DIY Yahtzee Jr

How to make your own game and how to personalize it for your family

Today we’re going to show you how you can DIY Yahtzee Jr. There are so many options there’s one that will be a perfect fit and before you know it you will be yelling out “Yahtzee!”

First, if you haven’t ever played Yahtzee Jr, then you can see how to play here. It’s a fun and easy dice game that kids love. You can buy a copy here or you can keep reading to learn just how easy and fun making your own can be.

What you need for DIY Yahtzee Jr

First, I’ll show you how to make a basic game then we’ll get into variations that will bring extra fun.

You will need a piece of paper, marker or pencil and ruler, five dice and 5 Bingo chips in up to four different colours. (Poker chips or curled up pipe cleaners could work too.)

Making your DIY Yahtzee Jr

First, use your ruler to make a grid of one inch squares in the middle of the paper. The grid needs to be 6 squares wide and five squares deep.

Next, in the first column of squares going down, draw a smaller square in each space. Then go back and fill in the dots for dice. The top squares gets a single dot for the number one. The second gets two dots for two, the third three dots and so on. You will have the numbers 1 to 5 shown in dice when you are done this step.

In the remaining boxes, write in the numbers 1 to 5 starting from right to left. At the end, you will have a row with a dice number and the numbers 1 to 5.

There is no box or row for the number 6.

(Don’t have the time to make your own board? No problem, we have a free copy in our Fun Library here.)

Playing

First, each player gets five bingo chips in one colour. To play, a player rolls all five dice. The goal is to get as many of one number as you can. Sixes are wild. The player can choose to score or to reroll any of the dice. She gets one more chance to re-roll any dice she’d like. At the end of the three rolls (or when she chooses to stop) she must score.

To score, she adds up all of the dice showing the same number and adds any sixes. She then puts her Bingo chip on the number in the row with that dice.

For example, if she has rolled 1, 2, 3, 3, 6 she has two 3s and one wild for a score of 3. She then covers the written three in the dice three row with her Bingo chip.

The play then moves to the next player.

On her second turn, if she’s filled in a number in the three row, then she needs to choose a different number to aim for.

There is only one score for each row and once a chip has been placed, it can’t be moved.

When a player can not score, they place their chip on the dice of that row meaning that they have scored zero.

When a player has rolled all sixes, then they have a lucky Yahtzee. This means that they can choose to place their chip in the number five spot of any row that they don’t have a chip in already.

Number of turns

The original Yahtzee Jr states that if there are two players then you get five turns, if there are three players then you get four turns and if there are four players then you get 3 turns. You can play this way or decide to play a certain amount of rounds or the full five turns. It’s up to you.

Winning DIY Yahtzee Jr

When the last player has taken their turn, it is time to add up everyone’s score. A player scores the amount that their chip is on in each row. For example, when your marker is on the 4 column then you have 4 points.

The player with the most points is the winner.

Colour DIY Yahtzee Jr

To make the game more colourful, and easier for kids who are not wanting to play with the numbers, you can make DIY Yahtzee Jr with colours instead. To do this, you will need blank dice and colour sticker dots (you want to make sure that your colour dots will fit on the dice). You can get blank dice that come with stickers included. Or you can place the stickers on regular dice over top of the numbers. Or you can buy the colour dot dice.

You make the board the same as before except that you place a colour dot in the column that has the dice.

You will need to choose one colour to be the wild colour. Do not put a colour dot on the board for this colour.

Play is the same as above.

(If you don’t want to make your own board, you can get our free blank Yahtzee Jr board in our fun library here.)

Personalize DIY Yahtzee Jr

This version of DIY Yahtzee Jr might be the most fun. First, choose six family members. (This could be done with anything really, but who wouldn’t want to roll five of their own face for a Yahtzee?) You will need a face picture for each person—don’t forget pets can be one of the sides too.

You will also need blank dice and either the stickers that can come with the dice or a sticker sheet that you can print on like this one.

Next, size the pictures so that they will fit on the dice. Most dice are 16mm so your pictures should be somewhere around 1/8 of an inch big, but be sure to measure first. Larger dice or foam dice might be a good choice for this project.

Print the photos out. You will need six of each person. Next, cut them and carefully apply them to the dice, making sure that each dice gets only one of each person.

The last sticker will go on the board in the first column where the dice went in the first game. Again, you will need to choose someone to be the wild side.

The play is the same as above.

(Again, you can get our free blank Yahtzee Jr board in our fun library here.)

Let’s Roll some Fun

The possibly for DIY Yahtzee Jr are endless. You could make one for their favorite characters or animals. It could be a great way to learn extended family’s names. You could even do sight words if you really wanted to.

Yahtzee Jr is fun and easy and perfect for DIYing. So grab some dice, make a board and have a great time rolling and winning with your kids.

If you love the idea but don’t have the time to make a board, you can get your for free in our fun library here.