Difficult Christmas dilemma.

We love "Who's in the Bag" at our family parties. Players are split into teams and have to guess the famous person by clues given by the team member who picked a name from the bag. It's suitable for all ages from 8yrs. upwards. Amazon stock it.

We had a power cut one year at Christmas and played charades by candlelight. I've never really liked playing charades but that night goes down as one of my favourite Christmas's ever. I think the fact that it was by candlelight made me feel less self concious doing it.

A home-made version of Pictionary including things the children will know.

(Two teams - or more, within each team take turns being the drawer and the guessers. Each card has a word on that the person has to communicate to the rest of their team by drawing it.
Could use a timer - the boxed set has a timer like an egg-timer. It also has a board but you can just score the points.) (Or buy the box set and have a child paired with each adult to help one another)

My GC (ranging from 6 to 22) love charades and are very good at it. They simply cannot forger my interpretation of Tom and Jerry. And I can't live it down. You might choose a limited range of characters - say, from Disney films which the children will probably know better than you do.

You can get printable pictures on line for Pin the Tail on the Donkey, or for Christmas I found one for the Nose on Rudolph. I used double side sticky tape or Blutac rather than pins.

I like the sound of that susied - I can see a new game for this Christmas

goldengirl - if there are young children around and most of the adults are agile, another great game (that my children, GC and family have played) is called Jailer's Keys. Sit everyone in a circle with one person sitting on a dining/kitchen chair in the middle of the circle - that person is the jailer. The jailer places a large bunch of keys under his chair and promptly goes to sleep clutching a torch (still sitting on the chair). Dim the lights (or turn them off) and each person has to try and steal the jailer's keys without 'waking' him up. If he is woken up, he shines his torch in the direction of the noise and if the beam of light hits someone, that person is out. If (and it's a big if) someone gets the keys, they also have to make it back to their place unheard. I've also played that with various Beaver Scouts/Cub Scouts, Big Scouts and youth groups and they all loved it.

Another one we used to love was Dingbats - not sure if you can still get that. We played that coming over here on the boat (4 and a half very long hours) 20+ years ago and I'm ashamed to say our laughs and groans could be heard quite some distance from where we were sitting

My family love the Name Game.
everyone is given a piece of a paper and they write the names of about 10 famous people on strips of paper which they tear off, fold and put in a bowl. Can be absolutely anyone, living dead, fictional etc but it should be people others have heard of. You do this bit individually without showing anyone else.
everyone is then divided into 2 teams could be men v women or a mix of ages in each team. you need a stop clock or timer - most people have one on their phones- teams take turn to have a go - the first person in the team holds the bowl of names and takes out one of the names and then describes the person to their team e.g. male, tennis player, scottish, their team try to guess the name on the paper as quick as possible. (other team keep quiet)
when they guess a name that team keeps the piece of paper. the person continues to describe as many people as they can in 1 minute. if they don't know a name or their team doesn't guess it they chuck the name back in the bowl. Then its the next teams turn, each member of each team has to take a turn to describe. winner is the team with the most names guessed. You can do further rounds put names back in the bowl then you can only use 3 worlds to describe the person, another round, can't use any words just use actions , (hilarious - you try acting out Andy Murray or Donald Duck etc)

this all sounds a bit complicated but its really easy once you get the hang of it.

I loathe games but there are some brilliant ideas here I'm actually tempted to try this Christmas - better than telly watching!

I love that one Gagagran thankyou

Wink murder is a good one for mixed age groups. One person is appointed as the detective and leaves the room. You have playing cards equalling the number left in the room, including the ace of spades and everyone draws a card unseen. The person who gets the ace of spades is the murderer.

The detective comes back in and watches the circle closely. The murderer winks at a victim, trying not to be seen by the detectives and that person "dies" - can be as dramatically as s/he likes - kids love that bit! The detective has three goes at guessing who the murderer is. Each person can have a turn at being the detective but the murderer is appointed by drawing the ace of spades.

Thanks for lots of interesting ideas I've 'watched' the thread so I don't lose it .
A bit of planning ahead and I hope the evening will turn out to be fun and light hearted we've all had enough of doom and gloom this year to last a lifetime.. I just hope that my effort at trying to normalise an evening together will be well received as some of the grands have been at each others throats at times.. its a difficult time for them all and even though some of them are in their 20's now its not easy to deal with the breakup of your parents even when you are an adult.

Thankyou ladies.

Games:

1. write names of famous people (bearing in mind that there are 10 year olds) on pieces of paper (or you could use small pictures of animals) and stick them to the foreheads of people playing the game. Each person asks a question to try and identify who (or what) they are but others can only answer yes or no. It's probably a good idea to limit the number of questions that can be asked.

2. Give each person a rectangular piece of paper and ask them to ensure that others cannot see their sheet of paper. Ask them to draw a head and neck of their choosing on the sheet then fold over (a couple of times) the drawing leaving only the 'two sticks' of the neck. Pass the drawings to the left or right and the next person draws the abdomonen. Fold and pass again and next is drawn the thigh to knee area. Fold and pass again for the lower legs to be drawn. Pass again and reveal the 'creatures' that have been created (children tend to like that one).

3. If you like crossword-type games, think of well known carols or festive songs and give them crossword clues, such as 'unbroken nocturnal quiet' would be 'Silent Night' (sorry, I'm not very good at crosswords but I hope that gives you an idea of what I mean). People can play on their own or in teams.

There are many murder mystery games where you can all play sleuth for the evening and I don't think they're that expensive.

Agus we play the same game except we stick post it notes to foreheads. Good for a small house as can be played sitting down.

Last year DD brought 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire' dvd with her which, we played in two teams of mixed ages and sexes. It works well as what DH and I didn't know the children did and vice versa.
We also like "I put in my suitcase"

Player 1 I put in my suitcase an apple
Player 2 " " " " an apple and a ball
Player3 " " "an apple, a ball and a cushion
and so on, the dafter the object i.e. jumbo jet. The more fun.

Silly games on Christmas night is the best bit for me

You could do a pub type quiz. Ask everyone to bring 10 questions, ( and answers) you could give out a list of topics like, TV , history, general knowledge, Disney films or whatever that person is interested in, or you could just get a family quiz book. Teams of about 3-4 people. The quiz can be as long or short as you like. There can be a small prize for winning team. If people bring their own questions it is usually better as that person asks the questions for that round but can't do the answers for that bit of course, and then goes through the answers, means you don't have to have one quizmaster and everyone can take part.

I love the way you seem to be tackling a tricky situation - a night of family fun sounds like just what you all will need - and in the spirit of the season!

Game suggestion: a tray of many miscellaneous objects. Players have a paper/pen each. They have one minute to observe everything on the tray and can only begin writing them down once the tray is covered. Winner is the one who names the most objects.

Also "Pass the Orange". Players divide into two teams and have to pass an orange from one team member to another without using hands. First team to get to the end wins.

Have fun!

Just what I was thinking roses!

We inherited a Devil Among the Tailors set that DFiL had made when his boys were young and it comes out every Christmas (not much help to you but it made me think!) We play Shove Ha'penny which doesn't need any special equipment. And a Beetle Drive can be good fun although you might have to buy a couple of sets for that many people. Twister is good too - for younger people!!

Enjoy!

Can't help with ideas I'm afraid tanith but hope you manage to have a fun evening, what a shame this has happened within your family.

I enjoy 'name the character'. Famous names are put on a piece of paper and pinned to each other's back. You then have to ask for any type of clue as to who your character is.

'Pass the Bomb' is a great game, and not very expensive. It involves having to come up with a word with certain letters in it while holding the ticking bomb and trying to pass it on before it goes off. Should be fine with 10 year old and as adults we have had a lot of fun. Cranium is good too. We used to play the 'memory game' whereby random objects were placed on a tray and put on show with say 1 minutes to memorise the contents. Then cloth thrown over it and tray removed from room and everyone given 2 minutes to write down as many objects as they can remember.All it needs is paper and pencil and a tray. Hope these suggestions have been useful.

This requires a bit of preparation, but we have sometimes played our own version of "Call my Bluff" - a game where a team each gives a different definition of an obscure word and the other team has to guess which is genuine. There is a website of obscure words and some are hilarious. And it helps if you make your definitions as funny as you can.

We have fun in the preceding weeks preparing the words and definitions.