I’M PUZZLED!

FIND THE CONNECTION

ALLOW ME TO INTRODUCE YOU TO THE SISTER YOU NEVER KNEW.

PREPARATION

This puzzle involves finding two words that have a special connection. For example, conditioner and hockey may not seem related, but both have a connection to the word air: air hockey and air conditioner. Butter and allergy both have a connection to peanut: peanut butter and peanut allergy. Arrest and doll have a connection to house: house arrest and dollhouse.

NOTE: When a word is combined with a “connector” (a connecting word like air, peanut, and house in the example above) those two words can be in any order (e.g., cell phone and phone book, with phone as the connector). Additionally, it doesn’t matter if the words, when connected, become one word (eyelash) or two (black eye).

To create this puzzle, players come up with twenty groups of two words that each have a “connector” and compile those forty words into one long, randomly ordered list on the page.

GAME TIME

With the game board set, players attempt to find the twenty groups and list the connector next to each group.

IMPORTANT: Many players find these puzzles extremely difficult (even when working as a team) if the words in the group of forty present many possible matching combinations with many different connectors. To make it challenging but still possible to complete in a reasonable amount of time, players should present a list of twenty-five connectors—twenty of which are the REAL connectors for the puzzle, with the other five just to throw people off.

All the players on each team must figure out which twenty are the real connectors and where they belong.

SAMPLE PUZZLE (ANSWERS IN THE BACK)

BUNNY PINKY SUPER LACE PLACE FLY NEWS POLICE ROPE BIRTHDAY SEAT WAX PLANNER CEILING

GLASSES PUDDING WAVE WHITE SUN BUS HORSE SKI LAKES HOLE HORN ENGINE BROADWAY SPURT

SET HORMONE PLATE BASEBALL BALL PRIVATE SWITCH INFECTION BICYCLE PAPER SPREE IDENTICAL

HINT: Here are the twenty actual connectors for this puzzle, plus 5 which don’t belong! Which are the real connectors, and where do they go? Match each of the twenty with a pair from above:

RABBIT, EAR, SUN, TREE, FINGER, HAPPY, TOILET, GLOVE, GROWTH, PARTY, JUMP, RACE, BREAD, SCHOOL, LIGHT, PAPER, BULLETIN, MAN, FAN, INVESTIGATOR, CRIME, SHOE, PLAY, FIRE, TWIN