White Elephant!

What do you get when you combine half a liquor store, enough food to feed an army, presents marked with 'adult exchange' and family?  A very fun, loud, family Christmas party, of course!

This Christmas Dustin and I are in Idaho celebrating with his family.  One of their traditions is a Christmas Eve White Elephant gift exchange party!  Now, I'm not exactly sure how the term 'White Elephant' came around (if you're really curious you can check here), but I don't think the origin is important to have fun and be entertained.  All you need know is to show up with a present in hand, following whatever price guidelines were set out, and be prepared to fight for a good gift!

Among the lot of gifts this year were a popcorn machine (think carnival style, not just your everyday counter top model), a ceramic frog and caramel corn, Parcheesi (which I've informed Dustin we MUST play before we go home) along with an Idaho $1,000,000 raffle ticket, a Bob Marley table lamp, $50 QVC gift card with Margarita Mix, Eddie Bauer blanket, Spinning Beer Pong game with all the bells and whistles, Bucket 'o Beer, remote control helicopter, baking supplies, pint glasses and shot glasses, huckleberry vodka, and a roulette game with hidden shots inside.

Now I'm not sure how this type of gift exchange plays out at other family gatherings, but ours always includes stealing, yelling, hiding, bribing, persuading, deal making and after-game trading.  All in all I'm pretty sure that everyone got something they wanted; Kevin and Saydee took home the popcorn machine for their basement, Grandma Barbar gets the cute ceramic frog, Jesse is the proud new owner of the beer bucket, Jimmy slyly ended up with the Bob Marley lamp, and Shayla and Rob took the remote control helicopter and roulette.  More importantly we were all entertained!

I'm so excited that we were able to be here this year to see his family and celebrate with them.  It would have been perfect if Didi and Barbar could have been here, along with the rest of the family, too!





...and stay tuned to see if Dustin wins the $1,000,000 on December 30th!  ;)