“Mom, what can we do?”
With freezing temperatures and the sun setting early…what should kids do for fun? (The answer is not play a video game. 🙂 ) The answer is to try playing Bean Bag Bocce!
This is an excellent family game for cold winter nights! Each player gets two matching bean bags that are different from the other players. There is a little bean bag called a “jack”. One person throws the jack and then throws his/her bean bags and tries to get close to the jack. Each player throws from that same spot. The player to get the closest wins (or gets points, if you want to keep track). Then the game resumes from the spot the jack was and the player who was the closest gets to throw the jack for the next round.
It is so fun to see the creativity of kids. I pay attention as the jack gets tossed just perfectly to go over the back of the recliner so no one can actually see it from the spot they have to throw from. I’ve watched the jack get tossed up stairs and around corners. So many fun memories come back to me that I just have to smile!
This game has been played so many times at our house that the bean bags are a bit dirty, but hopefully you can look past that in the pictures and see the possible fun times.
Here are the unofficial rules according to the Morgan Family: Bocce Rules
Now let’s make your own Bean Bag Bocce game for up to eight players:
Get five different pieces of material and some rice or beans.
Cut out the pieces:
1) For the jack: Cut out two 2 ¼ inch squares of the one color
2) For two bean bags of each color (besides the jack’s color): Cut out four 3 ½ inch squares of each color
Sewing the bean bag: fold one side of the square over ¼ of an inch so the wrong sides touch. Sew across it. Repeat for each square.
Then take the two of the same squares and align them right sides together. Sew on the three sides that don’t have any stitching. Trim the bottom corners. Turn it right side out and you should have a pouch. Fill it a little over half way with rice or beans and put pins to hold the rice in place. Sew across to close the finished edges. Be sure to back track. Take out the pins….and you made it!
Repeat this same process for all 8 bean bags and the jack. Have fun!
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