Preparing the menu for A Holiday Feast of Gaming

Although it's not quite May, I have November on the brain because I write a monthly column on playing games with kids for a local parenting blog. as I write, I've found my sanity is best served, and deadlines best met, by working several months ahead. In the first drafts of the column for November, I was trying to write a gift guide, but quickly realized there were two problems:

• I haven't played nearly enough games published in the last 5 years.
• If I tried to write it, I was going to blow past my word count before even making it past games for 7-8 year old kids.

Retooling the idea for my personal blog, where I'm more comfortable writing about things I haven't played personally, didn't help much. But the idea spent most of a day taking over my brain, to the point of (nearly) interfering with work. And thus was born the notion of trying to run it as a blog carnival. The theme, and the categories for organizing it, came almost by themselves, although there are a few categories and some miscellaneous areas where I could use some extra help.

So, the basics...

A Holiday Feast of Gaming is a blog carnival whose goal is to create a "menu" of suggestions for those unfamiliar with hobby games and looking to purchase a gift for a loved one, library, or school. The feast theme and categories are inspired by the timing, since this will run from November 1 through November 29 (Black Friday).

The current proposed "menu" categories, and descriptions with examples are:

• Caterers (reviews of Friendly Local Game Stores -- a good FLGS owner is like a game sommelier)
• The Kids' Table (games for those ages 5 and under, like Chicken Cha Cha Cha or Loopin' Louie)
• Appetizers (light games that play in under 30 minutes and cost ~$20 or less). Examples include No Thanks!, Forbidden Island, or any of the Zombie Dice variants
• Side Dishes (light-to-medium weight games that are too big in time or price to be Appetizers). Examples include Carcassonne, Settlers of Catan, or Race to Adventure!
• Entrees (medium-to-heavy games). Examples include Puerto Rico, Power Grid, or Titan.
• Salad Bar (party games) - Apples to Apples, Wits & Wagers, Telestrations.
• Adult Beverages -- game that should not, for reasons of theme or content, be played around pre-teens. The prime example I can think of is Cards Against Humanity.
• I'd like a category to cover story games and RPGs, but can't think of what to call it.

The main thing where I know I could use help is that I have no skills at logo design or image manipulation. I'm also happy to take suggestion for category names. Otherwise, I"ll start trying to recruit people heavily later in the year, although I'll probably e-mail a few people to specifically request submissions.