Some chapters have celebrations they do for Christmas and Birthdays. Some chapters will send members a birthday card on their birthday, or mention all the birthdays for the month in their newsletters. Chapter funds may be used to pay for a drink for the member whose birthday falls during that month – or other such customs.

Some ideas for Christmas gift exchange are:

  • Everyone brings a giftwrapped box containing items to a value of $10 or $20. These are placed on a table and are given at random to members (making sure the member does not receive her own box). The boxes are reused for the next year gifts.
  • As above, but another variant can be that the gifts can have a particular theme, or can be in the form of 5 low cost items of a particular type, for example: “One for the bedroom, one for the bathroom, one for the kitchen, one personal and something red”.
  • White Elephant exchange – Everyone brings a wrapped up item with a $5 value. The first person picks a wrapped gift at random an opens it. The next person can choose to steal the gift the first person opened, or select a new one. Then the next person has their turn, and so on. When a gift is stolen, the person whose gift was stolen may either replace it with a gift stolen from someone else or select a new gift. The game ends when the last unwrapped gift has been chosen.
  • Truth be Told – Have around 10-20 statements written on slips of paper. Everyone starts with a wrapped gift in front of them. When a statement is read out, anyone who answers yes to the statement has to swap their gift with someone else. Statements can be things such as “have you ever gone overseas”, “are you wearing pearls” etc.
  • The Right/Left game – there are several versions of the stories that can be read out, but the way they are played is always the same. (There is a Christmas version in our games section) You can start with everyone holding a gift, or just use the one gift – and as the story is read out, whenever the word “RIGHT” is spoken, everyone hands the gift to the person on their right. When “LEFT” is spoken, the gift is passed to the person on the left. Some versions also include “ACROSS” where it is passed across the table to the person opposite.
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