So the weekend was pretty decent. Still mired in the hot and sticky mess that is the neverending Florida summer, but it's starting to get a little better since the days are getting shorter. We start out just a tad bit cooler, and the air's just a tad bit drier, and the evenings get a tad bit more pleasant. I wish we could have gotten the tiniest shred of that big cold front that dipped down across the rest of the country last week!

Anyway. After running the aforementioned D&D idea by the girls, they were excited to dive right in, and loved the idea of heading to ACME, a big comic/toy/game store not too far away. So we went to a park we like in the area, did lunch, and then ACME. And.. kind of a bummer, really. I guess D&D is rather passé at present, as all they had was a few smallish cardboard trays of miniatures and a stack of old books. My main notion was to see if the girls could pick out a miniature to represent their characters, but since there wasn't much to choose from we figured we'd stick with the LEGO idea for now.

So the D&D Starter Set arrived in the mail that afternoon, and I spent a bit of the afternoon looking over the rulebook and the included adventure, The Lost Mine of Phandelver. The first encounter is a goblin ambush along a forest road, so I had the girls build a tree-lined road from LEGO while I built the wagon our party was using to haul a delivery of goods. I also assembled some LEGO goblins and other things we'd need. We took those (and our LEGO characters) to the dining room table, I set up the wagon and told them the basic premise so far. Then I plopped down two "dead" LEGO horses on the road ahead, which their characters investigated. Then I sprung the goblin ambush, and the game was afoot!

Now, since we're all new at this, and I'm trying to keep it as loose and as fun as possible to maintain their interest, I have a feeling that the way we played it would look very little like "true" D&D to anyone very familiar with it. I left out all the stuff that I thought would go over their heads or bog them down in details (which is a lot) and all the stuff that I myself am clueless about at this point (which is even more), and stripped it down to the very basics. We rolled for initiative, and then I just let them choose which goblin to attack and how, giving them some options. I didn't even (gasp!) worry about attack rolls, I just presumed every attack was successful and let them roll the damage. Hermione's character is a wizard, so I'd suggest a spell or two she could use and what the effect would be (without bothering about the memorization aspects of spellcasting), and she grasped that well. Hallie chose a rogue, so her basic MO is to sneak around behind the monsters and backstab them. To increase the size of our party (and to make it even more fun for the girls), I let their characters have "pets" which would also make attacks--Hermione's is a little unicorn, and Hallie picked a LEGO ant named Bob who is amazingly good wielding an axe. :) And I had a character in the party as well, in addition to trying to get the hang of running the game as DM. So yeah, as a proper D&D experience, I have no doubt it was terrible. But the girls and I had a ball, and at this point I consider that a lot more important. :)

Sunday I thought giving Heather a quiet morning at home would be a good idea, so I packed up the girls and we headed to Downtown Disney. It was already too hot, and it didn't help that I had to park pretty far from the stores we wanted to go to because of the major construction Disney has going on down there. But we played at the LEGO store for a while, and we played in the Once Upon a Toy store for a while, and then it was time for lunch, so we made our long way back to the car, did lunch, and that was that.

About as soon as we got home, Hallie started asking when we could play the game some more. So I guess that's a good sign of success as well! But I'd been meaning to change the oil in my car, so I did that, and confirmed my belief that it is impossible to do that job neatly where my car is concerned. Oil everywhere, and as a bonus I accidentally dropped the drain plug into the container of used oil, which meant plunging my hand in to get it, and eww. But that was done, eventually.

After dinner I gathered a bunch of our pre-built LEGO buildings to represent Phandalin, the little town at the center of our adventure. We finished the goblin hideout cave part of the adventure that we'd started the first night, and then I took us to the town to cover some of the NPC interactions and whatnot on the agenda there. And the girls had a great time again, but the actual playing of the game was rather lost in their exuberance this time around. They were more interested in just playing with the LEGOs and characters and going off on their own tangents, so I slipped in what story elements I could, but mostly just let them have fun. I don't even really consider that a gaming session, more like playtime with a tiny bit of game thrown in. But oh well. I know they'll want to play again tonight, so hopefully I can get them to settle down a little as we explore the hideout of the gang of ruffians terrorizing the town. :) I'm debating how to present the map for that one, though. LEGO, dry-erase board, something else?

Already almost time to call it a day! I hope everyone's week is off to a fine start.