Looking for Thursday’s Strands hints, spangram and answers? You can find them here:
Well my birthday has come and gone. June 20th was also the summer solstice, so it was an even better day to celebrate getting older than it usually is, though I’ve always liked being born in June. It’s half a year from Christmas. The pacing is nice. I always felt bad for people born too close to Christmas.
I’ve had a big movie week this week, going to see Inside Out 2 twice(!) and Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. Click on both those links for my reviews. I’m fiddling with the idea of seeing Bad Boys 4 and The Motorbikers this weekend. Go big or go home, yeah?
In any case, let’s smash this Strands puzzle, shall we?
How To Play Strands
The New York Times’ Strands puzzle is a play on the classic word search with a new puzzle each day. The game presents you with a six-by-eight grid of letters. The game provides you with a clue/theme and you try to find words that match that theme. When you find a theme word, it will remain highlighted in blue. If you find incorrect words, you can build up to an optional hint that highlights all the letters in one of the words. This affects your score, however.
Here’s an example of what this looks like when you find all the words:
You’ll also need to find a special word or combined called a spangram, pictured in yellow above. This tells you what the words have in common, serving as a more specific, unifying hint. The spangram links two opposite sides of the board. While the theme words will not be a proper name, the spangram can be a proper name. When you find the spangram, it will remain highlighted in yellow. As you can see above, MARINELIFE is the spangram, and describes the rest of the grid’s words, like SHARK and OCTOPUS.
In the following guide, I’ll help you solve the grid without having to use any of the game’s baked-in hints.
Strands still isn’t on the New York Times games app yet, but you can play it right here.
**Spoilers ahead**
What Is Today’s Strands Hint?
The official theme hint for today’s Strand puzzle is: We do
Here’s an extra hint to help guide you to the solution: Nuptials
What Are Today’s Strands Answers?
Remember, spoilers—including the answers—ahead.
Today’s Strands spangram is . . .
WEDDING
Here’s where the Spangram is on the grid:
Today’s Strands Clues & Answers
Before I give each of the answers and the entire grid, I’ll give an individual hint for each of the sitcoms included in today’s Strands:
- Two mouths
- Close relations
- Buddies
- One to rule them all
- Promises
- Move those feet
- Flowers
- Dessert
Spoilers ahead.
Here’s the full list of words:
- Kiss
- Family
- Friends
- Ring
- Vows
- Dance
- Bouquet
- Cake
Today’s Strands Breakdown
I actually had such a strong sense of what “We do” was hinting at that I found the spangram first. I just looked for a W on the edges and followed it all the way to WEDDING. The top of the grid was all pretty easy. KISS, FAMILY, RING, VOWS all feel like bowling pins. I had a bit more trouble with BOUQUET, though not much, and then FRIENDS, CAKE and DANCE rounded out the grid. Another too-easy Strands. Maybe these grids just need to be bigger.
How did you do on your Strands today? Let me know on Twitter and Facebook.
Be sure to check out my blog for my daily Wordle guides as well as all my other writing about TV shows, streaming guides, movie reviews, video game coverage and much more. Thanks for stopping by!