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Classic Riddles for Kids and Adults

These are the riddles that make the rounds. You may remember some of these classic riddles for kids from your childhood and now you can stump and delight your kids with them! 

Riddle: The more you take, the more you leave behind. "What am I?"
Answer: You take footsteps and leave footprints.
Riddle: What 8 letter word can have a letter taken away and it still makes a word. Take another letter away and it still makes a word. Keep on doing that until you have one letter left. What is the word?
Answer: The word is "starting". Remove the middle "T" and you have "staring", Remove the "A" and you get "string", remove the "R" then you have "sting", remove the "T" and you get "sing". Remove the "G", and you get "sin", remove the "S" and you're left with "in",  and finally, remove the "N" and you're left with "I".
Riddle: What has a head, a tail, is brown, and has no legs?
Answer: A Penny.
Classic Riddles
Riddle: Can you name three consecutive days without using the words Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, or Sunday?
Answer: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow.
Riddle: A doctor and a bus driver are both in love with the same woman, an attractive girl named Sarah. The bus driver had to go on a long bus trip that would last a week. Before he left, he gave Sarah seven apples. Why?
Answer: An apple a day keeps the doctor away!
Classic Riddles
Riddle: You live in a one story house made entirely of redwood. What color would the stairs be?
Answer: What stairs? You live in a one-story house.
Riddle: A boy was at a carnival and went to a booth where a man said to the boy, "If I write your exact weight on this piece of paper then you have to give me $50, but if I cannot, I will pay you $50." The boy looked around and saw no scale so he agrees, thinking no matter what the carny writes he'll just say he weighs more or less. In the end the boy ended up paying the man $50. How did the man win the bet?
Answer: The man did exactly as he said he would and wrote "your exact weight" on the paper.
Classic Riddles
Riddle: What comes once in a minute, twice in a moment, but never in a thousand years?
Answer: The letter M.
Riddle: What has 88 keys, but can't even open a single door?
Answer: A piano.
Riddle: What is more useful when it is broken?
Answer: An egg.
Riddle: Samuel was out for a walk when it started to rain. He did not have an umbrella and he wasn't wearing a hat. His clothes were soaked, yet not a single hair on his head got wet. How could this happen?
Answer: This man is bald!
Riddle: Re-arrange the letters, O O U S W T D N E J R, to spell just one word. What is it?
Answer: 'Just one word'.
Riddle: Two fathers and two sons went fishing one day. They were there the whole day and only caught 3 fish. One father said, that is enough for all of us, we will have one each. How can this be possible?
Answer: There was the father, his son, and his son's son. This equals 2 fathers and 2 sons for a total of 3!
Riddle: My life can be measured in hours, I serve by being devoured. Thin, I am quick. Fat, I am slow. Wind is my foe. What am I?
Answer: I am a candle.
Riddle: What can point in every direction but can't reach the destination by itself?
Answer: Your finger or a compass.
Riddle: What is black when you buy it, red when you use it, and gray when you throw it away?
Answer: Charcoal.
Riddle: A bus driver was heading down a street in Colorado. He went right past a stop sign without stopping, he turned left where there was a "no left turn" sign, and he went the wrong way on a one-way street. Then he went on the left side of the road past a cop car. Still - he didn't break any traffic laws. Why not?
Answer: He was walking...not driving.
Riddle: A man rode out of town on Sunday, he stayed a whole night at a hotel and rode back to town the next day on Sunday. How is this possible?
Answer: His Horse was called Sunday!
Riddle: A pet shop owner had a parrot with a sign on its cage that said "Parrot repeats everything it hears". Davey bought the parrot and for two weeks he spoke to it and it didn't say a word. He returned the parrot but the shopkeeper said he never lied about the parrot. How can this be?
Answer: The parrot was deaf.
Riddle: Poor people have it. Rich people need it. If you eat it you die. What is it? 
Answer: Nothing.

Riddles throughout history have not been limited to any single place or culture but throughout the world, riddles have been culturally significant. Mongolia, China, Russia, Mongolia, Persia, India, Hungary, Africa, the Philippines, and Scandinavia are just some parts of the world that are steeped in the tradition of classic riddles and brain puzzles. In ancient Greece and Egypt, people who solved riddles were held in high esteem. Certain cultures used riddles as a means to continue traditions and folklore from one generation to the next.

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