Christmas Around The World

We did this theme last year and our ward loved it.  We live in a very diverse area, and our ward members are from all around the world or have lived all around the world.  So we thought it would be neat to have ward members decorate a table with items they have from around the world.  The decorations ranged from small flags and books, to dolls and other toys, to Christmas decorations they collected while living or visiting there, etc.

For dinner that night we had ward members sign up to bring a main dish or a dessert from a certain country.  We had enchiladas from Mexico, Lumpia from the Phillipines, Shepherd's Pie from the UK, Red Cabbage from Germany,as well as great desserts - crepes from France, Swiss cookies, etc.

We also had a sing along from the Reader's Digest Christmas song book.  We sang 4 or 5 different songs from different countries, like "Bring A Torch Jeanette Isabella" from France, "Christmas in Killarny" from Scotland, "O Tannembaum" from Germany, etc.  We had a flute, violin, and piano play along.  We had a missionary in our ward at the time from Hungary so he got up and sang a Christmas song in Hungarian.

A sister in our ward from Spain even made a piñata for the kids at the end of the night!

Away in a Manger Idea

For this Ward Christmas Party idea, we took the title for a simple hymn "Away in a Manger" and followed that theme through the night.

We wanted to make the dinner delicious but something simple for our ward members to contribute.  So we had "bars" - salad bar, soup bar, baked potato bar, dessert bar, and everyone's favorite - the hot chocolate bar.  We just asked everyone to contribute either a soup, a dessert, or to cook up some baked potatoes, and the ward provided the salad, the toppings to the baked potatoes, and the hot chocolate.  We set up long rows of tables and as everyone arrived they placed their food on their designated table.  Everyone enjoyed the meal, and it put less pressure on everyone to prepare, but it made it feel less like a pot luck and more like a nicer meal.  Plus who doesn't like warm soup and hot chocolate on a cold night?

This year we are going to follow this theme again, and one thing we will add is a Nativity Room, probably the Relief Society Room.  We will have reverent Mormon Tabernacle Christmas music playing, and ask the members of our ward to bring their nativities to display in there.

For our presentation, we had the Primary children act out the story of Christ's birth, read straight from the scriptures.  When a hymn would fit in the story, we would have the congregation sing one verse of the hymn, which was all typed up and on each table.  To view the play, click here.  Our ward's favorite part was the three Sunbeams we had as the Wise Men.

How The Grinch Stole Christmas Idea #2

This Christmas party idea is similar to the first Grinch idea I posted, but just slightly different.  For the first idea, click here.  The play used the same script but adapted it a little to fit their ward party better.  Here are the links to their play:

Part 1

Part 2

Another difference is that for their spiritual message, they played President Uchtdorf's Christmas Devotional talk on a screen in the gym before dinner, which I think is a nice touch..  For a link to the talk, click here.