When life gets routine and you find yourself needing a little reconnect, most of the time a good dose of intentional time together does the trick. It doesn’t even need to be fancy or expensive.

I enjoy getting dressed up and going out but honestly something about having a good time in my own home, in comfy clothes with my husband will get my vote 80% of the time.

So picture this – a cheesy pot of fondue for two, paired with a fun game night that will have you laughing and competing like you’re kids again.

For our game night I created a board game. This made it more special to us because in addition to using our last name as the road map for the game, it gave me the opportunity to customize our cards and activities.

You can absolutely grab any card or board game and skip this part if you weren’t looking for a DIY project.

where do I start?

Start by deciding if you will be making your own game. If you are you will need a poster board and a few other supplies. If you’ve read a few posts you may know by now – I love Dollar Tree. It’s great for things like this. I grabbed poster board, dice, a few markers, and some colorful paper.

Once I had the supplies, I outlined what the board would look like and got to work on filling it in with action items. I kept it simple and used 3 main options to land on:

C, F, and S

Landing on a C meant you had to pull a Conversation Card. These were cards that got us talking, things like these –

Landing on a S meant you had to pull a Showdown Card. These were cards that got us competing, things like these –

Landing on a F meant you had to pull a Favor Card. These cards were like IOU’s –

how do I set up?

Make sure you have enough space to play the games you decide to incorporate. If you are playing UNO you won’t need quite as much room as I did with the poster board and activities that had us up and moving. The kitchen table was a great space for us because I was able to place the board and the fondue set up on the same surface.

To set up for the fondue part I grabbed a mix of things that would taste good in cheese – carrots, tomatoes, green apples, meats, pretzel sticks, bread and potatoes. I arranged these on a cutting board and added some skewers for us to dip.

I made a cheese fondue but next time we do this I’m making a chocolate version!  Swapping all the savory dippers for things like strawberries, marshmallows, cake pieces, and graham crackers.

tell me more

If you are planning to make your own board game and are looking for ideas on what you can put on the cards I would recommend using minute to win it games! These are perfect because they typically require minimal set up and can be completed pretty quickly so you can get back to the game.

While this was planned as a date night, with a few tweaks it could easily be a fun activity to spend time with the kids as well. The challenges would still be just as fun for them. Conversation cards can be replaced with Question Cards- asking the kids things like what their favorite holiday is and why, or if they could go anywhere in the world where would they go and what would they do? Favor Cards can be reimagined for things like 15 more minutes on the game or an ice cream sundae party.

These are just a few quick ideas. Let your imagination run wild, what makes the time special is making it unique for you and the people you are spending it with!