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| Can't for the life of me find a picture of any of the playground equipment we used, but have this lovely carpool instead. |
It was called castle dodgeball. We made it up and spent COUNTLESS hours playing it.
Set-up was simple. First, you had to have two castles. Although, actually, only one of the castles we used was an actual castle. The other was just a plastic jungle gym/slide that had walls. (The castle was plastic, too, in case you were wondering. And only about four or five feet tall) You also needed at least four players, a ball, and something to mark the boundary that is easily moveable. We usually used a shovel.
We'd devide into two teams. Growing up, it'd be my sister (V) and her best friend (Cat) vrs. me and best friend's younger sister (Pony). One team member would be chosen to be the princess and would sit inside the castle - V would be her team's princess, while Pony was mine.
The boundary marker would be set at the halfway point, and this is where the game got complicated. The point system.
You see, with only two member on each team, the usual "you get hit, you're out" just didn't work. Instead, we had a complicated system of points that would determin how we moved the boundary marker.
For instance, if I were to hit Cat, I would move the shovel one width closer to her castle. However, if she were to catch the ball, it'd be moved towards mine. If I were to hit her castle, it'd be moved towards her castle, and if I got the ball INSIDE the castle, it'd be moved two widths. HOWEVER, if I hit V, it'd be moved two spaced back towards me.
We couldn't cross the boundary marker, so the more points I'd score would mean I could get closer to the other castle and have a better chance of getting even more points. The winner was whoever could get the shovel to the other person's castle.
It was a fun game. I don't know why it hasn't become a national sport by now.
Anywho, would you be interested in playing this game? What sort of games did you make up as a kid?
Flag Tag. That's how my brother and I played capture the flag with only 2-4 people. Instead of both teams hiding flags and trying to capture the other team's flag to win, only one team hid a flag. To win, the other team would have to capture the flag and bring it to their side before being tagged 5 times. No going to jail was involved with so few people. Bring tagged five times first meant the hiding team won.
ReplyDeleteWe'd play with our two younger brothers who were too young to do too much.
'Twas fun.
Oh, that sounds like fun. We played ctf occasionally, too, but saved it for when our cousins were in the yard, so we had a few more players.
DeleteAlthough, most of my Capture the Flag memories come from AWANA, because that was our game leader's favorite game. (And if it wasn't Capture the Flag outside, we played Dodgeball inside. But it wasn't castle dodgeball)
Oh that does sound like fun!! When we were little we generally made up (or rather, Melody made them up) games where we were orphans (she was, well still is awfully fond of making people orphans) and were either pirates, or Southern plantation owners children, or American Revolution or something like that.
ReplyDeleteAlso, when I did the below this morning, it reminded me of the Robin/Meg hair sisters story.
http://thefloweringvales.blogspot.com/2016/10/braids.html
Sounds rather like what I did with my little brothers.
DeleteCastle Dodgeball was what we did when friend Cat was tired of doing story games. Would you like to know how many of the stories on my WIP list are inspired by the stories that we made up in our backyard? A lot of them. And most of the rest have been acted out at some point or another and in one form or another.
DeleteAnd you and Jenny are so cute!
I would make up story games with my brothers. Usually I at least would have multiple parts, since I like to add extra girls in. We had so many crazy adventures in our heads. And we did the same things with my dolls and tneir teddy bears. Usually kings and queens and picnics and wars. When thry got older we did it with Lego men instead. And I'd do similar things with friends.
ReplyDeleteBro and I used to take old refrigerator/appliance boxes and/or pieces of insulating cardboard (plain cardboard on one side, shiny silver on the other) and make spaceships in the living room. Sometimes the construction involved pieces of furniture (including the mini-trampoline), and whatever blankets, etc. we could find. Bro was usually the captain (being a boy and all), and I was probably first officer, and we usually had a crew of at least two or three dolls/plushies. Can't remember any specific adventures, but we sure had fun!
ReplyDeleteI do remember making us a snack once--peanut butter spread on slices of sharp Cheddar cheese. Sounds weird, I know, but it was actually pretty tasty (but talk about sticking to your mouth! Oy).
We also made forts in sundry places in the yard and played house with some of my dolls (a few made from rags and held together with strategically-tied portions).
Golly, why do we have to grow up, anyhow?? ;-)
Thanks for sharing!
~R~
I didn't really make up any games- I just played a great deal of pretend, some willingly and some not-so-willingly. But castle dodgeball sounds fun, and actually more fun than regular dodgeball.
ReplyDelete