This favorite party game of yesteryear gets a make over! So, bring on the apples!
Pretty much everyone has have heard of the harvest party favorite game of bobbing for apples. It’s just good clean fun… or was it? Let’s all gather around a big tub of water laden with floating apples. Next, we will all plunge our faces into the same tub in a literal head to head competition to see who can successfully snag an apple using only the mouth. No matter how hygienic you try to be, there is bound to be some slobber cross contamination under these circumstances. This concern has seen bobbing for apples party favorite disappear into the past, especially in light of the recent pandemic.
We think it's time to bring back the apples.
Key Points
- By using individual buckets instead of one big tub, you can avoid any sort of cross-contamination! Your guests will appreciate your consideration for their health and comfort.
- Introduce other fruits into the mix to spice things up!
- Remember that it may be fairer to have kids compete against kids and adults against adults. Adults often have an advantage over kids, so the game may not be very fair for the latter if everyone competes against one another.
Apple Bobbing
Everything Old is New Again
Thinking outside the tub will open a whole vista of apple bobbing games to liven up any party! Instead of having one tub with many heads inserted into it, try individual buckets for individual heads. This can be very fun. Start with each bucket on the table or floor; on the signal of ‘go’ players dive in and attempt to catch their apples. The first one to sink their teeth into their red delicious and hold it aloft wins. Good clean fun and all you need is a few buckets, some water, and of course the apples.
This is a great way to leave your guests feeling assured that this game is as safe as can be. No cross-contamination here! Just a lot of fun for anyone who's involved. Make sure to keep track of whose bucket is whose in case your guests want to come back for more rounds later.
Apples and Oranges
A twist to challenge those apple bobbing experts is to add other fruit to the tub. Try adding an apple, a peach, a nectarine, and an orange. The stakes are higher since they not only need to catch their quarry without hands; they also need to find it under water.
This is the perfect way to throw off those self-proclaimed apple bobbing experts! These fruits are relatively different shapes and sizes compared to an apple, so they'll be more challenging to grab. The winner is whoever can grab all four fruits the fastest, or whoever can grab the apple plus one of the other fruits.
Totally Out of the Tub
For younger children, or anyone else who may not think the idea of submerging one's head in water constitutes anything resembling fun, this is a creative deviation that captures the spirit of apple bobbing. You will need a string and a doughnut for each player. Suspend the doughnuts from the string. This can be done by hanging them from a clothes line, a curtain rod, or along a table edge. Be sure to allow space for each player. As play begins and those pastries begin to swing, the extra space will be appreciated.
Each player stands or lies beneath a single doughnut. On the mark of go they begin to eat using only their mouths. The first one to finish their doughnut wins. Choosing a filled or powdered variety of doughnut may increase the mess factor, but it also increases the fun and challenge!
If hanging doughnuts sound like too much trouble, then the game can be played in teams. The first team will hold the doughnuts from a string for the second team, then switch. The winners are the team that eats the fastest.
If doughnuts aren't your cup of tea, you can always use whatever other food you can suspend from a string! You can also have everyone pair up, and have one person hold the food item while the other person eats. By removing the string from the equation, you can pretty much use any food that you want. Make sure the food isn't able to be eaten in one or two bites, though, since this will create one hectic competition!
It may be fairer to have children compete against children and adults against adults. Adults are almost always going to be able to eat faster than children, so the competition will be a little unfair for the young ones. This can lead to feelings of frustration and a disinterest in playing this type of game again. Try to make it fair for everyone involved!
Any way you slice it, bobbing for apples is still fun, so get creative and have some good clean fun.