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Let me start off by confessing that my title is slightly misleading. This holiday service idea is not actually TWELVE days of Christmas, but SIX days of Christmas. Of course you can do as many as you like, but 6 days of deliveries is plenty for me, thank you. And it’s half of 12, so it made sense in my brain. So here’s an idea to get the whole family involved, thinking less about all the things they want, and more about the true spirit of Christmas. And really, I can almost promise you, you’re gonna have a ton of fun along the way.

So the idea here is you pick a family that might need a little pick-me-up this holiday season for whatever reason. Maybe they’re struggling financially, maybe they’ve been through some major health challenges recently, maybe they’ve lost a member of their family this year, or maybe you just feel like for some unknown reason you want to show them some extra love. Then you’ll want to pick 6 (or however many nights you are doing) nights in a row that work for you and drop of secret deliveries each night. I don’t think it has to be the 6 (or 12) days leading up to Christmas. I think any 6 nights in December works- but I do think it works best if they’re consecutive nights. I’ll share the deliveries we did to get you thinking, but of course you can alter and tweak these however you’d like!

Night One: Family Movie Night Gift Basket

I made tags (after the fact) to go along with these so now there’s a cute little (free) printable to go along with each of these nights to make it even easier for you. Our tag for the first night said,

“on the first day of Christmas, my good friends gave to me: family movie night next to the tree”

In the movie night gift basket we included things like: a cozy blanket, a Christmas movie, some movie treats (like popcorn and theatre candy), hot cocoa, marshmallows, candy canes etc.

Each night we would make a stealthy delivery of the gift basket, leaving it on the porch, ringing the doorbell and sprinting away. It was definitely the kids favorite part. And sure, they probably saw us at some point (or multiple points). But we kept pretending they didn’t. (I don’t think they figured out who it was by the way, so we were at least kind of sneaky). Another idea is to make several of the same basket (say 5 movie night baskets) and drop them all of in one night to 5 different families.

Night Two: Stocking Surprises

For the second night we went to the dollar store and got those little stockings that come in a 2 pack so we had enough for each kid in the family. Then we just filled them with a few items based on what we knew about the kids. The stockings are tiny so they are easy to fill up, just a few items is all it takes. The tag for that night read:

On the second day of Christmas, my good friends gave to me: stockings full of jubilee.

We picked out a piece of candy for each of them, and then a little fun item or two. I think we got some chapsticks and nail polish for the tween/teen girls, a toy for the toddler and a stress ball for the older boy. I had my kids pick what to get each of them. Then I put all of the stockings into a little sled container thing I found at the dollar store (that is the best place to get baskets and containers for this project), added a few more treats in there for all of them to share and that was it!

Night Three: Family Gingerbread Contest

For the third night we just got a couple of those gingerbread house kits, I tied them together with some curling ribbon and we added the tag. The tag read-

On the third day of Christmas, my good friends gave to me: a gingerbread contest with the family.

Gingerbread contests are a core part of our family Christmas tradition, so we were hoping they would have fun with that as well. And the kits make it so easy. I didn’t get a picture though- sorry!

Night Four: Dinner

For our fourth night we dropped off a basket with paper goods and a gift card for our local pizza place. You could drop off a home cooked meal, get take out and drop it off, have something door dashed, leave a door dash gift card… so many options. I added a little chocolate and some fun Christmas napkins to make the basket look a little more festive. The tag for this night read:

On the fourth day of Christmas, my good friends gave to me: dinner for a night off, yippee!

Night Five: Family Game Night

For the fifth night we dropped off a little family game night bundle. Again, I got the container from the dollar store and we put a couple games (farkle and throw throw burrito– do you know these games? They are such great family games). And then I added a couple cookie mixes so they could make some cookies to go along with their game night. What’s a family game night without hot fresh cookies?! In our house it’s a must. The tag for this night read-

On the fifth day of Christmas, my good friend gave to me: family game night with shouts of glee!

I’m getting pretty good at rhyming with the word “me” at this point in the process… 😉

Night Six (last night): Christmas Treats

On the last night we shared an abundance of our favorite family Christmas treats in a fun little container. We did our massive baking weekend where I did a x8 batch of my thumbprint cookies a x4 batch of my sugar cookies, 4 batches of fudge…and I don’t even know what else. And packaged up a bit of everything for the final night. The tag for that night read-

On the last day of Christmas, my good friends gave to me: Treats to enjoy, so yummy!

I put “last” on the tag so they knew it would be the last delivery. And as you can see you can keep going with this and do the full 12 days if you feel so inclined- or as many as you would like. I left a few blank tags that you could fill in with whatever you’d like to do. You can open them in canva and add text or just print them out and write in what you want. You can download the free tags by entering your email below:

I hope this can help bring the holiday spirit into your home and family this year. It’s a constant struggle to try and teach my kids to think of others instead of all about “me me me”. Let’s be honest, it’s even a struggle as an adult! So here’s one way to create those special family memories while showing some love to others in need along the way. And yes, there may be grumbling, fighting over who gets to ring the doorbell, and complaining about this or that. Don’t let that discourage you, you’ve got this mama! And if you’re looking for more ways to bring service into your Christmas, check out this post.