What Shall We Do Now? by Dorothy Canfield Fisher (unputdownable books .TXT) π
Stir the Mash
This is another variety of "Going to Jerusalem." The chairs are placed against the wall in a row, one fewer than the players. One of the players sits down in the middle of the room with a stick and pretends to be stirring a bowl of
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It is impossible to give directions in words about tying knots. The best way is to get clear illustrations and then work over them until you have mastered the intricacies. A few simple knots are shown here, but there are many books which give an almost endless variety.
A competitive game which is easy to manage is hit-or-miss illustrating. Any old magazine (the more the better) will furnish the material. Figures, furniture, landscape, machinesβanything and everythingβis cut out from the advertisement or illustrations, and put in a box or basket in the middle of the table. Every one is given a piece of paper and a proverb is selected for illustrating. Twenty minutes is allowed to choose suitable pictures, to paste them on to sheets of paper and to add, with pencil, accessories that are necessary: and then results are compared. The variety and excellence of these patchwork pictures are surprising. This can be played during convalescence. It is not necessary to select a proverb for illustrating. Any suggestive title will do. A few that have been found fruitful of varied and spirited pictures are given here.
A trying moment.
Companions in misery.
This is my busy day.
"I didn't know it was loaded."
His proudest moment.
The unhappy experimenter.
The best of friends.
A great scare.
Fine weather for ducks.
"Won't you have some?"
"Don't we make a pretty picture?"
Too busy to stop.
No harm done.
"I didn't mean to do it."
Stage-struck.
A great success.
"See you later."
A temporary quarrel.
A narrow escape.
A happy family.
The peace-maker.
A happy mother.
A game which is often played on shipboard can be modified for an indoor, rainy day game very easily. This is shuffle-board, all the outfit for which you can easily make yourself. If you can have a long table that scratching will not injure your board is all ready, but you can easily procure a common, smooth-finished piece of plank, two feet wide, if possible, and four feet long. On one end mark a diagram like the preceding, about ten inches by eight inches. Mark a line at the other end of the board about four inches from the edge, put your counters on the line and you are ready to play. The counters may be checkers (or any round pieces of wood) or twenty-five cent pieces, or large flat buttons, although discs of lead are the best because the heaviest. Your pusher should be a little tool made especially, like the illustration, about a foot long, and anybody with a jack-knife can whittle a satisfactory "shovel" as it is called.
But if an impromptu game is desired, your counters may be pushed off with a common ruler, with a long lead-pencil, or even snapped with the finger nail, though this is apt to hurt. Each player has six counters which he plays by three's, thus one person begins by shoving off three of his counters toward the board on the end, trying to make them fall on the places that count the highest. The next player then shoots three of his counters, trying not only to place his own men well but to dislodge his adversary's men if they are in good places. After all have played in turn, the first player shoots his other three counters and so on till all have played again. At the close of each round the board is inspected and each person is credited with the sum of the numbers on which his men rest. The game is continued thus, until some one has reached the limit set, which may be a hundred, or fifty, or any other number according to the skill of the players.
The counters of each player may be distinguished from the others by any distinctive sign marked on them. They must not be pushed along but struck a sharp blow with your shovel. The head of your shovel must not pass the line marked for the counters. Counters which rest on, or touch a line do not count. A very considerable degree of skill can be attained in this game and it is a never failing resource on dull days.
A rainy day is a good time to practice various tricks and puzzles so as to perfect yourself in performing them.
Balancing TricksThere are a number of balancing tricks which are easy and ingenious. The secret of most such tricks is in keeping the centre of gravity low, and when this idea is once mastered you can invent tricks to suit yourself. For instance a tea-cup can be balanced on the point of a pencil thus: put a cork through the handle of the cup (it should be just large enough to be pushed in firmly) and stick a fork into it, with two prongs on each side of the handle, and with the handle under the bottom of the cup. (Fig. 1.) The centre of gravity is thus made low, and if you experiment a little and have a little skill, and a steady hand you can balance the whole on a pencil's point.
Or you can balance a coin edgeway on a needle's point. The needle is stuck firmly into the cork of a bottle, and the coin is fixed in a slit cut in a cork, in which two forks are stuck. (Fig. 2.)
The simplest of these tricks is to balance a pencil on the tip of your finger by sticking two pen-knives in it, one on each side. (Fig. 3.)
A cork with two forks stuck in it can be made to balance almost anywhereβon the neck of a bottle from which the contents are being poured for instance. (See fig. 4.)
Amusing toys can be constructed on this principle. Tumbling dolls are made of light wood or cork, glued to the flat side of a half bullet. No matter how often they are knocked flat, they rise again at once.
The Dancing EggAnother good trick that needs a little practice is to make an egg dance. Boil an egg hard, keeping it in an upright position (between cups set in the water or in some other way). Then turn a plate bottom side up and put the egg on it. Turn the plate around, more and more quickly, always holding it flat and level, and the egg will rise on its end and stand quite straight while it spins about.
The Dancing PeaA pea can be made to dance on a column of air as you sometimes see a rubber ball rising and falling in a fountain of water. Take a piece of a clay pipe about three inches long, and make one end into a little rounded cup, by cutting the clay carefully with a knife or file. Then run two small pins cross-wise through a big, round pea, put the end of one pin in the pipe and hold the pipe in an upright position over your mouth. Blow gently through the pipe and the pea will dance up and down.
The Glass-MakerAnother trick to play with pins is the glass-making pin. Cut an ordinary rubber band in two, and stick a bent pin through the middle of this. Now hold an end of the elastic in each hand and whirl it rapidly around, stretching it a little. The revolving pin will at once assume the appearance of a tiny glass vase, or tumbler, and the shape can be varied at will. It is best to have a strong ray of light on the pin and the rest of the room darkened.
Various tricks can be played by means of the electricity in paper. Ordinary sealing wax, rubbed briskly on a coat-sleeve until it is warm will attract bits of tissue paper, or any other soft paper. A variation on jack-straws can be played by means of this trick. Tiny scraps of tissue paper, each numbered, are piled in the centre of the table and each player by means of a piece of sealing wax tries to draw out the greatest number in the shortest time. This is a fascinating game and arranged impromptu in a very short time. The pieces of paper need not be of tissue paper, as any very thin paper will do. They should be about a quarter of an inch wide by an inch long and numbered up to twenty. They must be removed from the centre pile and put in piles before the players without touching with the fingers. It will be found that shaking them off the sealing wax is often harder than making them stick to it. Of course an effort should be made to secure those pieces of paper which have the largest numbers on them, as a few of these count more than many of the others.
Electric dancers are easy to make. Cut little figures out of tissue paper and lay them on the table. Put on each side of them two books and lay a sheet of glass over them about an inch and a half above them. Rub the glass briskly with a flannel cloth and they will jump up and down.
A rubber comb rubbed with a silk handkerchief will attract small bits of paper, feathers or wool. Various games and tricks can be devised by this means, such as "bringing the dead to life," i. e., raising paper figures to an upright position from a grave made of books, or a box.
OUTDOOR GAMES FOR GIRLS OUTDOOR GAMES FOR GIRLSOutdoor games for girls and outdoor games for boys are very often the same, although they are separated here for the sake of convenience.
Battledore and Shuttlecock"Battledore and Shuttlecock" is equally good for one player or for two. The only game to be played is to see how long the shuttlecock can be kept in the air. If you are alone the best way is to set yourself a number, say a hundred, and persevere until you reach it. This can be varied by striving to reach, say, thirty, by first hitting the ball each time as hard as possible, and then hitting it very gently so that it hardly rises at all.
Jumping RopeOrdinary skipping is good enough fun for most of us, but for those who are not satisfied with it there is skipping extraordinary, one feat of which is now and then to send the rope round twice before you touch the ground again. To do this, as it cannot be done with a mere rope, you must make a new rope of whipcord, in the middle of which you place a small chain about a foot long. This chain gives the weight necessary for whirling the rope very swiftly through the air.
Tom Tiddler's GroundThe player who is first going to be Tom Tiddler stands or sits inside the part of the garden (or room) marked off for him, pretending to be asleep. The others venture on
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