One of my favorite childhood memories is playing a card game called Kings Corner. It is a simple game much like solitaire but 2-4 people can play.

The game itself is not so memorable but playing with my mom is . My mom was addicted to the game and would corral anyone that passed by the kitchen to play with her. We lived very close to aunts and uncles and cousins so we were always having a house full of family. We also had a pond and some random horses too–maybe they came for that instead of us!

My mom would literally keep spiral notebooks so she could keep track of the scores she played with various relatives. The game ended at 500 points. Lowest score wins. When she saw you coming, she’d pull out your spiral and she would wait at the kitchen table with a cigarette and a cup of coffee…you knew you weren’t leaving until you played a few rounds or until she won….

One rule of the game is that you would knock on the table when you were done with your turn. That rule came about because my mom would catch a play that you missed and we would complain that we weren’t done with our turn and we would have caught the play. (Big fat hairy lie…) That rule took the hostility out of the game.

I had my two grown kids with me this weekend. My kids got me a deck of cards with my dog’s (Earl) picture on the back. I love my kids!!! Anyway, we played several rounds of Kings Corner in honor of my mom!

My kids better not bend the cards or get food on my Earl deck!