It’s the 5th annual 12 Days of Christmas Swap, and its the first one where Simone has handed it over to me completely to take the reigns – I am beyond excited and so happy to take this over from my bestie – thank you for entrusting me with this – I feel honoured~

So…….Do YOU love gifts as much as I do? If so, then this one is definitely for you!

If this is your first year, you in for a fun ride! If at any time you need a little inspiration, why not look at some of the giftees’ experience of our previous 12 Days of Christmas Swap by using the official hashtag : #12DaysofChristmasSwap to get yourself super excited. Most of the us created a highlight reel on Instagram with every day’s gift and experience – so feel free to do that too – if you want to.

CHRISTMAS THEME

Last year’s Christmas theme was GRATITUDE, and we tried to incorporate this throughout our gifts.

This year’s theme is GIVING.

There is no better feeling than “GIVING” especially to someone who is in need especially during the festive period.

We open our hearts to GIVE – and when we give and accept gratefully, everyone is blessed. GIVING gifts, love, food, memories and joy is the true joy of this season – and so fit for this years theme.

HOW IT WORKS:

The idea behind the 12 Days of Christmas Swap is that you send the person you’re paired up with 12 gifts to open on the 12 days leading up to Christmas day. In return, they do the same for you. It’s NOT to out-do anyone, but to show genuine love and gratefulness for new friends.

If you’ve never participated in a Christmas swap before, here’s how it goes:

1. You fill out your information the handy sign-up button below.
2. We use the information you provided to match you up with another who has also signed up
3. Get to know your new pal (stalk their blog/social media, email them questions, etc.)
4. You each pick out 12 fun gifts (within the allowed price range) that you think the other person would like
5. Wrap the gifts (whether or not you number them is up to you)
6. Send each other the gifts all at once
7. You each open one gift every day in the 12 days leading up to Christmas
8. Post about your gifts/experience/new friend on your blog or social media.

WHO CAN SIGN UP:

• Anyone with a public blogs or social media accounts (even if you have an active insta-account (business or personal) that is public and you’d like to get involved)
• People located within South Africa

IMPORTANT DATES TO REMEMBER

• Sign-Ups: November 7th – November 15th
• Partners Matched by: November 18th
• Packages Mailed by: December 3rd (They must receive their gift packages BEFORE December 12th)
• Start Opening Gifts: December 13th till 24th Dec
• Post About Experience: Every day you open a gift, (or if you have a blog, create one specifically dedicated to this whole experience.) Please remember to create a highlight reel so others can go back and see all 12 days.

12 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS SWAP RULES

Here are the rules you need to abide by when swapping:

Follow through!
If you sign up, you need to follow through and send off the gifts. It isn’t fair for your partner to put in the effort of sending to you, and then receive nothing in return. Please please please follow through.

YOUR PACKAGE:

You must send 12 wrapped gifts to your partner.
How you wrap them is entirely up to you; you can go all out or just wrap them up in newspaper. No judgement here. They just need to all be a surprise so that they can be opened on 12 different days without spoiling it.

Your complete package should not exceed R500 cost before courier.
The reason for the cost limit is so that we don’t have one partner who goes all out with her gift, and another who might not be able to afford to, and then a disparity in gift quality that leaves one or both feeling badly. But it’s NOT about how much money you spend either. Try to keep your gifts inexpensive. (R500 divided by 12 gifts, averages about R40-odd a gift) You can cut your cost by:

• Shopping sales.
• Handmaking some of the gifts.
• Regifting (gifts need to be new or like-new, nothing old and gross)

SHIPPING RULES

Your package must be shipped out by December 3rd.
They need to have the package in hand before December 12th so they can start opening gifts on time. You should courier earlier if you think it’ll take longer with regular shipping, or use a faster method of shipping. I recommend that you just put all gifts into one Aramex bag (from PicknPay or Checkers) that courier overnight.  It’s the easiest and has no weight limit. Postnet also offers great rates. If you live close enough to your partner, why not arrange to meet up?

You MUST provide a tracking number if shipping.
I cannot stress this enough. As soon as you ship out your gift package, you need to send the tracking number to both your partner and to myself so we know that it will be arriving and can watch out for it. This also helps us make sure that there is follow through so someone isn’t left without. Again, those amazing flat-rate Aramex bags include this, so I recommend them.

POST ABOUT YOUR SWAP

You need to post about your swap somewhere publicly.
You can blog about it, or you can post to your Twitter/Facebook/Instagram/Tik Tok, etc. It just needs to be posted somewhere publicly. Please tag your gifter. This is just a nice way to show your gratitude and share what your partner got you. It also allows you to give your followers a little introduction to your partner and you both get more exposure in each other’s world.

Most importantly; Have fun and be kind!

All my love, Mama N xxx

SIGN UP HERE: