The Party Host's Guide To Holiday Entertaining

If you decide to host a 4th of July party this year, make sure your guests are entertained with these great games for all ages.

 

Frozen T-Shirt Contest

 

This is a great game for a hot day!

• Take large t-shirts and soak them in water the night before your event. Roll them up really tight and stick them in the freezer. The next day hand them out to the participants. The first one who is able to successfully get the shirt on wins the game.

 

Giant Jenga 

 

If you or a member of your family have the tools to cut wood, this can be a fun and inexpensive game.

• Purchase two-by-fours and cut them in equal lengths according to how large you want the game to be. After that, sand them down and you are good to play!
• For extra fun, write activities on certain blocks (i.e. you cannot use your right hand or must stand on one leg). When a participant pulls that block they have to follow the rule for their next turn.

 

Aim Games 

 

• Take a tarp or old sheet and cut out shapes. You and your guests can throw footballs, baseballs, or even try and shoot a water gun through the holes. Make sure to tape up the edges so that they do not fray or rip.
• Hang up the sheet between two trees, two ladders or anything that is tall and sturdy.

*Bonus challenge: Make the holes different sizes and add points depending on how hard it is.

 

Backyard Bowling 

 

• Set up empty water bottles or soda cans in the same formation as bowling pins on your driveway. Fill them up with water to make sure that they do not fall down with the wind. Draw the lanes in chalk and use a basketball or baseball for the bowling ball.

*To make it extra festive, dye some of the water blue and red.

Flour Finder

 

Hide three items in a bowl/ plate of flour (or pudding). Each contestant will get a bowl filled with the three items which they can only find using their face. The first contestant to find all three items wins!
Make sure the items are large enough that no one could accidentally swallow them.


Happy Independence Day! Did we miss any of your favorite party games? Let us know in the comments!

For The Many, ALL IN One Day

She was an 80 year old babushka-wearing Croatian grandma, and she had been sitting in her plastic lawn chair just west of the intersection of East 9^th and Lakeside Avenues in downtown Cleveland since 5:30 a.m. It was the Cavalier’s 2016 NBA Championship Parade Day, and she wasn’t going to miss it for the world.

When my wife Allison and I arrived at the same spot about 7:40, the sidewalks were filling up. We wanted curbside, and it was already running solid for blocks. We started chit-chat with grandma, “Great day, go Cavs, can we kinda-sorta squeeze in near you?” She said a stern-sounding something in Croatian, and Allison and I ain’t got game for that. The woman next to her (turned out to be her daughter) translated, saying Grandma warned us not to block her when the floats came by, but said Ok. 

We were in.

Fast forward 3 hours, and the sidewalks are now teeming with NEO humanity; all shapes, sizes, variety of Cavs t-shirts, and geographic starting points for the journey downtown. The one thing we shared, and the only thing that mattered, was the joy of celebrating Cleveland’s first major championship in 52 years. Halleluiah, and grandma made it too.

Just in our dense little pop-up neighborhood we hung out with hillbillies, hipsters, high income suburbanites, holy-rollers (with Jesus T- shirts), half-in-the-bag frat boys eating Doritos and at least one hopeful woman, dressed to score points, screaming, “SHUMP I LOVE YOU!!!” as Cav’s player Iman Shumpert drove by (probably wanted to become a basketball wife). 

What we ALL wanted was to get close to King James and his court. So we waited, and waited, and waited. 

Finally we got our rewards: there they were, our majestic Warrior-beaters, really live and really right in front of us. Not just LeBron, but all his supporting cast (it’s Channing Frye hoisting the trophy in the picture above, with Richard Jefferson smiling alongside). It took a team to beat those boys from the Golden State, and we had just the right collection of superstars, role players, coaches, and bench cheerleaders. It took the whole team to make it happen.

Now, since this is a company blog, and it’s pretty much expected I bring this around to work, let me go strong to the basket: like the Cavs, it takes the whole Redwood team to bring championship living to communities across all the States where we do business. It takes accountants, deal-makers, service technicians, leasing agents, community managers, regional managers, marketeers, human resourcers, executives, computer geeks, support staff, bill payers, payroll distributers, trainers, operators, decorators, heck—even interns.

The key to all of it is working together, figuring out where our strengths and challenges are and finding the right combination of smarts and skills to go with our dedicated efforts.

Redwood strives for a championship daily, and our fans (residents) deserve no less. Like the entire smorgasbord that makes up Cavaliers fans, we need to be ALL IN for our residents.

--Luke Frazier

Luke is the Marketing Director at Redwood, and a huge Cavs fan

Top 10 Things I Love About Being a Dad

       Top 10 Things I Love About Being a Dad

10.

Being woken up in the morning and not having to set an alarm clock any more.

9. 

Acting like I’m changing a tire in the pit stop while changing a diaper (telling my wife to time me).

8.

Saying I would never drive/own a minivan and totally rocking out in my new Honda Odyssey.

7.

Gagging to my wife that the diaper smells so bad I can’t change it so she has to.

6.

Singing songs to her to get her to go to sleep.

5.

Watching sports with her and telling her who is winning the game like she cares.

4.

Having strangers come up to us when we’re out saying she is such a cute baby. 

3.

Watching her gradually do something new from time to time.

2.

When she sleeps peacefully on my chest.

1.

Saying or doing something goofy to get her to smile at me.

Bonus: The thing I love most of all, is being surprised everyday with how much I love her.

Eric Davis is a Community Manager for Redwood in Noblesville, Indiana.