Our Collection of Children's Board Games Has Provided Hours of Entertainment

Over the years, my wife and I have collected a number of children's board games for our son and daughter to provide them with a form of entertainment that is not always used these days. With the onset of video games, the Internet and DVDs, it is not as easy to convince young people to play board games, but my children love them and have played many of them dozens of time. Those board games have provided my children hours of entertainment.

One of the first children's board games that my wife and I bought for our children was Chutes and Ladders. It is a very simple board game to play that kids can play at a very young age, and the box to the game is worn out from use. The funny thing to watch now is the two of them get out the game and laugh as they are playing. The talk about how easy it is and how much they used to enjoy playing it, but that it is too simple now to really be that fun or challenging.

Another of the more popular children's board games that we have for our children, and that the rest of their friends have played, is Connect Four. This is the game that is played with the checker-like pieces that are placed into a big slot, the with objective being to get four of the same color in a row. I watch my daughter play that game with her friends and it may seem kind of silly, but I always a feel a little pride when my daughter wins the game and empties the pieces out of the slot to start the game over.

I also bought my children the game Win, Lose or Draw, and both of my kids absolutely love it. It is a game kind of like charades, in which one person draws a picture for a phrase and the other participant tries to guess the phrase. My children will play this game with two of their friends and they are always on the same team. We have this game for years, and my children almost always win. I try to get their friends to select some of the other children's board games that we own when I see them choose Win, Lose or Draw, because my kids know the game and each other so well.

Children's board games have provided my children and many of the neighborhood children with hours of entertainment. I am glad to see that my children like them so much because I think it is good for them to try something different and use their imaginations.

Junior College Basketball Can Be Interesting

We live in an area of the country that has a number of junior colleges with sports programs. As a sports lover myself, I try to take my son and daughter to as many sporting events as possible, and junior college basketball is usually a good choice. It's indoors, the seating is always comfortable and junior college basketball players are typically pretty good.

The first time that I took my son to a junior college basketball game was when he was seven years old. He liked playing basketball out in the driveway, and we wanted to see what he could become one day if he kept at it. He was amazed by how tall the players were, and their athleticism. He kept asking me if I thought he would ever get to that level, and I told him that he could, but that he would have to work hard at it, because all of the young men out the court had done the same thing.

He asked why the kids were playing junior college basketball instead of for a major college program like Duke, Kentucky or Syracuse. I informed him that it could be for a variety of reasons, including that the kids were not quite to that talent level yet, did not have the grades to get into a major Division I school or that they wanted to hone their skills in the junior college basketball level before trying to go off and play major college basketball at a four-year college.

The first time that I took my daughter was when she was eight years old, and immediately she fell in the love with the sport. She loved how the junior college basketball players wore their hair in pony tails and how all of the girls worked together as a team. She did express some concerns about whether or not she would ever be tall enough to play basketball at the junior college level, and I told her that it was not really how tall she was and that what mattered the most was how much desire she had to be a good basketball player. She started playing pick-up basketball games with my son out in the driveway as well.

Junior college basketball has provided a lot of great entertainment for my children, and I have watched some great players go on to D1 and professional basketball from those ranks. It is an affordable way to have some fun on the weekend and a great way to spend some time as a family. We will continue to take advantage of the opportunity to watch basketball at the junior college level, and who knows? Maybe one day I will be watching my own son or daughter playing at that level.

The Year of the Dragon and What It Means

It's the Year of the Dragon once again, a time where most folks are deemed to enjoy prosperity and advancement. Considered the luckiest of all signs, people from Eastern cultures joyfully anticipate this season, as the Dragon comes out once every 12 years according to the Chinese Zodiac.

Unlike its Western counterpart which assigns a curious assortment of mythological creatures, animals, humans and inanimate objects for each month of the year, the Chinese Zodiac makes use of real animals, and lines them up in a certain order until it reaches the last symbol and the cycle is repeated. The Dragon is the only mythical creature the Chinese have included in their astrological zoo.

And the most likely reason for this would be that the Dragon is, indeed, the embodiment of good fortune.

Fairy tales and much of European folklore would often depict dragons as malevolent beasts that would kidnap beautiful maidens or devour little children. However, in Chinese mythology they are portrayed as benevolent creatures who - being mostly water-dwellers - can control the weather, particularly storms, rainfall and floods.

Because of their size and appearance they have become the symbol of greatness, grandeur and strength. The emperors of ancient China themselves used the dragon on their emblems and royal seals, and had their figures painted, sculpted and carved on almost every surface and implement in and around the palace.

The dragon is also known to represent infinite wisdom and intense power. It is a divine being and as such, believed to be all knowing and can invoke magic at will. They are also thought to be kind and caring protectors, and a constant guardian of people who are devoted to the more spiritual concerns of life.

All in all, if one were to analyze, the dragon is a creature of non-conformity. It can adopt various personas, as it is said to harbor the diverse personalities of the other animals in the Chinese Zodiac. The myriad colors on its scales reflect not just its many attributes, but also its underlying potential.

But while the brightness of its appearance may mesmerize you, the very essence of the dragon remains the same: that it is a strong, elegant, and powerful entity.

There are various other aspects of the dragon that astrological experts have gathered over the years. With time, the dragon only grows in mystery and magnificence. Not surprisingly, the myth of the dragon is one that will not die easily.