xwordswithbabka

Hello! I suppose if I think about it, 2023 has been pretty good in the way of crosswords? By my count, 3 LA Times, a Modern, and an AVCX Cryptic?? That is not bad!! Plus a bunch of collaborations with friends, and a year's worth of puzzles for this blog. Also a few tournament apperances. Oh no great do I need to make goals for next year now?? I think the best part, as always, is getting to know and spend time with people, either on Twitch, Discord, or in person. I want you to know that I appreciate you! This will be the final blog puzzle for 2023. The theme is based on a phrase that I actually came up with have and have been saying for probably ten years or so, and am excited to have found a way to make a puzzle with it. Quiara Vasquez did the test solving. Let me know what you think, and I hope that in the new year you can take some time to rest, much like Babka and Paprika pictured above. Thank you! [ .puz ] [ Direct Crosshare link ]

I hope you are doing well! I don't have a lot to say about this puzzle, other than I think it's fun and hope you enjoy. It was tested by Quiara Vasquez . Thank you! [ .puz ] [ Direct Crosshare link ]

Much like Babka (pictured above), I believe everyone can use a nap. This puzzle was meant to be an elaborate meta, but it turns out it was too difficult to figure out. I could either completely redo it in order to make it actually solvable, or just change it slightly and put it on the blog as just another crossword. I chose option two! Hopefully it will be okay. This crossword was called "fine" by Boswords Choppy Champion Will Eisenberg and Reigning E Division Champion Shannon "Norah" Rapp . Please enjoy! [ .puz ] [ Direct Crosshare link ]

Hello, I hope you are well! We have been trying to get cozy as fall somehow keeps happening. Today's puzzle was actually inspired by something that happened while trying to clue my last puzzle. Mild spoiler but I needed to come up with tea-based puns, and unfortunately I came up with a few truly awful ones based off of pop songs. What's worse, they were all different lengths so I needed to come up with an asymmetrical grid to make them work. By all rights this puzzle should not exist! ...and yet!! Thanks once again to Ann Snowhill aka Lohan Reborn for test solving. I hope you enjoy! [ .puz ][ Direct Crosshare link ]

Hello! It has been a while since my last puzzle here. I have been busy with stuff! But also now that I have been doing puzzles for a year or so, I think maybe it's ok to get off schedule? I don't want to stop making puzzles or posting to this blog, but I think I am going to try for quality rather than quantity. (At least hopefully, I don't want to get anyone's hopes up!) Today's puzzle is a themeless! I still don't really know how to make one of these. I want to get better at them, and unfortunately with this medium the only way to get better is to keep doing it! Why is that?? This one was test solved by the dream team of Sharp enberg . Thanks again! [ .puz ] [ Direct Crosshare link ]

Hello! Since the last time I posted here, I had my first cryptic puzzle published by AVCX . Let me tell you this is a huge milestone and an incredible honor! I want to thank the entire AVCX staff as well as my editor, Steve Mossberg, for making it the best it can be. I hope there will be more puzzles to come but idk!! For anyone who came here from AVCX somehow, Babka is the shorter-haired orange cat and Paprika is the medium-haired orange cat. But here is a blog puzzle for you today. Normally I want to fit as many theme ideas into a puzzle as possible, but since Ingrid kept giving me "Unfillable" I decided to pare back and only do three themers. I hope you don't feel cheated! I think it worked out okay. I also decided to keep in an embarrassing mistake I made in the fill, as a reminder to myself that I need to double check what I'm doing. Thanks to Kate Chin Park as well as Roy Johnson for test solving! [ .puz ] [ Direct Crosshare link ]

Hello! Today we have a very special puzzle, a collobaration with none other than Norah Sharpe ! Norah and I have collaborated on a number of puzzles and working with her is always a joy and a privilege. She basically sent me the entire grid and theme already made and asked me if I wanted to work on it. I am lucky to have a friend like Norah in my life! You can see above that there will hopefully be a Babka and Roxie collab in the future. Norah says: "I love making puzzles with Dan! You've already seen us three times at LAT and once at Universal (and more new places to come!) so I can't believe this is my first appearance on babka's blog!! So excited 🙂 🙂 🙂 This one came about because one of us said something dumb in a twitch chat - imagine that! Thanks to Will for the test, and make sure you check out his kickin' new Browser ." [ .puz ] [ Direct Crosshare link ]