Pick A Duck and Fishing Games

With the help of my two big boys I finished another Mario Party party game today. It is a Cheep Cheep (Mario fish)fishing game that made me want to post about two more classic games, Pick A Duck and The Fishing Game.

Pick A Duck -

You've all seen this one at the fair. It is a truly simple party game that is always a good bit of fun. Thanks to the many differen rubber duckies available you can really make it fit your theme. You can find a big selection at Oriental Trading Company.


Shown here are Halloween ducks for Halloween Pick A Duck

You can play Pick A Duck just like at the fair with lots of prizes to choose from and the ducks indicating which selection of prizes you may pick from or change it up a bit and have one prize per duck with each prize numbered to match the number on the bottom of each duck.

Another idea is to have a large amount of little candies or stickers and let each child pick two or three ducks and add up the "points" of each numbered duck to see how many they get.


Farm Animal ducks for a Barnyard party
awarded points to pick candy from the Candy Tree

A fun twist is to give each child a paper plate, gluestick, and cut out paper eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. Write one of the parts of the face on each duck and have them take turns picking ducks until they complete their face. You could of course change this to more specifically fit your theme (for example parts of a monkey for a jungle theme).


The Fishing Game -

This one was always a favorite of mine when I was a child.

First make a fishing pole by tying a piece of string to a stick, wooden dowel or whatever pole-like object you can find and attatch either a clothespin or magnet to the end.

To set up your fishing spot you can either hang up a sheet, cut the back from a very large box, or you can even just fish over the couch (maybe with a blue blanket or sheet draped over it).

If you've made clothespin poles all you have to do is have each child "cast" the pole over and have a helper on the other side of your sheet, box, or couch attatch a small prize. To make it more "fishy" you can put your prizes in ziplocs or paper sacks with a paper fish glued or taped on.

For the magnetic poles you can make several paper fish with paper clips attatched. You'll want to be sure that your fishing spot is low enough for the pole to reach and catch the fish. Alternately you can set your fish out in the open. As with Pick A Duck you can number your fish to award prizes.


Our Mario Party game titled Fish Sticks was inspired by this mini game from Mario Party 5 as well as Pick a Duck and The Fishing Game -



We made 4 magnetic fishing poles and Cheep Cheep fish with magnets inside them. The fish have numbers on the back to indicate point value and there is one gold fish that says "You get an extra turn". Each team member will catch three fish (blindfolded) and then their points will be added up.

Here is the finished product (total cost=$0),
scroll down for a step by step guide

First I traced out circles on red construction paper and cut them out (2 per fish)

I then traced the red circle onto a white piece of paper and drew out the details

The features were cut out and the hair colored in with yellow marker
They were then traced and cut out in duplicate

The features were added onto the red circles assembly line style

Here is a finished Cheep Cheep

Magnetic buttons (leftover from a Valentine's party two years ago) were glued onto the backs

Numbered circles were attatched to the back stuck only to the magnet and the top
leaving the bottom unglued so the two circles can spread out and the fish can stand up

Fishing poles were made from plastic sticks leftover from Halloween yard decorations, ribbon cut from a leftover Easter windsock craft, bobbers made by tracing around a paint bottle and adding details with a red marker, and magnetic buttons.

Here is a finished fishing pole. I first bent the plastic stick, then made a hole towards the end using a thumb tack. I pushed the ribbon in and out the top with the thumbtack and then tied it in a double knot. On the other end I tied a double knot around one of the magnetic buttons and then glued a paper bobber to each side and glued the edges together.

Here is the official list of what was used and the cost of this game -

Red construction paper (already had) $0
White paper (already had) $0
Gold paint (already had) $0
Markers, glue, gluestick (already had) $0
Magnetic buttons (already had) $0
Plastic sticks (already had) $0

Total Cost = $0