November 10th, 2008 by Administrator

Everyone’s played this game at one time or another, but it goes by many names. It’s called Christmas Grinch, Yankee Swap, White Elephant, Dirty Santa… and many more. But no matter what you call it, it’s definitely the most popular of all the Christmas party games because it’s great for anonymous gift exchanges at office parties or at school. Here are the unnofficial “official” rules for playing this game that goes by so many names.

Everyone playing the game brings a wrapped gift so that all of the gifts are anonymous and you don’t know what’s inside. Place gifts together in one spot.
The host writes numbers on pieces of paper for every gift and places them in a basket, hat or bowl.
Each person draws a number.
The person with #1 picks a gift to open from the batch.
The person with #2 can choose to open another package or steal the gift #1.
If a gift is stolen, the person who had it then steals from someone else or picks another gift to open.
The game continues like this until everyone takes a turn opening or stealing a gift.
The last person to go can steal from anyone in the game or open the remaining gift.
Once a gift is stolen three times, it is retired from the game.