in that picture, I think.) Or some of the boxes…maybe waxed paper? Only has cardboard, not metal.
By ohamanda on 09.16.10 1:15 pm | Permalink
Congratulations Amanda,
Cards & Tinfoil Boxes made this week’s Top 5 Hits! Come check it out, grab a button if you’d like and thanks for sharing your great idea.
By gnee on 09.17.10 4:37 am | Permalink
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