Fill Your Pants: Tips for Harassed Parents/Carers
The practicalities of us COVID working-from-home, many of us with stir-crazy kids to juggle, has meant that this year’s batch of new games have gone through an even more intensive burst of real-world play-testing than usual.
And that most definitely includes Fill Your Pants. Or ‘The Unbelievably Silly Game of Literally Stuffing Household Objects Down a Pair Of Huge Underpants,’ to use its original, sadly discarded, strapline.
It’s fair to say that ‘Pants’ has been a big hit with the Drumond Park offspring – even more so than we’d anticipated. So we got together, pooled our parental pants-wisdom, and sat down to write for you:
A Quick Guide to How Best to Fill Your Pants.
a) Use it to close the sibling age gap
It’s tough finding activities that will keep both older and younger kids happily occupied. But even we were taken aback by how well ‘Pants’ worked with a nine- and fourteen-year old. In fact the former was at a slight advantage, enjoying more spare capacity in his pants. The latter was in fits, claiming that it was the most hilariously silly thing that she’d ever played; she now wants to play it with her friends. In an ‘ironic’ way, natch.
b) Define your hunting ground
Will you allow objects situated in the same room as ‘base’, or will you insist on a scramble to forage further afield? Are any rooms out-of-bounds? Will you help the little ones by barring older siblings from some areas? We’d advise barring staircases on safety grounds, and setting some ground rules about your fragile Ming vases etc.
c) And Place the Base
A coffee table makes an excellent base; clear it off and try to site it so that one player isn’t at a disadvantage. Players might want to swap starting positions for each round, so that – for example – one player isn’t always the furthest away from the living room door.
d) Adults can – and should – play too
For kids, there is literally nothing funnier than watching Grandma/Uncle Rob totter around the room in a pair of giant underpants. And that applies to you, too. Yes, you.
e) And on that note
If two households/work colleagues have the game, there is no reason why you shouldn’t play ‘Pants’ via Zoom. Set up your camera so that your whole body – including pants – is visible. Then disappear off to forage, returning back to shriek the word ‘PANTS!!!’ in lieu of touching base.
f) Let Teddy play!
Just the single child? Never fear! Teddies love ‘Fill Your Pants’ also. They will need a little practical assistance from their owner, who could perhaps use a timer to see how quickly ten items could be found, whilst mum or dad gets on with their important social media work. And then teddy could have another go to try to beat their time. And then another.
Fill Your Pants is available from all good toystores!
