My Secret Santas

At Christmas time my team does a Secret Santa. I put the names of everyone who wants to participate in a hat, and everyone is allocated their Secret Santa recipient. We keep it secret until our team Christmas dinner, when we open our gifts and have a guess who we think our Secret Santa is. In the few weeks before the dinner we also send our Secret Santa recipient a card. Because I allocate all the names, the only one who it isn't a secret for is me. I thought I had it all organised (no mean feat, since we had nearly 30 participants!), but then imagine my shock when I received 2 cards in the mail, both signed "Secret Santa"! I thought I had really mucked it up, and was trying to think how it had happened and what on earth I could do about it. Then the next day, I received 2 more, and then 3 the next day. By this time I knew something fishy was going on. Without me knowing, my lovely team of wonderful ladies had joined forces to shower me with Secret Santa greetings. In the midst of renovation chaos, it was the nicest 2 weeks of mail that I have ever received! Each card was an absolute work of art.
Here they are, gracing my lounge room:
Each one had a cryptic message inside. I LOVE this one, Serial Killer style! On the night of our Christmas dinner they came clean, and told me how they had co-ordinated it (with Robyn P the brains behind the scheme). I feel so lucky to be part of such a thoughtful, generous, clever and talented group of ladies :o)

The Secret Santa gifts themselves were a sight to behold. The emphasis is on the packaging, rather than the actual gift (although the gift of Stampin' Up! goodies is easy to appreciate too!). Everyone took this to heart and went to SO much effort to make their gift packaging special. I have never seen so many gorgeous boxes, bags and containers. It was amazing. It was also so much fun making a gift for someone that you KNEW would appreciate the time and thought that had gone into it :o)
I received the most amazing handmade bag from Sarah, in Baja Breeze and Chocolate Chip (my favourites!). She had also made little tins and boxes inside, all exquisitely decorated, and even some handmade jewellery made form Stampin' Up! buttons. Also a gorgeous decorated Cookie tin, filled with homemade cookies! You can see the bag on the right and the cookie tin on the left. It was one of the most memorable gifts I have ever received.

This is what's under my Christmas tree at the moment, all from lovely team members.The kids are a bit distressed that there's nothing under there for them yet. Until the floors are done on Monday and Tuesday, I can't really wrap anything, as we'll be shuffling things all over the house. I think I'll be doing a marathon wrapping session in the wee hours of Christmas Eve!