What if you took advantage of Christmas Eve to have a little fun with your family? Here are a few ideas for "home-made" games that should add a healthy dose of fun to this magical moment... and help your little ones wait until the presents are opened!
1. Christmas stocking game
The aim of the game? Guess what is inside the sock. Clue: Christmas. You will have filled it with a dozen or so objects and treats such as a Christmas ball, a candy cane, a chocolate Santa Claus, etc. Of course, you must close the stocking with a rubber band before starting the game, and your children will have to guess the objects hidden inside by feeling or shaking it. 1 point for each find.
2. Santa's Phone Game
Your mission: to pass on a message from Santa to Mrs. Claus by whispering it in each other's ears. The last one to hear it has to repeat it out loud and it usually doesn't sound like the original version, which will make the whole table laugh. Example: "My dear, can you knit me a new hat, I forgot it in a fireplace and I'm starting to catch a cold. By the way, I'll bring you some good cookies and lots of dummies!
3. The game of forbidden words
Christmas dinner without talking about Christmas and its lexical field (presents, Santa, tree, party, decorations, etc.) seems impossible? Let's see who can do it best during dinner. Of course, you won't have to wait too long for a forbidden word to be uttered. And it shouldn't be just one player who gets nailed!
4. Reindeer snack
Take some old socks and ask your children to make reindeer out of them. Give them red pom-poms for the nose, brown kennel thread for the antlers, movable eyes (or felt pens to draw them themselves) and of course, fabric glue. After this manual activity, ask them to thread their creation onto their hand, like a puppet. Meanwhile, place all sorts of tasty Christmas treats in a container. The aim of the game is for your reindeer lover to catch as many as possible in less than a minute. The winner is the one who collects the most. But with a sock, or rather a reindeer for a hand, it's a lot less easy (and more fun).
5. Santa's hat
At the dinner table, the whole family wears a Santa hat, including you. And anyone who takes his off before you take yours off loses. Except that as the dinner progresses, your elves will quickly focus more on the food than on your hat, so you take the opportunity to remove it discreetly. The players will gradually realise this and imitate you. The last one wearing his hat loses!
6. Christmas Dancefloor
At nightfall, take advantage of the Christmas lights on your tree and/or in your living room to turn off the lights and turn the room into a dancefloor. You can stick to the Christmas theme by playing a dedicated playlist or let them go wild with their favourite music.
7. The Secret Santa
On Christmas Eve, before Santa comes to put the (real) presents under the tree, you can give yourself a fun foretaste by organising a Secret Santa. If you're interested, you'll have to arrange it a few days in advance, so that everyone can draw the name of a family member. The name written on the paper is the one for whom the person should prepare a gift. You can decide that each gift must be made yourself (a drawing, a biscuit, a knitted scarf, a candle, a pearl necklace, etc.) or bought but limit the budget to 5 euros for example. The aim of the game is not to break the piggy bank but to be creative in trying to please the other person!
8. Christmas Pictionary
Same principle as the classic Pictionary except that it is based on the theme of Christmas by writing down words such as log, gift, Santa, tree, hood, etc. on pieces of paper. Form two teams, one player from each team pulls out a piece of paper and draws what he has written on it to try and get his team to guess it in less than a minute. If no one finds it, the other team can answer and take over.
9. Post-it game: which Christmas character am I?
In the same vein, the Christmas version of the post-it game should also produce a good mood break between the turkey and the log for example. How does it work? Each player has a post-it note stuck to his forehead on which is written a character reminiscent of Christmas (Rudolph, Santa Claus, an elf, the Grinch, the bogeyman...) and must guess which one it is by asking questions.
10. The Christmas maze
Buy as many balls of wool as there are children and attach a small present to each one. Choose different colours. Hide your present somewhere in the house and unroll the ball of wool, passing it around the house. Repeat the maze for each ball. All they have to do is follow the thread until it leads them to their present! Tip: Tie a pencil to the other end of the ball so that they can wrap the string around it as they go without getting tangled.
