If you you know me well, you know I love to play board games. If you know me really well, you know that I love to buy unusual board games at thrift stores to play them with family and friends. Those two things definitely keep a song in my heart. Both are just so fun! I skip over most of the mass market games and look for unusual games. I use boardgamegeek.com to find the ratings of the game and descriptions to help me skip over the chaff and find the golden games that give connection and laughs, or teach something, for me to use with gameschooling. Some treasures that I’ve found are: Druthers, Whoonu, Truth Be Told, and Likewise.

Back in June, I had a fun mini-vacation retreat with some friends where I discovered the above board game called Moods. Some of my dear friends brought it to play. We had such a blast playing it that I put it on my “to-buy while thrifting” list. It’s out of print so you have to find it used. Amazon has it for $100 currently, but on ebay it’s a lot cheaper.

The game involves having to say a phrase that is given to you on a card, in a certain mood, like “bashful”, “silly,” or “flirtatious.” That mood is determined by the roll of the die. People then guess what mood you are in, with a choice of 10 different ones. We had so much fun playing this game at my retreat. (It would be great for actor’s training if you teach drama.)

So ever since then I’ve been wanting to find this game at a thrift store. Well guess what?! I found it! I found a copy on a Friday in July. I knew one of my retreat girlfriends was looking for it too. So the next day, on Saturday, in the morning, I prayed that I would find a copy for my friend.

So then, that very day, I found another copy, in the evening, five minutes before the store closed! God answered my prayer so quickly. Two games in two days after not seeing any copies for over a month. Wow!

The thrill of discovery of the two games was marred by the fact that one was missing the board. Bummer. I used to check games a lot for missing pieces before I bought them at thrift stores but had gotten out of the habit. Lesson learned. So I adapted. I gave the copy with the board to my friend, and we at my house played without the board, which is doable. We would do that in the meantime, while I waited and trusted that God would bring me another copy of the game with the board.

It was just four days later that I found another copy, on a Wednesday. The same place I found one as the previous Saturday. This time the copy had the board! That morning, I went berry picking with my children and grandchildren. That was a tender mercy in itself. (Every summer, for years, I’ve had a yen to go berry picking. My sister who lives in Maine sends pictures of her kids picking blueberries every summer. I’ve been wanting to do that too but blueberries don’t grow in Utah. I knew I’d have to settle for strawberries or raspberries. So when my sis-in-law texted me info about a neighbor who would let us pick raspberries for free, I jumped at the choice.) On the way home from berry picking, I felt prompted to stop at the thrift store where I had found the Moods game the previous Saturday. That morning, I had prayed that God would send me another copy of the game, so I could have a board. As I drove to the thrift store, I thought, “Wouldn’t it be funny if the game were here again? Probably not though,” I thought. It just seemed too much to ask for.

I walked to the game area and started looking. There it was, on the middle shelf! The familiar bright green lid with purple letters. I let out an audible gasp. This was my own little miracle, just for me! What seemed too much to ask for, came true that very day that I asked.

So I feel very grateful to God for this. It’s such a silly little thing but yet it means so much to me. It is evidence that God blessed me with a tender delight. It shows to me that He cares about me having fun, wholesome recreation. He delights to delight me. He loves me, he loves you, He loves us all. He doesn’t always answer our prayers so quickly as in this story. He doesn’t always answer with a yes. This time He did for me, and I will always remember this.

I love what Elder David A. Bednar shares about tender mercies in this talk below. You can also read it here.