Yard games for Thanksgiving

The mistake is treating it as one event and putting out one game. A flag football set is perfect at eleven in the morning and completely wrong at three in the afternoon, when the people still outside want something they can play holding a plate.

1. It has to run without the host. This is the criterion that matters most and the one nobody applies. Whoever is cooking is not available to explain rules, referee or reset anything.
2. Self-refereeing. If a game needs somebody to adjudicate, it will stop the first time there is a disagreement.
3. No stakes in the ground. Late November ground is frozen, saturated or both. Anything held up by guylines is out — see yard games for cold weather.
4. It absorbs a crowd without a queue. Twenty people and a two-player game is nineteen people standing in the cold.
5. It survives gloves. Precision throwing is the first thing cold takes away.

Flag football — the Turkey Bowl

The tradition, and the only game here that genuinely improves in cold weather. Franklin publishes eight belts with two flags each — four red and four yellow — a 34 inch belt length and a bright orange bean bag field marker, for 4 on 4. It is also the highest-capacity game on this site that needs no installation at all.

The honest con: Franklin publishes that no ball is included, which is the single most common Thanksgiving-morning discovery in this category. It also needs real open ground and genuinely does not work with four people. See flag football sets.

Cornhole — the game that runs all afternoon

A published 33 by 10 foot court, boards 27 feet apart, eight 16 oz bags, two or four players. People walk up to it with a drink, play a round and wander off, which is exactly the behavior a long afternoon needs.

The honest con: it is the game cold damages most. A 16 oz bag thrown in gloves goes where it likes, and the set we recommend weighs 38 lb, so it is not something you move once it is placed.

Kan Jam — for the people who want to move but not tackle

Goals 50 feet apart, four players as 2 v 2, finishing at exactly 21. A flying disc forgives thick fingers in a way a bag does not, and the goals rest on the ground rather than being staked into it.

The honest con: it is published for exactly four, so at a gathering of twenty it produces a queue unless you rotate deliberately.

Washer toss — the post-meal game

Two solid birch boxes that sit on the grass, eight plastic-coated steel washers, and scoring most people already know: three in the cup, one in the box, play to 21. It arrives fully assembled, takes about 20 feet, and asks almost nothing of anyone physically.

The honest con: nobody governs washer toss, so box sizes and throwing distances vary by region and by maker — two sets bought in different states may not play the same game. See washer toss.

Giant yard dice — the one that includes everybody

Six 3.5 inch hand-sanded pine dice with heat-stamped numbers, published for two or more players. Turn-based with no limit on the number of people, no teams to organize and nothing to explain, which makes it the game a grandparent and a six-year-old can both join after dinner.

The honest con: it is a dice game. The skill ceiling is zero, and the people who wanted to compete will be bored within twenty minutes.

Three groups of games on this site are wrong for this specific day, and it is worth knowing which before you carry them out.

• Anything staked. Volleyball, badminton, soccer goals and tetherball all need ground that takes a stake. Late November ground does not.
• Rolling games. Bocce, croquet and lawn bowling all need grass that a ball will run on. Wet, cold, long November grass stops a rolled ball dead, which is a shame because they would otherwise suit the post-meal slot perfectly.
• Anything you have to teach. Kubb is the best game on this site and it is the wrong purchase for Thanksgiving, because the first game anyone plays is spent learning it and nobody has the attention span for that after eating.

The practical answer is to set the games up before anyone arrives and then delegate them entirely.

1. Place them the night before. Boards out, bags in a basket by the door, football pumped. A game that requires a trip to the shed mid-morning does not get played.
2. Hand the Turkey Bowl to someone else. Name a person, not a role. It is a job that takes ten minutes of organizing and it should not be yours.
3. Put the quiet game where people already stand. Near the back door, not at the end of the garden. After the meal, nobody walks anywhere.
4. Accept the light. The afternoon is short at the end of November. Whatever is going to be played gets played before the light goes, which is another argument for two games rather than four.

For a gathering this size in general, the capacity question is covered in yard games for large groups, and the broader cold-weather logic is in yard games for cold weather.