Children act as game pieces to win sweets at library event
BY Jordan Cohen
WARREN
Three-year old Gianna Magazine of Warren was the picture of concentration as she finished following a colorful path of squares to a finish line marked by the word “Winner”—a word she cannot yet read.
“I got a sucker, taffy and chocolate,” she said after being prompted by her mother, Deborah Magazine.
The little girl was one of several whose parents braved the Saturday morning snowfall for the annual Live Candy Land game at the Warren Trumbull County Public Library.
Instead of playing the classic board game, the young people live it by following color-coded cards and matching the colors as they walk on more than 100 squares on a winding pathway. At various points, they win different types of candy.
Since many of the children have not yet learned to read, all the cards have only colors for them to recognize, the same as the board game.
“It took us three hours to set this up,” said Lori Faust, Boardman, the library’s youth-services director. “We thought it would be a nice thing for kids to do while schools are out.”
Along with the squares, the pathway had large displays of characters that players of Candy Land know well such as Grandma Nutt, Queen Frostine and Gloppy in his chocolate swamp.
Saturday marked the last day of the three-day game, but Faust said the weather held down the turnout. Last year, she said, was much better. “We had more than 300 kids show up and we had to run out and buy more candy,” Faust said.
That was not the case Saturday, which was fine with Lyla Amburgy, 3, of Leavittsburg. Accompanied by her mother, Beth Amburgy, Lyla played the game several times, stuffing her pockets with her candy winnings.
“I am a winner,” she sang repeatedly. She gladly emptied her pockets to show the varieties of goodies she planned to devour at home.
“I like lollipops, and I lick them,” she said to the applause of the staff as she finished another circuit of the pathway.
Faust said she expects the library to have the event again during the Christmas break next year. “This is the second year we’ve done this because it’s our goal to get more kids in the library and associate it with being a fun place.”