It’s often hard to come up with ideas for Christmas gifts for your friends and family. Why not consider buying them a board game? Board games are lots of fun for the family, for parties, and even to play alone occasionally. Many families are having family game nights rather than spending $100 or more on a night out at the movies. Playing a board game with them is a great way to get to know your family and friends.

I love word games and my favorite word game of all time is Scrabble. I still own the board I bought in the 70s; in the original purple box with wooden letter trays. I use a purple Chivas Regal bag for the letter tiles. There is a copy of the Scrabble Players Dictionary in the box too. I have played literally hundreds of games with this set; with my mother, with my friends, and alone. One of my friends had to be the slowest Scrabble player ever; you could read a book during games with her. But, it was always fun.

Alfred Mosher Butts first came up with the idea for Scrabble in 1931. The game was copyrighted in 1948 when Butts made a deal with James Brunot; Brunot and his wife would manufacture the game and Butts would receive a royalty on every game sold. In 1953, due to high demand for the game, Selchow and Righter became the licensed manufacturers of the game and that same year the game was picked up by Macy’s in New York City. The rest, as they say, is history.

This is the Scrabble set most people own; nothing fancy, just a regular folding board with 225 squares, 4 wooden tile trays and 100 wooden letter tiles. It is probably common sense but the game is only recommended for those over 3 due to chocking hazards.

This version of Scrabble features a rotating board and a grid to fit the letters into. The board has 441 spaces and 200 hundred letter tiles.  It also comes with four wooded tile trays and a bag to hold the letter tiles.

This should make for longer and more exciting Scrabble games for you and your friends.

This is the Scrabble version for serious Scrabble players.

The rotating raised board is made of wood and has storage for letter trays and tiles. It comes with a drawstring bag to hold the tiles, a timer, a scorecard and a rule-book.

This is a portable version of Scrabble, so you can play the game wherever you go. Now you can take your addiction with you.

It features a zippered case with a folding board. The 100 letter tiles snap onto the board so you can fold the game up and continue at another time. It also features 4 plastic letter trays, a scorecard, and a pouch to hold the tiles.

This game will start your child off on the road to Scrabble in an easy to understand format. The game board is reversible and features a more advanced game on the back.

In the simpler version, children draw 7 tiles from the 101 letter tiles and try and match them to letters printed on the board and receive chips when they complete a word. The one with the most chips at the end wins the game. The advanced game is just played like regular Scrabble.

This is another game for those who love their Scrabble.

This electronic version runs on 2 AA batteries and includes four games (2 for up to 2 players, and 2 against the computer), 9 skill settings and a built-in dictionary.