I’ve always loved hosting gatherings at our house and for me it’s so important that people enjoy their time when here. I love creating a fun filled environment with lots of memories.
Post Christmas lunch, when everyone’s in a semi food coma, playing games is always a great way to perk everyone up! I love my family as everyone’s so up for getting involved – mum’s and dad’s included and to be honest, they’re usually the most competitive!
I generally purchase token novelty gifts as prizes – it always makes it that little bit more fun when there’s a prize up for grabs! You’re guaranteed to pick up some great buys from shops like Tiger.
Here are the Christmas games I had planned this year:
It’s a Wrap!: This game is played in pairs whereby each team is given 60 seconds to wrap their box using the materials provided and each person can only use one hand. The winners are the team that wrapped the quickest and neatest.
Materials required:
- A sheet of wrapping paper per pair
- A box to wrap
- Celotape for each pair
Mitts and Gifts: This game is a follow on game from “It’s a wrap”. Each team is given a gift that was wrapped by another team and one pair of oven gloves. Both people in each team must wear one glove from the oven mitts and unwrap the gift using only the hands covered in a mitt. The winning team is the one that unwraps the fastest!
Materials required:
- Oven gloves
Christmas Tree Construction Challenge: Each pair is given 36 paper cups and are required to construct a pyramid (aka a tree)! The team that manages to do this the quickest in the correct form is the winner! You’ll get some pretty hilarious outcomes with this game – we ended up with one very short stocky and lopsided tree!
Materials required:
- 36 paper cups per team
Guess the Ornaments in the Jar: This is an easy game and as the name suggests, each person must guess how many ornaments are included in a jar without removing them from the jar. The winner is the one that comes closest to the correct number.
Materials required:
- A jar
- Ornaments
Christmas Doodle: Each person is given a paper plate and must place it on top of their head and draw a picture without looking in 30 seconds. I decided to ask everyone to draw a snowman with a hat and scarf on. The masterpieces were hilarious!
Materials required:
A paper plate per person or a sheet of paper
A felt tip pen
Bauble Swap: This is a super fun competitive game whereby all the guests were separated in to two teams. In each bowl, place 12 of the same coloured baubles. Place two bowls with different coloured baubles on one side of the table, and the other two on the other side. The aim of the game is to swap all the baubles between the bowls on each side of the table fastest against the other team. The team that manages to swap them fastest is the winner.
Materials required:
- 24 baubles in one colour
- 24 baubles in second colour
- 4 bowls
Snowball Throw : Again all the guests were split in to two teams. Each member of the team was given 3 “snowballs” and had to throw them in to their teams bowl from a 2 meter distance. The team with the most number of snowballs in the bowl won.
Materials required:
- Polystyrene balls (3 per person playing)
- 2 bowls
Christmas Tree Chop: Here, each person is given a piece of card which they must hold behind their back. They have 60 seconds to use their hands to create a Christmas tree shape behind their back! The winner is the person that creates the best tree.
Material required:
- 1 piece of card per person
None of these games required much planning and preparation and they were cheap to administer and provided us with lots of fun, giggles and memories!
I’d love to hear about your favourite Christmas games!x
