slumber party memories

For some reason when I woke up this morning some words popped into my head from long, long ago. They may seem foreign to some of you, but for others you will know exactly what I'm talking about when I say that the words on my mind were, "There is a SALE at the KITCHEN STORE." This was followed by me laying in bed for a minute longer…and sure enough I was then totally THERE. "There" being a teenage sleepover playing silly board games targeted completely, one hundred and fifteen percent, at girls.

Does anyone know the game referred to above? I know my sister will, as we spent ours huddled over its electronic speaker, telling us when and where to shop next.

Yes, this game is just what it looks like. I  giant, plastic mall that encourages girls to shop with plastic cards boasting such things as "easy money." And I am not even being the least bit sarcastic when I say: IT WAS AWESOME. The premise of the game was to buy certain things from different locations around the mall, and then be the first "shopper" back to the parking lot. However, you only had a certain amount of money…sort of… if you ran out you had to waste precious turns to walk ALL THE WAY back to the "bank" in the center of the ball. Once there you had  to swipe your card, and the bank would tell you how much it gave you. That simple. Sometimes it said, "Sorry! Come again later!" That was a real bummer, let me tell ya.


This game did not have dice; instead you simply pushed a button on the "bank", and it informed you how many spaces mall tiles you were allowed to move. Now, the crazy thing, the thing that kept everyone on their toes, was that sometimes when you pushed this button the speaker would start balking out new SALES! And everyone had to frantically scoop up the sale signs that had previously been placed and move them to the new stores. "There is a SALE in the KITCHEN store. There is a SALE in the ARCADE. And there is a CLEARANCE at the TOY store." And then the race was on…. to try and get to these stores before the sale or clearance left, so we could get the most bang for our buck [and therefore not have to go back to the bank as often].

Yes, it was a crazy good time. Setting it up was a bit of a pain, but well worth the effort once we were off and shopping. This board game is still tucked away in the closet at my parents' house, so if you are ever up for a riveting good time, come on over and I'll race you to the sales!


However, no slumber party was complete without DREAM PHONE!

Oh my word did I love Dream Phone. Now the premise of this came was a little like Clue. There was one boy that "liked" you, and you had to figure our exactly who that crush was. You did this by calling different guys, and getting secret calls from "him" during which he would give you a clue like, "I like to play ball, but I'm not at the park." You could them eliminate every guy who was at the park, and any guy who was not playing ball of some sort. Yes, it took some mad deducing skills, but it was well worth it when you finally figured out that STEVE liked you.


This is a sampling of the cards. Sometimes you had to share something you learned with another player, and sometimes you had to share that awesome call to Bruce with all the other players when you put it on speakerphone. Sometimes you missed a turn when you drew a card that said, "Mom says to get off the phone!" Bummer. But seriously, look at that cutie Matt. 555-7557. He was at Jim's Gym too. He was my favorite.

And if we weren't shopping, or calling guys on a pink phone, we were talking…GIRL TALKing that is!

Basically GIRL TALK was a glorified game of truth or dare. You had to answer questions about crushes, or walk like a duck in front of all your friends! If you just couldn't bring yourself to answer a question or the dare was too mortifying though, you could always just pass. However, passing meant taking a "Zit Sticker." These were essentially red circles that you had to stick on your face, and if your friend had owned the game for longer than a year they were all gone anyway so you had to figure out some other way to denote that you "took a zit."

Yes, my early teen years were spent fluctuating between these three games. They taught me many things nothing. Unless you count racking up a credit card, calling random boys I don't know, and daring people into giving you the truth. And of course I also learned that zits are a punishment.

However, in spite of all of these things, I think I would be okay with finding some throw backs of these and letting Blythe play them someday. I mean, they were seriously, totally fun.

What about you? Do you remember playing these games? Or what were the equivalent of these games in your time? For my younger readers, are there any games like this any more?