Whether you spend the day with friends, family, or a mix of both, it's always a treat to celebrate the festive time with the ones you care about. And what better way to do that than bringing out everyone's competitive spirit! Why not give the following games a try this 25 December?
White elephant
A Christmas classic that goes by many names, white elephant involves making a pile of quirky gifts that range from the desirable to the downright silly, then taking it in turns to either unwrap a present, or steal an already revealed one from another player's hands. Each present can be stolen three times, and the game ends once every player has a present. You can't have more than one, if you steal from someone whilst you already have a gift, it becomes an exchange. Just to be nice, the first player can choose to steal one final present once the game is over. If they do steal, the game continues until someone decides to keep their current gift. If you're lucky, you'll wind up with something good. If not, well, that's just white elephant.
Pho-ho-hotoshop
If you're a bit tech-savvy and you're looking to bring some pre-prepared fun to the shindig, one option is to boot up your photoshop software and merge a headshot from each of your guests onto a well-known Christmas character, or a famous person who made headlines during the past year. Have your guests guess who's who for a bit of a festive giggle.
Christmas quiz
Choose a host, split into teams, and hey presto! You have a Christmas quiz on your hands. If you haven't made one beforehand, there are plenty of questions to find online, or you can do a bit of Christmas movie trivia! For those who look for opportunities to bond during their Christmas games, it could be nice to get everyone to write a little known fact about themselves on a piece of paper, mix them up, and get everyone to match the fact to the person.
Charades
An age-old Christmas tradition, there's a reason this particular game seems to inevitably rear its head this time of year. It's a laugh. Wildly gesticulating to a row of vacant expressions as you desperately try to think of a way to mime Miracle on 34th Street is one of the best ways to loosen up after a bit of holiday stress. If you want to personalise it a bit, have everyone throw suggestions into a hat for the performer to draw from.
Bonus game: Secret bingo
This is for those that know their Christmas compatriots all too well. Choose one accomplice and set out a bingo card for the day ahead. Each block should predict something that your family and friends are likely to do. Try not to be too mean-spirited; the reveal will go down a lot better if you write things like, "gran tells a funny story", rather than, "Garry makes people uncomfortable by talking about politics for half an hour". Check them off as the day goes on until one of you reaches bingo, then let everyone else know what you two have been doing. For extra chaos, approach every person coming to the Christmas party beforehand in secret, tell them that they are the only other person playing the game, and then unveil your masterplan once the evening starts to wrap up!
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